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A review of hundreds of Facebook patent applications since 2012 reveals that the company has considered following almost every aspect of the lives of its users: where are you, with whom you spend time, if you in a relationship, the brands you use and the politicians you follow. The company even tried to patent a method to predict when its users will die.
One of them describes the use of forward – facing cameras to analyze expressions and detect if you are bored or surprised by what you see on your wall. Another is considering the use of the phone's microphone to determine which TV program the user is watching. Others imagine systems to guess if you will soon get married, predict your socioeconomic status and find out how much you sleep, says the New York Times.
Facebook has repeatedly stated that its patent applications should not be considered as indications of future product plans. "Most of the technologies described in these patents have not been included in any of our products, and will never be included," said Allen Lo, Vice President and Deputy Legal Director of Facebook and Head of Intellectual Property. the society.
Taken together, Facebook's patents testify to a commitment to collect personal information, despite widespread public criticism of the company's privacy policies and the CEO's promise of "l & # 39; 39; improve ".
"A patent portfolio is a map of how a company thinks its technology is changing," says Jason M. Schultz, a law professor at the New York University in the New York Times. Here are seven Facebook patent applications that show how the company has considered the collection and exploitation of the personal information of its users:
Reading Your Relationships
A Patent Application Analyzes the Prediction of Knowledge if you will be in a romantic relationship using information such as the number of times you visit another user's page, the number of people in your profile picture and the percentage of friends in your relationship. a different sex
Classify your personality
Another proposes to use your messages and messages to deduce personality traits. Judge your degree of extroversion, openness, or emotional stability, then use these features to select news or advertisements to display.
Predicting Your Future
This patent application describes the use of your publications and messages, in addition to transactions and the location of your credit card, to predict when an event is likely to occur. likely to happen significant life, such as birth, death or graduation.
Identifying Your Camera
Another analysis of the image involves creating a unique "signature" of the camera using defective pixels or lens stripes. This signature could be used to find out if you know anyone who downloads images taken on his device, even if they were not already connected. Or it can be used to guess "affinity" between the user and a friend, depending on how often they use the same camera.
Listening to Your Environment
This patent application explores the use of your phone's microphone to identify the TV shows you are watching and whether the commercials have been silenced. It also proposes to use the electrical interference pattern created by your TV's power cord to guess what program is being played.
Tracking Your Routine
Another patent application analyzes the tracking of your weekly routine and sends notifications to other users of deviations from the routine. In addition, he describes the use of the location of his phone in the middle of the night to establish where he lives.
Deduce your habits
This patent proposes to correlate the location of your phone with that of the phones of your friends to deduce with whom you frequent most frequently. It also offers monitoring when the phone is stopped to find out how many hours the user sleeps
In some cases, companies are presenting their patents to beat their rivals with new technology, even if they do not. Do not Have the Intent to Use Although this may be the case with some Facebook patents, many of them are considering new ways to collect, analyze and analyze. Use personal information and group it for advertisers, an essential process for the business model of the company. In the first quarter of 2018, nearly 99% of Facebook's revenues came from advertising.
While Facebook continues to collect personal information, we need to be cautious so that they can be used for more insidious purposes than targeted advertising, such as influencing elections or manipulating the emotions of users, says Jennifer King , Director of Privacy. Internet and Society Center at Stanford Law School. "There could be real consequences," he said.
Other technology companies have also filed disturbing patent applications. They include Amazon bracelets for tracking store employees and the Google plush bear equipped with a camera and a microphone. But with over 2 billion active monthly users, most of whom share their thoughts and feelings on the platform, Facebook is accumulating our personal data on an unprecedented scale. That will probably not change, said Siva Vaidhyanathan, a professor of media studies at the University of Virginia. "I have not seen any signs that Facebook has changed its commitment to observe everything we do, to record everything we do and to exploit everything we do," he says.
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