
Facebook will show ads to non-Facebook users on other websites - ApplePolisher
http://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-wants-to-help-sell-every-ad-on-the-web-1464321603
======
weinzierl
> Users with a Facebook account can opt-out of the ad scheme by adjusting
> their settings, while non-Facebook members can opt-out through the Digital
> Advertising Alliance in the US, the Digital Advertising Alliance in Canada,
> and the European Interactive Digital Advertising Alliance in Europe.

...or by using a wide-spectrum blocker like uBlock Origin, and for the cookie
warning problem there is a solution too: "EU: Prebake - Filter Obtrusive
Cookie Notices"[1]

[1]
[https://raw.githubusercontent.com/liamja/Prebake/master/obtr...](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/liamja/Prebake/master/obtrusive.txt)

~~~
ljk
Also use extensions like NoScript/Privacy Badger to block the background
scripts

~~~
JTon
I enjoy using NoScript but I found I could not recommend it to non-techie
friends, as it requires a lot of manual input to not break webpages. Is
Privacy Badger more user friendly?

~~~
guelo
NoScript really needs a black-list mode powered by a community-curated filter
similar to adblock filters.

~~~
RileyKyeden
How is a NoScript with community filters different from uBlock/AdBlock? It
would be vulnerable to the same profit-driven whitelisting AdBlock does.

~~~
ljk
It would be the same i think; If NoScript pulled the same thing AdBlock Plus
did there would be a new app taking its place(like how uBlock Origin did)

------
dzek69
It did years ago :) When i didn't had account they already know my name, mail,
telephone number, because some idiots gave them their mails login & passwords,
allowing FB to read all contacts.

I wasn't on Facebook, yet in the "hey, join FB" message they listed 6 of
"people I know that are already of Facebook".

So imagine how much data they got about me: 1) No account on FB 2) But FB
tracked me with their cookies on almost every page, because almost every page
has some FB widget (fanpage box, like buttons etc) 3) They know "some-random-
guy-9348239849" likes to browse pages A, B, C, D, which means he likes AA, AB,
BA, BB, BC, CA, DA activities 4) Then people start giving away "their" data
about me. A lot of them did, so FB could connect who I know, and their
connections with each other. 5) So FB got "my-name-PERSONAL_DATA", not
associated with the data from point 3. 6) I got that message 7) If I'd click
the welcoming link, then I wouldn't even need to register - FB then could
connect that "some-random-guy" data with "my-name" data.

This probably goes even deeper, but we just don't know that.

Facebook with that message told me way too much about how much they know about
unregistered users, I bet they don't do this anymore :)

~~~
csydas
Yep, what you're describing is what I believe is called "Shadow Profiles", and
they've been unapologetically doing it for years. Very likely, even if you
have all the privacy extensions and jsblockers installed on your computer, or
even if you go full RMS and only wget once a day to get your daily content and
email, odds are Facebook has a full profile on you because of the people in
your life who leak the information about you.

Your folks filling out a form on Facebook saying that they have X children,
your friends sharing their contact list with LinkedIn/Google/Facebook and
you're on it, your workplace profile being crawled, and so on. Unless you go
full on hermit, there's really no way to not be part of Facebook either
actively as a user or passively as a shadow profile.

Exfiltrating this data, or even so much as seeing the entirety of it also
appears to not be possible to see what bits of your information have been
gathered, to know who has access to it, to know what it's being used for, or
even to deny them the ability to make profit on this information. It's
incredibly frustrating, as if any individual citizen were to do this sort of
reconnaissance and data gathering on another citizen, it'd be called stalking,
and people would have legal means to redress. But the fact that even those who
have not agreed to the Facebook TOS are still profiled and sold and used for
profit without the aforementioned persons' consent seems very wrong.

------
eknkc
Surprised they weren't doing that already. Facebook has javascript injected on
a lot of sites, always assumed that they'd collect a shit ton of data whether
you are a user or not.

Also, all ad blockers block google analytics like tracking services but social
plugins are generally opt in. I guess they should be blocked by default too.

~~~
sdoering
I know a lot of AdBlocking Tools/List that do not block Google Analytics or
Adobe Analytics by default.

Do you know the ones that do?

~~~
bballer
Just to add to the others comments, get NoScript and you can control exactly
who gets to run Javascript at all times. It makes the internet so much safer
and you will be blown away at how many domains some sites are trying to run
scripts from.

~~~
tunap
Gotta 2nd NoScript for blocking all detritus from wasting my data caps & cpu
cycles, although the default white-list needs much purging out of the box.

For added goodness, I also run the Blender Add-On[1] for the sites I do allow
on occasion. I value my privacy <b>MORE</b> than the marketeers do.

[1][https://github.com/meh/blender](https://github.com/meh/blender)

------
vthallam
This is really a big thing since it directly affects the Google cash
cow(Adwords/Doubleclick). Facebook has all the data in the world about a
user(location, personal details, current mood) which google lacks and so they
can target users on the rest of the internet in a better way.

~~~
EGreg
Google has all their internet searches

~~~
asimuvPR
People use Facebook to search, too. Not only standard Web search, but search
with whatever context they were doing or talking about. I don't know how
Google would have that data without having a widely adopted social network.

~~~
newscracker
From whatever I have seen over the years (including the present moment),
Facebook is light years behind Google in searching for stuff and getting all
the relevant results within Facebook. I can't help but be very amused at the
thought of Facebook being able to search the web well. :)

To me (and my searches on Facebook) it has always appeared that Facebook
search is a crippled and neglected product. It's so bad that I save important
information I see on Facebook elsewhere. Facebook is the place for the
ephemeral and constantly "new" stream of stuff to keep people clicking. So it
doesn't seem to have had any good reason to put competent people in search
related development so far.

~~~
asimuvPR
Yes, good points. Notice I meant people use Facebook for search. Not that
people use Facebook for Web search. You can't directly search for people on
google (to a degree), but you can do so in facebook (and other social
networks). Point being that search is bigger than the standard web. Google is
at and business disadvantage because it does not have a widely adopted social
network. :)

------
userbinator
_while non-Facebook members can opt-out through the Digital Advertising
Alliance in the US, the Digital Advertising Alliance in Canada, and the
European Interactive Digital Advertising Alliance in Europe._

Or you can just block all requests to their domains. I have *.facebook.com and
a few others blocked.

~~~
sdoering
wc -l /etc/hosts == 11846

About 90% are blocked sites. The rest is local (privat and business) dev
configuration.

~~~
pcora
serious question, doesn't having such a big hosts file affects performance
somehow?

~~~
gruez
The time it takes to scan a 10k line file (even if it's not cached in memory)
is much smaller than a round trip to your DNS server.

------
astazangasta
Again, I deplore the colossal waste of human effort and talent that is going
into building a sophisticated panopticon for the noble purpose of _better
targeted advertising_. For fuck's sake, what a waste of the best minds of our
generation.

~~~
deprave
Of course this comment was downvoted.

I really want to know what's the opposing view to this statement. Who's going
to step forward and say why they think this is wrong?

At the very least, make an argument like "the AI needed to trick a teenager
into spending half their awake time on Facebook can also be used to solve
actual problems."

~~~
kasey_junk
\- spam free, virtually limitless storage free email

\- free video delivery channel, that has created its own industry

\- communication tool that has changed news delivery & how people organize
protests

\- free chat communication (with e2e encryption) for nearly everyone in the
world (including some of the poorest)

\- on demand data center infrastructure at ridiculously low cost

\- instantly freely searchable data set of most of the worlds written
information

\- self driving cars

\- ubiquitous hand held computers

\- free easy to use video conferencing

\- a social network that connects a gigantic part of the planets population
(if you are into that sort of thing)

Just some of the mind boggling technology at least partially funded by
internet ads in the last 15 years.

Are there issues that have arisen? Of course, what sort of funding model
doesn't have downsides? Acting like working for pay from advertisers
constitutes some sort of modern Gallipoli is such a vacuous argument in the
face of the staggering amount of tech it has at least partly helped bring
about, I'm shocked that the comment hasn't been down voted more.

~~~
astazangasta
I deeply disagree with this on a level that will be difficult to capture in an
Internet comment, but I will try:

What you're describing is the advancement of technology, which has occurred at
the institutions that have accumulated the most power. Yes, Facebook, Google
and others have hired some of the most talented people in the country, and
these people have continued to produce useful technology while ensconced at
these companies. Previously the same people could be found at AT&T, Xerox
PARC, various DARPA-connected institutions, etc.

All you're describing is the shift in the center of power. In the 50s and 60s
it was the government. During the 70s, as power began to shift more and more
away from government towards private capital, we saw more and more
technologists moving into the employ of monopolists.

It is a mistake to confuse this transfer of power, and the corresponding
ability to purchase talent, with the output of that pool of smart people.
Moreover in Silicon Valley these people are deeply connected to a much broader
community of intellectuals (e.g. through HN) - I'd argue that this culture, of
which many members currently sojourn in the arms of large corporations like
Facebook, is the real productive unit.

Facebook found a money faucet and connected these people to it; but this money
faucet could have been anything. It could have been something of real social
value, except we have largely destroyed the mechanisms that direct
productivity on the basis of social values and now direct it purely based on
the interests of private capital, which is currently enamored with data
accumulation and targeted advertising.

I'll end here, but I'd also like to point out that a lot of the stuff you've
listed here existed long before Facebook and Google were a twinkle in anyone's
eye. You're taking things that were literally developed in the 60s and giving
credit to them for the private concentrations of power that were built on top
of that work.

~~~
kasey_junk
I was talking more about the idea that we've somehow wasted developer minds on
the pursuit of non-valuable advertising. Which clearly isn't the case.
Advertising might have paid for a part of it, but the benefits clearly exist.

I'll also stand by my argument that every model of financing these technical
improvements (at least that I can think of) have downsides. Compared to the
war machine of the 20th century, I find the ads pretty tame. Not to mention
that advertising is a lot less coercive than tax based defense spending or
government granted monopolies.

------
Bedon292
Begins? I though they were already tracking everyone who saw a Facebook badge
anywhere on the internet already. Or were they just trying to track the users
who were not logged in at the time?

~~~
AimHere
They WERE tracking you already. Now they're throwing ads at you.

------
slazaro
All the more reason to block their widgets on other websites, using something
like Ghostery or Disconnect.

~~~
Freak_NL
Another alternative is EFF's PrivacyBadger:

[https://www.eff.org/privacybadger](https://www.eff.org/privacybadger)

All this in addition to an ad-blocker (such as uBlock Origin) of course.

~~~
ymse
I prefer uMatrix[0] (by the uBlock author) which gives absolute control over
third (and first) party requests.

I don't even subscribe to the built-in Adblock filter because of my default-
deny rule. It also negates the need for Privacy Badger and similar.

See the screenshots for how it works (similar to, but more granular than,
uBlock advanced mode).

[https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix/wiki/Very-bare-
walkthroug...](https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix/wiki/Very-bare-walkthrough-
for-first-time-users)

[https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix/wiki/Examples-of-
useful-r...](https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix/wiki/Examples-of-useful-
rulesets)

0: [https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix](https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix)

------
andy_ppp
I'm seeing this now:

"To help personalize content, tailor and measure ads, and provide a safer
experience, we use cookies. By clicking or navigating the site, you agree to
allow our collection of information on and off Facebook through cookies. Learn
more, including about available controls: Cookies Policy."

Am I signing a contract with Facebook by clicking on their website. Is that
legal?

~~~
unlinker
That's the cookies warning that must be shown according to the law to all
European users on all websites that use cookies.

~~~
belorn
I have heard talks from one of the politician that wrote the directive , and
they did not view "continue browsing" as a valid method. They are however only
the writers of the directive, and they used the concept of "consent" as it was
stated in a different directive. The interpretation of that directive was
radically changed by most of the larger corporations as a direct reaction of
the cookie law, and none has yet to challenge it.

Tha politician was not very happy about the company lawyers change in
complying with the "explicit informed consent" requirement, as that is the
strongest from of consent that EU directives uses, and it basically is a
ticking time bomb until someone abuses this new interpretation. "continued
browsing of this website mean that you give a explicit informed consent that
you agree to buy our service" is a major concern that I got, but maybe we will
need such thing before it get thrown to the courts.

------
deadowl
There are entire companies built on tracking non-users around the internet.

------
joesmo
Will Mozilla finally make ad blocking the default or do we need yet another
organization that can stand up to corporate pressure and money going forward
to do so? That's my only question: who if anyone will bring a web browser to
market that blocks ads and thereby malware by default?

------
aorth
Super annoying and sleezy of Facebook, but basically they are doing what
Google already does with Analytics. Completely unsurprising.

Anyways, as a technically competent, privacy aware user, the first thing I do
on a new installation of Chrome or Firefox is disable third-party cookies,
install uBlock Origin and subscribe to a handful of third-party filter lists.
I also do this for my friends and family, though I am more conservative on
their installations.

------
DyslexicAtheist
this does the trick:
[https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts.git](https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts.git)

------
DKnoll3
France already pumped the brakes on Facebook using their position of power to
target non-users [http://thehackernews.com/2016/02/facebook-
france.html](http://thehackernews.com/2016/02/facebook-france.html),

I wonder where this will land them in the future with France, Brazil, or other
countries that aren't as "friendly" with FB as the United States.

------
iamgopal
Ads, Facebook and many a times google display network irritates me not because
they demands my attention, but they do it by tracking my behavior, and hence
usually shows me what I already know, used a million times, and can write
review of ten pages. They take away discover-ability of internet from me, and
I hate it.

------
Jemm
127.0.0.1 facebook.com

~~~
sp332
Unless you're running a server on localhost, you'll have to wait for the
connection to time out. Better to use 0.0.0.0 which is an invalid address and
will fail immediately.

~~~
drivers99
Wouldn't you get an immediate "connection refused" for localhost, not have to
wait for a timeout?

~~~
sp332
That's true on my phone but not my laptop. I would guess that most firewalls
would just drop the packets.

------
MrBra
Install Disconnect or Ghostery right now and spread the word.

------
cloudjacker
.... like every other company does?

------
nxzero
Surprised Facebook didn't by AddThis when it was up for sell; instead Oracle
did.

------
cdnsteve
So Google Adwords/Adsense. That would have saved a whole article.

------
callmeed
I _just_ added FB ads to an iOS app this morning. The app doesn't even use FB
login so I was suprised to see the sample ads were still very location-
specific and targeted. They've also got web/HTML tools for placing ads on a
domain.

------
ComodoHacker
So we must assume their shadow profiles are complete now.

------
quantum_nerd
Dear Facebook,

you can track me all over the net all you want. I am just not buying shit.

------
theoapps
Zero ethics

------
lucb1e
They have been doing this since forever and if I remember correctly, the EU
told them to stop. I don't remember if they really did stop (at least, I'm not
sure if they say they did, nobody knows what they really did of course).

/me opens article

Oh, it's about showing ads to non-users, not about tracking. The article
doesn't even claim they didn't track non-users before. Clickbait?

~~~
necessity
Didn't they also do this before? I remember installing Fanboy's Social
Annoyances List in my ad blocker years ago and never seeing those like buttons
and social media crap again.

------
perseusprime11
Facebook, please stop!

------
dang
Url changed from [http://www.theverge.com/2016/5/27/11795248/facebook-ad-
netwo...](http://www.theverge.com/2016/5/27/11795248/facebook-ad-network-non-
users-cookies-plug-ins), which points to this.

