Have you ever mentioned a product in spoken conversation only to be advertised that exact product on social media hours later? We have.
There could be a number of reasons for this, but we’re going to discuss the two most plausible explanations: either algorithms are much more sophisticated than we think, or companies are listening to our conversations through our mobile microphones. So which is true?
We feed sensitive information to all sorts of hungry machines from the moment we wake up until the moment we fall asleep. In fact, some of us track what’s happening to us even whilst we sleep. Our devices and phones know where we are, the route we used to get there, who we’re likely to talk to, and can predict when we’ll be on the move again. And that’s readily available information – think about what we manually input; Do you take photos of your food? Do you track your steps and calorie intake? Do you monitor your heart rate and sleep pattern? Do you use internet banking? Technology knows a lot about us.
Over the past few years users have suspected social media platforms of listening in on conversations through mobile phone microphones. For good reason too, as with the emergence of virtual assistants (Siri, Alexa, Cortana, Google Home) we’re talking to technology more than ever. But here’s the conundrum: how much of this information is shared? I’m not the only one who has been targeted with extremely particular advertising on social media. So how do the likes of Facebook know what I’m talking about?
Theory one: our phones are listening to us
Do our phones listen to our conversations?
Google and Facebook categorically reject accusations that they are listening to our conversations to advertise to us. The thing is, this doesn’t mean they aren’t listening. As pointed out by Terra Ferma Media MD David, if you have an android phone, Google IS listening to and recording your conversations. It’s highly likely that Apple users have the same issue, but there’s no way to turn this off yet. So they’re listening, but both social giants insist they aren’t using this information for advertising. Facebook released a statement about this in 2016.
Google has a developer policy that all app developers must agree to that specifies apps must not breach privacy in this way (you can get lost in the policy here).
It’s also worth reminding you that Facebook owns WhatsApp and Instagram. Google owns YouTube and Google Maps. The point is these companies have a lot of information about us, whether we like it or not, and are using this information to their advantage.
Theory two: it's just a clever algorithm
Is it just a clever algorithm?
Every social media platform is governed by algorithms. Twitter is a good example of this with its trending topics; a live, fast-moving algorithm that displays the most popular topics based on a number of rules (how many people are talking about the topic, at what speed the topic arose, how many verified users are talking about it, if it’s a breaking news item, etc).
Facebook probably uses the most advanced algorithms in the game. The benefit Facebook has over other platforms is the plethora of your friends’ data. Facebook knows who your family is, who your partner is (and ex-partners), and who your closest friends are based on interactions. You and your close friends probably have a similar way of thinking, or are interested in similar topics, so Facebook will assume that anything your closest friends are talking about will be of interest to you. This also means whatever your friends are searching for, reading, liking, hiding, and following could also be of interest to you. This is how clever targeted advertising comes into play.
We also can’t ignore the fact that companies advertising on Facebook have a huge range of data available to them. They can target people living in certain locations of particular genders and ages, people who attend certain schools or workplaces, commuters, people with particular interests, and so much more. Combined, these two methods of data gathering is probably the outcome of the adverts you’re seeing. No hocus pocus.
Our advice? Keep talking.
Finally, to cover all bases, we need to mention cookies and remarketing. A cookie (apart from being delicious) is a small code left on every web page you visit, telling the website owners which pages you’ve clicked on. Take Amazon: you’ve probably browsed something on the Amazon website only to see that product advertised to you on Facebook too. This is because Amazon remembers what you’ve looked at (via a cookie) and uses their advertising space on Facebook to show this product to you again (remarketing). Even if you searched for something months ago, if Amazon wants to sell it to you, it will advertise that product to you.
So where does this leave us? Facebook and Google both deny using the microphones on our phones to listen in to our conversations for advertising purposes. Can we believe them? On the algorithm side of the coin, there are three things at play:
- Sophisticated algorithms taking data from your extended friendship groups
- Companies having excessive amounts of advertising data to target specific audiences
- Social platforms storing information about your online habits
These factors combined make a convincing case that could make you think you’re being listened to. It really is that clever.
Ultimately we don’t have the magic answer, and of course if large companies were indeed using our conversations to advertise to us, they wouldn’t exactly shout it from the rooftops.
Our advice? Keep talking. While there’s no evidence of any wrong doing, if you are being targeted with relevant ads, then what’s the harm? If you’re that worried why not start talking about the lottery and see what happens. You never know…