[chmike]

Facebook may only need to recognize a few keywords. The one that companies had payed for. It wouldn't be that many. An approximate recognition is good enough. So processing and data transmission could be small.

As long as there is no uncontestable proof, the doubt must benefit Facebook.

The testimonies are not uncontestbale proofs. Considering the million people uisng the facebook app, there will always be a small set of people who will see advertisement of what they just talked about. That is statistic. Some of these, understandably chocked, may be very vocal about it.

We also know that people are payed to spread fake news and manipulate people. So I'm cautious. The truth is unknown, and the longer it takes to get uncontestable proofs, the less credible the listening thesis becomes.

Facebook can't do much appart to let it rain. Open source is the way I would go. That is one way to calm down paranoid or conspirationist people.

[cryoshon]

>As long as there is no uncontestable proof, the doubt must benefit Facebook.

they have a history of privacy violations

they have an incentive to snoop further

i see no reason to offer the benefit of the doubt to either hypothesis, as anecdotes do not constitute data

but for what it's worth, my hunch is that there's some extra snooping going on that has yet to be unearthed. might not be audio, necessarily.

[superbrama]

Interesting, curious to hear more. What techniques are you referring to? Some re-appropriation of mobile hardware for cross sensory applications? Data sharing of some kind?