[bshastry]

I like the critical thinking in this article. Problem is, I am critical about it's critique. Just because Ted Cruz made use of the same platform and did not win, does not mean there is no problem with what Facebook is doing. They are still thieving people's data and selling it for a nice sum.

[throwawayyx96]

I don't think the author was trying to excuse Facebook's business model by bringing up Cruz. She was pointing out that if this 'psychological profiling' technique from CA was really a silver bullet for swaying votes, Cruz would have done better in his run the Republican nomination. It's a single data point that arguably isn't worth much, but it was interesting to me as I'd not heard of any other prominent politicians using the service. Balanced article by WAPO in my view.

[jessaustin]

I thought Cruz came in 2nd? To the guy who was on every channel of TV all the time. Keep in mind R primary voters get more of their news from TV than the general electorate, which explains why Trump beat Cruz more than he beat Clinton. Keep in mind also that Cruz is a total pariah in Washington. The only people who will talk to him are those who are paid to do so. Based on previous form, one would not have expected Jeb and the rest to all lose to Trump and Cruz.

[PunchTornado]

What the hell are you talking about? There is no stealing. People agreed to give their data to facebook and do whatever with it. read the terms and conditions of using fb.

[blunte]

It's not that simple. Facebook's shifting privacy defaults are what enabled some of the deeper reach of the CA mining tactics and are arguably what gave them much more information than probably even Facebook had intended.

That's not to say that people are pretty careless about privacy management (and security), but this went well beyond what the informed public thought was happening (or possible) on FB during those years.