[throwaway98121]

I disagree. What is “line” you referred to and who gets to define it?

No one forced you to use Facebook. Look, I don’t use FB, and I don’t particular respect Mark or Sheryl, but the daily barrage of anti tech posts crapping on FB, Apple, or Amazon are turning this place into armchairs experts and politicians all pretending to be on some moral high ground when their own employers are likely just as greed driven.

We need comprehensive regulation IMO. What that should look like, I’m not qualified to say. Regardless, it’s sad to see hacker news morph into Reddit.

[lovich]

I don't use Facebook either and yet they still collect data on me. Its the same issue that happened with Experian leaking data on people who never did business with Experian.

I'd be comfortable calling that a line that got crossed

[throwaway98121]

I wouldn’t. That line doesn’t exist, at least in the laws of the legal system. It might cross your own moral boundary, but that’s intrinsic to you and subjective at best.

I’m not defending them as a company. I do think the rest of the media is just as horrible and would seize a similar opportunity if given the chance.

We are in dire need of regulation here.

[kodablah]

> We are in dire need of regulation here.

In many cases internet regulation, especially the sort that would curb data misuse, is a scarier line to cross.

[enraged_camel]

>>I wouldn’t. That line doesn’t exist, at least in the laws of the legal system.

Who cares? It is well known that the legal system trails technology by at least a decade. Therefore, it should be clear that we are discussing a line of an ethical nature, not a legal one.

[cmsj]

Well said, we have to get past this "well you have a choice" nonsense. Data is too easily acquired and cross-referenced for that to be remotely true anymore.

[Aqueous]

Experian's entire business model is built around collecting data about people who have never interacted directly with Experian. In fact, our entire system of credit would break down unless there were ways for lenders to know the credit-worthiness of their borrowers. Now, very good arguments can be made that credit rating has an inherent conflict of interest if privatized. But that's another conversation. In this one, we seem to continually fail to distinguish between 'information about you' and 'private information.' There is clearly a distinction. Figuring out exactly what that distinction is almost certainly a regulatory problem.

[simongr3dal]

People report their personal wealth and income to the local tax authority every year, presumably that tells you something about a person's financial credibility.

[rtkwe]

It's down to the unfortunate reality that people aren't the actual customers of Facebook or Experian, their actual customers are advertisers and lenders (principally there's a few other people but basically anyone who's asked you for permission for a credit report). Under that lens it makes perfect sense that both would have information about everyone because it makes them more valuable.

It's easier to see with Experian because people pretty much never actually use their credit report actively but rather monitor it to know what the actual users will see about them. It's a metric about you rather than a metric for you. Same basic schema applies to the advertiser profile Facebook builds. They've just built a facade to get you to give them a lot of info willingly (in the case of users).

[tzs]

> It's down to the unfortunate reality that people aren't the actual customers of Facebook or Experian, their actual customers are advertisers and lenders

These are kind of opposite cases, aren't they?

With Facebook, their actual customers are people who want to have a relationship with you.

With Experian, their actual customers are people who you want to have a relationship with.

[rtkwe]

Lenders also want to have a relationship with you too. They want to make all the loans they can as long as they're good loans. Either way it doesn't change the dynamic that much for the average person they're the product, or I suppose more accurately information about them is the product and the companies are the customer.

[gyaniv]

I agree. I also think that we need a lot more regulations, because the problem isn't only Facebook, there are so many companies that hold/collect/sell our information, and that's the bigger problem in my opinion, Facebook is just the biggest one so we hear about it the most.

Just because you don't use Facebook doesn't mean that some other company isn't doing the same thing with your data, you just probably haven't heard of it.

[chris_wot]

Explain shadow accounts then. Those people didn’t even sign up for Facebook!