If you’ve been wondering how come the ads that are being served to you on Facebook appears to be based on your search queries, there’s an answer to that: a report from 404 Media revealed that Cox Media Group (CMG), one of the partners for Facebook Marketing, targets ads to customers based on what they said near their device’s microphones.
Further proving their findings, 404 Media obtained a pitch deck from CMG, where it proudly mentioned that its partners include Facebook, Amazon, and Google. Google, for their part, has kicked out CMG in response to the complaints. The said deck made mention of “Active Listening software”, which made use of AI to listen to what you say on the microphone to collect behavioral data.
How does this controversial feature work? According to the leaked slides, it collects voice data from any device that has a microphone. These include phones, tablets, laptops, and even smart speakers. From here, advertisers use this information to give targeted ads to consumers. So if, for example, you and your friend are talking about gaming phones, the program will send you ads related to it. The same goes for any other topic under the sun.
To make matters worse, CMG said in a now-deleted post that their software is legal.
“We know what you’re thinking. Is this even legal? It is legal for phones and devices to listen to you. When a new app download or update prompts consumers with a multi-page term of use agreement somewhere in the fine print, Active Listening is often included,” CMG said in their now-deleted post.
