Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, the three flagship apps owned by Meta, have long faced public criticism for their data collection and sharing practices, sparking persistent concerns about user privacy.
These platforms employ various complementary strategies to collect and leverage user data for targeted advertising, personalized content delivery, and to create “personas:” psychological and behavioral profiles, which you as a user are filed into according to your interactions with the three apps.
The apps’ data-collection practices extend beyond individual platforms, with Facebook serving as the parent company aggregating and processing the collected information from all three.
Here’s an overview of how these apps collect and use data to spy on you and construct detailed user profiles.
Facebook Data Collection:
The data collection process encompasses a wide array of user information, including personal details, interests, and online behaviors. Facebook, as the umbrella company, collects demographic data such as your age, gender, location, and occupation. Instagram complements this by focusing on visual content, lifestyle preferences, and additional demographic details through shared posts and interactions. WhatsApp, despite its end-to-end encryption, collects metadata¹ such as phone numbers, device information, and usage User activity is extensively monitored on all platforms. Facebook and Instagram utilize tracking pixels, cookies, and algorithms to analyze user behaviors and interactions. These mechanisms track the content you engage with, accounts you follow, the type of media you share, and what your sentiments are about current affairs.
Facebook knows how you feel about the Israeli genocide in Gaza better than you do. It also knows what you’ve said about it and who you’ve said it to. Your feelings about FBI corruption? Yup, Facebook knows about that too.
Location data is another crucial aspect of Facebook’s user profiling. Instagram and WhatsApp gather location data through geo-tagging features and location-sharing options.
And while the company’s stated purpose of all this wholesale surveillance is ostensibly serving you, the user, a more individualized set of adverts and bringing you the content you REALLY WANT and that interests you the most, many think there’s a darker purpose lurking behind the 24/7 user-tracking carried out by Meta’s pet apps.
We’ll get to that in a moment.
Technical information, such as device type, operating system, network connection details, walking/driving speed, and GPS data is also collected.
Behavioral analytics contribute to the construction of user profiles by tracking how users interact within and outside the platforms. This includes metrics such as time spent on the apps, frequency of interactions, and patterns of engagement.
Coupled with the behavioral patterns, user interaction information, communications metadata, technical information, and everything else already in Facebook’s possession, a “Fingerprint” of you is created that effectively tracks you every minute or every day, and that – according to several patents – can be used to manipulate you on on an extremely individual level.
Building User Fingerprints:
The collected data serves as the foundation for constructing intricate user profiles. These profiles are dynamic and ever-evolving, adapting to your changing behaviors and preferences. Cross-platform integration and data sharing plays a significant role in this process, with Facebook serving as the central hub for aggregated user data. Information gathered from one platform influences the content and ads you’re shown on another, and all accumulate to create a highly accurate behavioral and psychological profile about: YOU!
So what about your Privacy?
While the purpose of these data collection practices is ostensibly to provide a more personalized user experience and enable advertisers to reach their target audience effectively, the methods and profiling techniques employed by Facebook raise significant concerns about user privacy. For starters, the Facebook Terms of Service, and Privacy Policies alone take approximately five to six hours to read.
Since no sane human being is likely to devote the better part of a workday to doing that, app users are simply not aware of what they consent to when they click “I Agree,” or indeed of the extent to which their data is being utilized. And though it’s theoretically possible to disable a great deal of the tracking, and to disable data sharing between the three apps, the sheer complexity of app privacy settings and policies makes it beyond challenging for any normal person to gain any kind of real control over their own data.
The information and disclosures buried within the company’s mammoth Terms of Service and Privacy Policy documents also raise further questions about exactly who or what your personal data and user fingerprint are shared with. Besides the usual references to “government agencies,” there are numerous references to third-party aggregation and processing entities that work on behalf of Meta.
Such disclosure of personal data to third parties not only opens the door to leaks and data breaches, but also to wholesale abuse, as any outside organization is not bound by Facebook’s own terms and policies.
Lastly, WhatsApp, which was initially universally praised for its end-to-end encryption, faced massive backlash when it updated its privacy policy to allow data sharing with Facebook. Essentially, although the content of Whatsapp messages remains private, the shared metadata can reveal valuable information about user interactions, topics of conversation, and a slew of other information, then coupled with surveillance data from Facebook and Instagram.
In response to these concerns, Meta implemented measures to enhance privacy features. These include more granular controls over ad preferences and options to limit data sharing. However, due to the aforementioned complexity of the in-app privacy settings, widespread skepticism remains about the true extent of user control and whether these measures are even remotely sufficient to address the underlying privacy issues.
Suffice it to say that Facebook has a longstanding track record of ignoring privacy rights and of abusing the data it collects from its users, so if you’re serious about regaining ANY REAL online privacy and about protecting your personal data, you need to steer clear of the company’s Unholy App Trinity: Facebook, Instagram, and Whatsapp.
¹ Whatsapp’s Metadata collection encompasses:
- Phone Numbers: WhatsApp collects the phone numbers involved in the call, identifying the caller and the recipient.
- Date and Time: The timestamp of the call, indicating when it was initiated or received.
- Duration: The length of the call, specifying how long the call lasted.
- Type of Call: WhatsApp distinguishes between voice and video calls, indicating whether the call was audio-only or included video.
- Device Information: Metadata may include details about the devices used by both the caller and recipient, such as the type of device, operating system, and possibly network information.