In December 2020, the Federal Trade Commission commissioned the largest social media and the world's streaming companies, including the owner of Twitch, Amazon, Facebook (now Meta), YouTube, Reddit, WhatsApp, Twitter (now X), Snap, Discord and TikTok's ByteDance, to share how they used personal information of their users.
On Thursday, the FTC staff was fired a report of 129 pageswho found that all these companies “take massive amounts of Americans' personal data and monetize it to the tune of billions of dollars a year,” said FTC Chairman Lina M. Khan.
“While profitable for companies, these surveillance practices can compromise people's privacy, threaten their liberties and expose them to a range of harms, from identified theft to stalking,” Khan said.
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The report called the major social media companies to a meeting a large amount of personal data and using it in ways that their users cannot expect. The FTC found, for example, that “many” of these companies buy data from third-party brokers about where a user is, how much they earn annually, and what their interests are, to understand more about a user's activity. on the Internet outside of the social media platform.
This personal information becomes the basis of targeted advertising, which most social media sites rely on for revenue. This was reported by Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and other products and platforms 98% of its revenue of $39.07 billion in the second quarter it came from advertising on Facebook and Instagram.
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According to the FTC report, it is difficult for users to understand how social media platforms collect their information and how much is used to tailor ads. Many may not even be aware of what is going on behind the scenes.
Plus, even if users are tuned in and know that social media platforms are using their data, they still don't have “any meaningful control over how personal information is used,” the FTC report shows.
Companies use personal information to drive algorithms, data analytics, and AI that, in turn, shape content recommendations, search, advertising, and other core aspects of their business. The FTC recommended that companies be transparent about the data they collect, do more to protect privacy and put users in charge of data.
The FTC further found that if a user wants to delete their data, some sites will de-identify the data they have, but keep it on file instead of deleting it all. According to the report, platforms that deleted personal data on demand would choose which parts to delete and not remove all of them.
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“Companies can and should do more to protect consumer privacy, and Congress should pass comprehensive federal privacy legislation that limits surveillance and gives consumers data rights,” the report said.