Facebook Could Use Data Collected From Its Portal In-Home Video Device To Target You With Ads

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Recode: Facebook announced Portal last week, its take on the in-home, voice-activated speaker to rival competitors from Amazon, Google and Apple. Last Monday, we wrote: 'No data collected through Portal -- even call log data or app usage data, like the fact that you listened to Spotify -- will be used to target users with ads on Facebook.' We wrote that because that's what we were told by Facebook executives. But Facebook has since reached out to change its answer: Portal doesn't have ads, but data about who you call and data about which apps you use on Portal can be used to target you with ads on other Facebook-owned properties.

'Portal voice calling is built on the Messenger infrastructure, so when you make a video call on Portal, we collect the same types of information (i.e. usage data such as length of calls, frequency of calls) that we collect on other Messenger-enabled devices. We may use this information to inform the ads we show you across our platforms. Other general usage data, such as aggregate usage of apps, etc., may also feed into the information that we use to serve ads,' a spokesperson said in an email to Recode. That isn't very surprising, considering Facebook's business model. The biggest benefit of Facebook owning a device in your home is that it provides the company with another data stream for its ad-targeting business.

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