this post was submitted on 05 Aug 2025
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Meta illegally collected data from Flo period and pregnancy app, jury finds (arstechnica.com)
submitted 3 days ago by misk@piefed.social to c/technology@lemmy.zip
18 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Archive: https://archive.ph/2025.08.05-225314/https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/08/jury-finds-meta-broke-wiretap-law-by-collecting-data-from-period-tracker-app/

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[–] pelespirit@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

The deck does not say where CMG allegedly sources this voice data, be that a particular brand of smart TV, a smart speaker, or smartphone loaded with a particular app. It says that once it has used the voice data to identify an audience that is “ready-to-buy,” CMG builds a list of those audience members and uploads it to ad platforms to then target advertisements. It says for $100 a day, CMG can target people in a 10-mile radius, or $200 a day for a 20-mile radius.

https://archive.is/ckFB2

You might be partially right, but I can't find what is meant by the "recorded conversations" part. I guess I gotta look further in.

"Each of the Defendants had their own purpose for collecting and using Flo user data," the brief said. "Flo used this information to acquire new app users through advertising and marketing, including advertisements based on Flo App users' reproductive goals (e.g., getting pregnant). Flo also sold access to the CAEs sent through SDKs to other third parties for profit. Google and Meta separately used the data they intercepted for their own commercial purposes, including to feed their machine learning algorithms that power each of their respective advertising networks."

[–] dev_null@lemmy.ml 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

To be clear, I'm not saying secretly recording conversations with a mic never happens, just that it didn't happen in this case.

To the other story you linked, what we know happened is that some company had a slide deck claiming they have that capability. It could be that they really did and that it's used everywhere. It could also be that they were judging interest and didn't even look into the feasibility of building it. It could be that they wanted publicity by manufacturing some controversial news and never even wanted to build it. Or, again, it could be true. But all we know for a fact, in that case, is that a slide deck existed. Not that any product existed, let alone that it was deployed anywhere.

Again, I'm not saying it doesn't happen, it probably does, but that story doesn't prove it either.

[–] pelespirit@sh.itjust.works -2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Again, I’m not saying it doesn’t happen, it probably does, but that story doesn’t prove it either.

Why are you writing diatribes then?

[–] dev_null@lemmy.ml 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

English is not my first language, so had to look "diatribes" up. "a forceful and bitter verbal attack against someone or something"? That was not my intention, I'm trying to have a polite conversation, maybe I'm failing at it if that's how it's received!