You may not recognize the names – Laura Edelson and Damon McCoy, but if you follow the tech news you may know that Facebook recently “unauthorized” researchers trying to understand misinformation circulated through Facebook. This was Edelson and McCoy – academics from New York University. I became interested when I read their frustration with the way they were treated by Facebook in the NYTimes (you may not have access – try some of the links I offer).
When their research. Edelson and McCoy received a short message claiming – Facebook says we used “unauthorized means to access and collect data” and that it shut us out to comply with an order from the Federal Trade Commission to respect the privacy of its users. The researchers claim they focus on the ads Facebook includes in user posts and not the identity of users.
In reading the article, I realized that I have been participating in the researcher’s work that is based on the installation of a browser extension – AD Observer. This extension collects the Facebook ads (and YouTube) you experience, shares this data with the researchers and with you, and shows you why you received the ads that you did. You provide some basic data to the researchers (see red box around settings) to help in the process of trying to understand why you were served the ads you experienced.
One thing I have learned by looking at the ads is that I would not necessarily label some of the ads as ads and it is interesting to know someone paid to target me with this information.
Here are a few additional links to these researches: A podcast with Edelson as a guest, Recode description of Edelson and McCoy situation.