It blew right in our face.
The “Facebook Scandal” (FB data breach with The Cambridge Analytica) shook many industries using this social media platform to “influence” a particular interest.
“We exploited Facebook to harvest millions of people’s profiles. And built models to exploit what we knew about them and target their inner demons…” Christopher Wylie, the whistleblower who worked with a Cambridge University academic to obtain these data using third party app, told the Observer.
Mark Zuckerberg & Co built Facebook to fill its users’ need for socialising, online. We all knew however, that Facebook was also created to harvest data in the first place. This is in the fine print of FB’s terms of use you’ve agreed to, when you started using Facebook. Although the company publicly admitted using data for their own regulated and targeted advertising algorithm alone, it may have “unknowingly” provided “limited data” to third party companies thru the various apps. Zuckerberg apologised for the “break of trust” given to them by their users because of this. What those “third party entities” do ( or did) with these data remains a mystery to the public.
Remember how Target “snooped” on its customers and figured out a teen girls is pregnant before her father found out? By harvesting its customers’ shopping habits and using predictive analysis, it was able to predict the most likely “next buys” of its customers and “structured” their stores to capture that buying intention. This pregnancy prediction model predicted with 87% accuracy that a lady would soon be delivering a baby if it buys vitamins, supplements, diapers or a blue rug! We can only hypothesise about the staggering scenarios of “what ifs” if these breached data reached a not so well intentioned party. Elections, politics or buying habits are but to name three.
In healthcare, privacy breaches are not only considered scandalous. It is “deadly” as well for it may cost lives.
To be fair to Facebook, healthcare (willingly or unwillingly) benefitted from some of the platforms “allure”. The relatively inexpensive, easy, accessible and wider user base are very good reasons for educating the masses about health issues. It is also a very good alternative to ( or in fact dismantling) more traditional, expensive media platforms for getting across messages to a wide range of users. There are probably thousands if not millions of patient support groups in FB. Advocacy campaigns aimed at improving healthcare abound in this platform. There are also healthcare professionals who use FB as a listening and or speaking platforms for many well intentioned campaigns. In short, the healthcare industry through its stakeholders, are also benefitting from FB’s social media clout while knowingly giving away part of its privacy. Here’s where the conundrum begin and why this breach opened a pandora’s box in healthcare.
Imagine, if user profiles and data went into the hands of not so well intentioned healthcare industry player. What if this data is used “shape”, influence or manipulate minds to buy a particular product? Or tinkered, to accept or debunk certain healthcare issue without the benefit of validated research and recommended protocols by the medical community? What if the data are “manipulated’ to “influence” the medical community itself? This may or may not happen and regulations are something we- the healthcare stakeholders, have to really look at in so many different ways.
While social media regulation is still being debated, most rely on “self regulation” on what, when or how they do things on Facebook, to prevent data from falling into the “wrong hands”. Self regulation on social media is though balancing act itself and remains a huge challenge to many of its users. #HealthXPh believe that educating the masses about health uses of these social media platforms’ plays a key role in this balancing act. This is what #HealthXPh is discussing (on Tweetchat) this Saturday March 24, 2018 9:00PM Manila Time .
As a patient, healthcare professional, student, policy maker, or advocate, how much of your personal privacy are you willing to “give away” for using Facebook?
- T1. Why would you or would you not deactivate your Facebook account?
T2. For using FB, what kind “data” are you willing to give away and why?
T3. What are your parameters for absolutely stopping Facebook use?
We are inviting you to a lively discussion thru a twitter chat , this coming Saturday March 24, 2018 9:00PM Manila time. Join discussion!