Facebook agrees to overhaul targeted advertising system for job, housing and loan ads
Source: Washington Post
Facebook on Tuesday agreed to overhaul its lucrative targeted advertising system to settle accusations that landlords, lenders and employers use the platform to discriminate. The far-reaching settlement compels Facebook to withhold a wide array of detailed demographic information — including Zip codes, gender and age — from advertisers when they market housing, credit and job opportunities. Although the settlement is unlikely to deal a major blow to Facebook’s bottom line, the change represents a significant shift for a company that has built one of the most successful advertising platforms in history.
Facebook has long allowed advertisers to target potential customers and employees based on their demographics and interests, as gleaned from the vast trove of data the platform collects. Now, the social media giant is stepping away from that approach, amid mounting evidence that its microtargeting techniques were abused. Civil rights advocates have warned for years that Facebook’s ads violated anti-discrimination laws because advertisers were able to use that data to exclude African Americans, women, seniors, people with disabilities and others.
The Justice Department allowed a lawsuit to proceed last year over Facebook’s objections, arguing that the company can be held liable for ad-targeting tools that deprive people of housing offers. Until now, the company made only minimal tweaks to its systems and largely resisted calls for change, arguing that these ads were standard in online advertising.
Tuesday’s announcement will require a major overhaul of Facebook’s software, and could make the platform less valuable to certain advertisers. Many companies use Facebook to recruit workers. Facebook said it will make the changes by the end of the year, creating a separate portal to limit how much advertisers for housing, employment and credit can micro-target their audience.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/facebook-agrees-to-dismantle-targeted-advertising-system-for-job-housing-and-loan-ads-after-discrimination-complaints/2019/03/19/7dc9b5fa-4983-11e9-b79a-961983b7e0cd_story.html?utm_term=.23a7499f387d
Full title: Facebook agrees to overhaul targeted advertising system for job, housing and loan ads after discrimination complaints
Can't get away from discrimination - even online. With online advertising of homes, for the first time, many minorities got to actually SEE what was available without some racist realtor steering them away or insisting something "wasn't available". But thanks to things like "cookies" on your computer put there by various sites that include things like zip codes (or that obtain that info based on your IP address), then the discrimination engines have been fired up once more.
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I don't want this crap hounding my every day life. The people who run these companies are psychos. 
