Facebook delays smart speaker launch, report says

March is a month Mark Zuckerberg would surely like to forget.

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Security Flaws in Dating App Grindr Expose Users' Location

Grindr, a gay-dating app, suffers from security issues that can expose the information of its more than 3 million daily users, including the location data of people who have opted out of sharing such...

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Apple faces multiple lawsuits over throttled iPhones

Dozens of iPhone owners are taking Apple Inc. to court over the company’s disclosure that it slowed down old phones to preserve battery life, in what could become one of the biggest legal challenges to the smartphone since its 2007 debut.

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Your online identity sells for exactly $1,170 on the dark web -- here's how to block the sale

What is the asking price for your online identity? Now, we finally know.

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Facebook Sued by Housing Advocates Alleging Discrimination

Facebook still allows for discriminatory housing advertisements despite past promises to remove tools that allow landlords and brokers to exclude certain groups of people from seeing their listings, a new...

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PSA: Instagram Uses All Your Facebook Data, Too

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The news that Cambridge Analytica collected the data of millions of Facebook users without their consent has a lot of people freaked out about how much Facebook actually knows about us, and what it’s doing with our personal information.

Frankly, people are pissed. A #DeleteFacebook campaign started trending on Twitter, and even Elon Musk deleted the Tesla and SpaceX Facebook pages in protest. Amid mounting public pressure, Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg went on an apology press tour, promising to do better in the future. But this scandal isn’t going away just yet, and people are starting to more closely scrutinize how Facebook and Google collect and use their data.

But even before the Cambridge Analytica fallout, we’ve all known that Facebook knows a lot about us — and that’s how it sells ads, by using all that stuff it knows about us to help advertisers target us with their ads.

But... what about Instagram?

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OK. First of all, Facebook owns Instagram.

Of course you already knew that; you’re a smart cookie. But in a recent survey by the Verge, 60% of people didn’t know that Facebook owns Instagram. So, just making sure we’re all on the same page here.

Instagram and Facebook use the same advertising tool.

Instagram advertising IS Facebook advertising, and vice-versa. If you want to run an ad on Instagram, you do it through the Facebook ad tool. And both Instagram and Facebook share the data they collect about you with each other and advertisers.

So there is no such thing as Instagram-only ads?

Brands and marketers can choose to have ads run only on Instagram and not show up on Facebook. But they still have to place the ads through the Facebook ad manager. So yes, ads can be tailored to only appear on Instagram, but all of that is handled in Facebook’s ad system.

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Advertisers can target you based on both your Facebook AND Instagram accounts.

They are essentially one and the same, as far as advertising is concerned. Advertisers can target you on your Instagram based on your Facebook profile, and they can target you on Facebook using information collected from your Instagram account.

What if my Instagram and Facebook are totally different though?

Let’s say your Facebook is pretty normal, but your Instagram is something totally weird or specific, like only pictures of your dog, and you only follow viral dog accounts. You'll still see ads on Instagram that are based on the overall profile Facebook has created about you, based on all the things it knows about you from both Instagram and Facebook

Are my likes and follows on Instagram part of what advertisers can use to target me?

Yep. Your likes, your follows, and even everything you search for or just browse through on Instagram and Facebook can help advertisers target you.

What the fuck?!

Sorry.

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So do brands know if I like a Kim Kardashian selfie?

Not exactly; they don’t know that you liked it, but all of your Instagram activity is rolled into a whole set of data that advertisers can use to target people like you.

How does a brand use my Instagram activity to target me?

Let’s say an online shoe store wants to target new potential customers. One way it can do this is to upload a list of their customer emails into the Facebook ad manager. Facebook can identify those people from their emails, and then it analyzes those people based on everything it knows about them. Then, it comes up with a new, similar group of potential customers – and that’s who the shoe store should target with its ads. So while your Instagram likes might just be a small detail about you, they help advertisers target you.

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What if my Instagram is private?

Sorry, they’re still using your data to target you with ads. Going private on Instagram only affects how other users can see you, and has nothing to do with your data or ad targeting.

What if I use a “finsta” that’s separate from my regular Instagram?

If you’re switching between accounts in the app, it knows they’re connected to the same Facebook account. You might see different ads on the two accounts based on your activity, but they both use your Facebook profile to target you.

Is Facebook or Instagram listening to what I say? The other day I was talking about something out loud and then saw an Instagram ad for it.

No, although lots of people certainly have noticed the same thing. The trick is, Facebook is so good at targeting you that it can tailor Instagram ads scarily well.

I noticed an Instagram ad for something I looked at online recently – what’s up with that?

Facebook has a pixel that tracks you as you surf around the web (unless you’re using a private browser or are logged out with no cookies). So Facebook can target you based on what you do online outside of Facebook and Instagram.

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Should I delete my Instagram??!!

Your call. If all of this freaks you out so much you’re willing to give up the fun and joy of Instagram, then delete. But if Instagram and Facebook bring you joy, then… here are some tips on how to limit the data you give Facebook.

BuzzFeed’s own Nick Greene, one of our in-house advertising experts, (yes, we target people on Facebook to advertise to them, too) helped explain some of the details in this post about how Facebook and Instagram ad targeting works.

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Google's Waymo Just Unveiled A New, Premium, Electric, Completely Self-Driving Jaguar

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Google’s Waymo is creating a new, premium, self-driving electric car in partnership with Jaguar Land Rover, the company announced Tuesday.

Waymo unveiled the car, called the I-PACE, at a press event at Chelsea Piers in New York City. The company plans to get prototypes on the road in Phoenix, Arizona, this year, and will put the cars in production by 2020.

The vehicles will initially be accessible only via Waymo’s ride-hailing app.

The company did not say whether it plans to make the cars available for private ownership down the road, nor did it say whether there would be a premium price for the Jaguar.

Between 2020 and 2021, Waymo and Jaguar plan to produce 20,000 cars, Waymo CEO John Krafcik said.

“This is a production-ready vehicle with self-driving technology that’s ready today,” Krafcik said. “Those 20,000 vehicles can serve about one million trips on a single day.”

Brendan Mcdermid / Reuters

Waymo’s introduction of the new car comes a little more than a week after an Uber self-driving car killed a woman in Tempe, Arizona.

Asked about the impact of that crash on the self-driving vehicle industry, Krafcik declined to answer, pointing to a past statement and saying, “Our focus today, and what we’re talking about doing today, is moving forward into the future with technology that we are very confident in."

Ultimately, this new car will test whether premium vehicles have appeal in ride-sharing or ride-hailing when owned by a third-party company, compared to simply being status symbols owned by individuals.

Brendan Mcdermid / Reuters

LINK: An Autonomous Uber Vehicle Struck And Killed A Woman In Arizona

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