Facebook and Cambridge Analytica.

As a very frequent Facebook user (though I've been having a sojourn from it this week) and a news junkie, I've formed several opinions on the current scandal it's embroiled in with the data research company Cambridge Analytica. Now, I'm no IT specialist or demographist (a real term), but social media has come to define my fellow Millennials and I more than any other demographic and again I use it myself (albeit only Facebook), so that's why this scandal matters to me.

I don't know yet if I was one of the roughly 350 000 Australian Facebook users whose data was given to Cambridge Analytica. (I definitely do know I've posted things on there which have landed me in trouble or which I'd just rather nobody saw now if they were from several years ago.) But I frequently see ads or particularly memes in my feed related to things I've posted about a lot and which, thus, the site's administrators evidently know I love. I suppose that's better than them trying to sway me into embracing other stuff, but this can be bait to keep users returning there, and Internet addiction would exist even without social media (for that reason I always have at least one net-free day a week). It's also presumptuous of such sites' administrators to generalise their ads and memes to any whole demographic (i.e. gardening and kitchen products for elderly women), whatever their users' activity might suggest they enjoy.

Then there's the accusations of CA using this information hall with Facebook's approval for political donation. Everybody associated with both companies can have and express their politics, but all I can think of to say about this aspect of it is that professionally, they should at least try be bipartisan, or simply stress they are just stating their own views. If Facebook, like all its competition, can let politicians and candidates of all stripes sign up, surely they shouldn't associate with companies that donate to just one side, if these allegations are indeed true. However, while social media sites could and should do more to safeguard users' privacy, I liken it to eating out and having an allergic reaction to the meal: ultimately, the decision to post anything at all comes down to the user.

Now, despite all its drawbacks I still like (no pun intended) and use Facebook regularly. But I hope it learns and grows from this debacle, as do all its rivals.