Facebook Has Mapped the Entire Human Population of Earth (cnbc.com) 160
Facebook doesn't only know what its 2 billion users "Like." It now knows where 7.5 billion humans live, everywhere on earth, to within 15 feet. From a report: The company has created a data map of the planet's entire human population by combining government census numbers with information it's obtained from space satellites, according to Janna Lewis, Facebook's head of strategic innovation partnerships and sourcing. The mapping technology, which Facebook says it developed itself, can pinpoint any man-made structures in any country on earth to a resolution of five meters. Facebook is using the data to understand the precise distribution of humans around the planet.
Well thats not creepy at all... (Score:5, Interesting)
Just when I think Facebook can't be more creepy and intrusive they manage to surprise me.
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Just when I think Facebook can't be more creepy and intrusive they manage to surprise me.
Just wait until they introduce implantable RFID chips in some manner palatable to the common idiot.
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Facebook used satellite-based data
always carry umbrella shaped like piece of rock, check
and government census information
never co-operate with the authorities, check
to map the Earth's entire human population. The data set has a resolution of five meters and knows where man-made structures are everywhere on the planet.
live in cave, check
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Just wait until they introduce implantable RFID chips in some manner palatable to the common idiot.
Hey, if it gets me free games, sign me up!
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I just had a colonoscopy, in which I agreed in advance, in case there was a medical necessity to implant devices, which I thought a little creepy.
You're saying I should have looked to see WHOSE devices?
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Re: Well thats not creepy at all... (Score:1)
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Sure. Just say you're a Nazi or Racist if you don't get the chip. That's all you have to do to make so much of the world do anything they don't want to do. Yea, rape, pillage, screw us big time but don't call us a racist. Anything but that. Looking at you Merkel, Obama, Macron, May, etc.
Re:Well thats not creepy at all... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Few years ago they did a similar thing as an academic super computing exercise. They could map an area of a size of California in minutes, if I recall correctly. Take a pair of oil tankers and a satellite, put a super computer in one of them and an automatic cruise missile launcher in the other. Destroy all humans from any California sized part of the world. "Profit".
Are you worried about Zuckerberg (Score:1)
Running for President yet ???
You should be...
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Re:Well thats not creepy at all... (Score:5, Interesting)
I signed up for Facebook very recently at the persistent urging of a group of friends. I was moving away and so, after years of intentionally avoiding Facebook due to privacy concerns, gave in and signed up so that I could keep in touch. I figured that as long as I was careful (fake birth date, restricting who could view my page, posting minimal personal information, not logging in with my primary computer, ect.) then they wouldn't be able to track me too much.
Creepy describes what I got indeed. Before even making any friend requests or even viewing anyone else's page, Facebook already had a large number of friend suggestions already prepared. Some of which were recent people I saw regularly, which made some sense, but some where people I had only met a few times years ago. Facebook tracks you, whether or not you have an account. I don't know all the ways they track you, but I assume the phone app is a major one. As long as people running the app have your name & number in their phone, Facebook starts to build a profile based on the secondary data they gather, even if you are security and privacy minded in your own actions. There really should be laws against gathering data on people who never agreed to be part of your network.
Still not entirely certain if I made the right decision to finally, after so many years, sign up. But I do not like or trust Facebook. The concept is good, I like that part of it, but there really does need to be stronger regulations concerning tracking and privacy.
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They know your real birth date, probably your SSN too, where you grew up, all of your friends you've ever had and even your relatives you never knew you had.
You didn't make the right decision, but they already knew all of this about you without you ever signing up, you just validated their information regardless of you providing them false info.
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EU right to be forgotten (Score:2)
I wonder if the EU will do the right thing and extend its right to be forgotten [wikipedia.org] proposals to allow you to demand that facebook, et al, remove all of that information about you? The other thing that might be fun is doing a subject access request [ico.org.uk] and have facebook tell you everything that they know about you.
FaceBook Inc aka FBI (Score:1)
Of course they've been tracking you before you signed up. They're a branch of the FBI afterall.
What? You didn't really believe the FBI still drives around in black windowless vans with "Flowers by Irene" painted on the sides did you? Its so much more efficient for them to use your friends and electronics to spy on you than all that old tech.
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Re: Well thats not creepy at all... (Score:1)
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The Zuck is going to run for President in 2020 as an Independent.
It's going to assure a 2020 victory for either Trump or Pence.
In Early 2021 Facebook will be a smoking hole in the ground because the Antifa-Fashionists will be driven to an uncontainable rage.
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I think his point was that Google is just as creepy as Facebook. Interacting with either of them on a voluntary basis is a questionable decision, but regularly interacting with one of them while avoiding the other because it's creepy is just silly.
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Just when I think Facebook can't be more creepy and intrusive they manage to surprise me.
The really fucked up part is they won't lose a single customer over it.
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Why would they lose customers over combining government census numbers with information it's obtained from space satellites? It has nothing to do with their social networking site.
They won't lose customers because none of them give a shit about privacy anymore.
Oh, and this activity has nothing to do with social media. They'll merely try and sell it that way, in much the same way they've been trying to innocently label themselves as just a social networking site.
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The headline is a bit misleading. The editorializing even more so:
"It now knows where 7.5 billion humans live, everywhere on earth, to within 15 feet. "
Satellite data with 3m granularity has been around for some time now and that had nothing to do with Facebook. All Facebook did was to combine that data with census data and its own data.
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Just when I think Facebook can't be more creepy and intrusive they manage to surprise me.
Next step: declare all the mapped people to be citizens of the seasteaded Republic of Zuckerbergia. Muahahahahahaha!
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Bollocks (Score:1)
They really haven't.
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I, too, have a very difficult time believing that they have accurate data about all of the African, Afghani and Middle Eastern illegal aliens that have been essentially invading Europe the past 3 or 4 years. Many of these people have no record of existence in their home nations. If they do have some sort of identification, they try to destroy it. Even European authorities find it exceedingly difficult to figure out who the hell these invaders actually are.
Then there are all of the babies who were born well
Entire Human Population (Score:2, Insightful)
"Entire Human Population"
Perhaps "entire" doesn't mean what you think it does?
NK? (Score:1)
Even in North Korea? That just smacks to me that they have CIA funding. The CIA used to do the Worldbook fact thing, Now all they have is Facebook.
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The CIA Fac[et]book?
you cannot escape the monster. (Score:5, Interesting)
Even if you never signed up. Even if you block their IP ranges. You cannot escape. People wave phones around, take photos, immediately upload them to Facebook. Facebook performs biometric analysis on everyone in the photo, even non-Facebook users, for "shadow profiles".
What's that? You think you turned away in time? Oh, sorry:
Since then, Facebook has continued to deepen and enrich its facial recognition technologies. An algorithm from the company’s artificial intelligence research group managed the seemingly impossible task of recognizing people 83% of the time even when their faces were not visible. [privateint...access.com]
Unless you are a hermit who never leaves his cave and has no friends, you ARE in Facebook's database, whether you signed up or not. Your image has been recorded, your face has been associated with your identity and your home address and thus forth. Unless you are among the few who block FB IP ranges, also associated with your internet usage when not on FB itself.
You cannot escape this monster. You can try, but your friends and family are agents of it now too.
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Unless you are a hermit who never leaves his cave and has no friends...
China.
Don't panic (Score:5, Funny)
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Now now, let's not all panic. Perhaps Facebook intends to do only good things with all this information!
Unlikely, only Google does no evil.
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Perhaps Facebook intends to do only good things with all this information!
I'm sure that bail bond agencies ("Bounty Hunters") and loan collection outfits will pay top dollar for this valuable information service.
Maybe you are very good about going into hiding, and not giving away where you are. But maybe your friends and family are unintentionally not so careful.
An expensive Facebook report of your friends and family might indicate where you are.
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Try going into London just to visit a conference event. No sooner than I'm off the train than tourists are going clicky-clicky with all their cameras. Everything - each other getting off the train, the historic clocks, the other trains, the platform. That's one set of cameras. Going through the crowns waiting for trains? More pictures taken. Walking past street corners? Selfie-stick time. Sit inside a sandwich shop? Someone's got to take a picture of that as well.
The freaky thing was that I never entered or
BS (Score:4, Insightful)
X2 quote (Score:2)
They have the targeting information (Score:2)
Now all they need is a few billion robot drones. Or a satellite laser system.
Maybe they could sell the information to the appropriate governments looking for some people.
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The Defintion of Terrorism (Score:5, Insightful)
(US Citizen) "Hey guys, check this out. I combined information and I know where every single human on the planet is."
(US Government) "Seize the terrorists assets immediately and throw him in prison indefinitely."
[Meanwhile, over in the land of Too Valuable To Fail...]
(Facebook) "Hey guys, check this out. We combined information and we know where every single human on the planet is."
(US Government) "Oh wow, hey cool. Mind if we get a piece of that? Sweet, thx."
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Not enough users for Facebook... (Score:3, Interesting)
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You can still buy that book at abe.com [abebooks.com] for $7.86 including shipping.
Don't click on creimier's referral link.
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You don't want to be declared Not of the Body.
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According to "Chaos Monkeys: Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley" [amzn.to] by Antonio Garcia Martinez, Facebook only has 2.5B+ people to convert into users. User growth stalls out after that as the few billion people who aren't users live in areas too remote for Internet access. Facebook will have to find new ways to grow that doesn't rely on adding new users in the future.
Facebook will need to pioneer galactic enrollment net. Ping times will suck for a while. Like 200 years for that hot Orion chick to click like.
Re:Not enough users for Facebook... (Score:4, Interesting)
According to "Chaos Monkeys: Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley" [amzn.to] by Antonio Garcia Martinez, Facebook only has 2.5B+ people to convert into users. User growth stalls out after that as the few billion people who aren't users live in areas too remote for Internet access. Facebook will have to find new ways to grow that doesn't rely on adding new users in the future.
Or (actually "and") they could take it upon themselves to push Internet out to those remaining billions. Something like this.
If you read the Wired article you will see that this mapping project is part of this 'universal Internet' access plan. And you will also see that 'universal access' means just having an Internet connection. It is not a net-neutral ISP connection. It is a "Facebook selected set of services" connection. They get on because Facebook says "yes". If there is any money to made now, or in the future, it will be Facebook's.
According to Zuckerberg this is the epitome of "net neutrality" since the most discriminatory thing is not to have Internet, that, and the fact that he is permitting a few hundred other services on the connection compensates for the fact that he has complete control over that connection.
Re:Not enough users for Facebook... (Score:4, Interesting)
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How is this filth modded up. Fuck this site. Blatant spam by a blatant spammer.
1) The comment is relevant. 2) The comment attracted other comments. 3) I'm having such a karma whoring power trip, my trolls are petrified (or they took off for the weekend).
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Translation.... (Score:2)
Translation: stalk.
Well ... (Score:2)
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"Do not fold, bend, spindle, or mutilate."
I think we have our homework assignment.
Extra Creepy (Score:2)
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Pinpoint this one finger salute, Facebook.
TFS said this . . .
The mapping technology, which Facebook says it developed itself, can pinpoint any man-made structures in any country on earth to a resolution of five meters.
. . . so you'll need to build a big one finger salute statue on your front lawn . . . big enough to be picked up by Facebook's satellites.
Just remember to tell the neighbors that it is not directed at them, but at Facebook.
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If your ISP uses the same DHCP pool for a wide area, that will happen. Of course, large companies might pay for data from other tracking sites where you have provided that info (Facebook, Google, etc). But by IP address alone, it's unlikely.
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I think you underestimate how many people use Facebook on a mobile device with full access to location services - and in 3rd-world countries there are few desktop web site users anyway. They would have a pretty accurate mapping, even if it's not 1:1 per every human.
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Seems Implausible (Score:3)
Facebook claims to know where everyone lives...and Google Maps can't even find our house - it's claimed to be on a side street behind us where other houses that are on that side street are. They (Google) fixed it once after 6 correction submissions over 2 years, but it got retconned.
Even in NK? (Score:1)
Even in North Korea?
American cheese, hotdogs, and Facebook (Score:1)
What the fuck? Article contradicts summary (Score:2)
Where the fuck did this 7.5 billion people, "every person on earth" come from?
The article clearly says they have coverage of 23 countries, and "millions" of people.
Not surprised... (Score:1)
Hooray! (Score:2)
Now no one will ever be lost again!
Or, on the other hand, you now can find where to go to really be alone!
Unless it doesn't work that way. With Facebook, who knows?
Facebook free internet is a walled garden (Score:1)
Facebook says it will use its map data to help bring free internet access to un-served communities. BUT the 'Free Basics' internet service only provides restricted access to certain websites!
That prompted "65 advocacy groups from 31 countries [to] release an open letter to Mark Zuckerberg, calling then-Internet.org a 'walled garden' in which the world’s poorest people only have access to a limited set of online services approved by Facebook and local carriers," according to a Mashable report* in 2016
Re: No (Score:2)