Facebook Promised Free Internet Access, but Users Got Charged Anyway (wsj.com) 17
Facebook says it's helping millions of the world's poorest people get online through apps and services that allow them to use internet data free. Internal company documents show that many of these people end up being charged in amounts that collectively add up to an estimated millions of dollars a month. WSJ: To attract new users, Facebook made deals with cellular carriers in countries including Pakistan, Indonesia and the Philippines to let low-income people use a limited version of Facebook and browse some other websites without data charges. Many of the users have inexpensive cellphone plans that cost just a few dollars a month, often prepaid, for phone service and a small amount of internet data. Because of software problems at Facebook, which it has known about and failed to correct for months, people using the apps in free mode are getting unexpectedly charged by local cellular carriers for using data. In many cases they only discover this when their prepaid plans are drained of funds.
In internal documents, employees of Facebook parent Meta Platforms acknowledge this is a problem. Charging people for services Facebook says are free "breaches our transparency principle," an employee wrote in an October memo. In the year ended July 2021, charges made by the cellular carriers to users of Facebook's free-data products grew to an estimated total of $7.8 million a month, when purchasing power adjustments were made, from about $1.3 million a year earlier, according to a Facebook document. Facebook calls the problem "leakage," since paid services are leaking into the free apps and services. It defines leakage in internal documents as, "When users are in Free Mode and believe that the data they are using is being covered by their carrier networks, even though these users are actually paying for the data themselves."
In internal documents, employees of Facebook parent Meta Platforms acknowledge this is a problem. Charging people for services Facebook says are free "breaches our transparency principle," an employee wrote in an October memo. In the year ended July 2021, charges made by the cellular carriers to users of Facebook's free-data products grew to an estimated total of $7.8 million a month, when purchasing power adjustments were made, from about $1.3 million a year earlier, according to a Facebook document. Facebook calls the problem "leakage," since paid services are leaking into the free apps and services. It defines leakage in internal documents as, "When users are in Free Mode and believe that the data they are using is being covered by their carrier networks, even though these users are actually paying for the data themselves."
You mean Meta? (Score:4, Insightful)
If you are going to put all the good stuff as Meta then you should also be putting all the bad stuff as Meta too.
Words (Score:5, Insightful)
Not doing what you said you're going to do is called lack of integrity.
Not clearly indicating to users of the free app that what they're about to do is going to use paid data is called lack of transparency.
Making paid features available without consent prompts in an app specifically marketed as free to poor people is called a scam.
Re: (Score:2)
I have one of these plans on one of my SIM cards, but if I read the details correctly it seems simpler. For about a quarter a day, if I buy a week, the Facebook, WhatsApp, and twitter stuff appears to included, as well as voice and text, and I just have limited data. I donâ(TM)t really know if
Re: (Score:3)
Two obvious deals they might have made with telecoms are: 1) Meta earns advertising money from the new audience, pays the telecoms for the traffic. 2) Meta earns advertising money from the new audience, pays the telecoms nothing, but telecoms also get a way to increase revenues because if a free user is already online they might then do things that cost money.
Meta is blaming software problems. They've known about this for months, apparently. Do you believe they don't have enough cash to get a few smart peop
I'm (Score:1)
shocked! Shocked, I tell you!
Third-party cell carriers (Score:3, Informative)
The issue is that third-party cellular carriers in India charged the users, not Facebook. That Facebook knew about the problem but failed to correct it reflects badly on Facebook, but its the cell carriers that profited, not Facebook.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
LOL (Score:2)
"breaches our transparency principle", sorry, I laughed.
Downside (Score:2)
Charging people for services Facebook says are free "breaches our transparency principle,"
It doesn't breach a transparency principle. It breaches a fraud principle. Or a programming bug principle. Or both.
"Free" Internet... (Score:3)
"Agree to watch ads while you surf in exchange for free internet."
"Rent this computer that includes free internet."
"Buy this modem that includes free internet."
Over and over and over again these 'offers' went bust as the revenue side of the equation never materialized.
What weasel wrote this article? (Score:1)
"an estimated total of $7.8 million a month, when purchasing power adjustments were made"
What does that even mean, really? Who decides how to calculate purchasing power? Is it based on food, technology, the cost of the cell phone plan, ...? Considering this "free WhatsaFaceaGram" is targeted at countries with $3/month cell phone plans, one could assume they inflated the charges by at least 10x. But that would be oversimplifying things... in some of those countries, people likely make $100/month or less,
Re: (Score:2)
+1 they should give the actual numbers first.
The fuzzy math about adjusted purchasing power is interesting but not crucial. It would have been more useful if they translated it to how many Superbowl ad seconds you can buy, or how many football field lengths it would be if you used all that money to buy footballs and then lined them up end to end. Just kidding./p.
Facebook lies? OMG!!! (Score:2)
There is no God!
Seepage... (Score:2)
They should of called it seepage, like you know when your getting rammed up the ass...