Are they listening to us everytime?

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We all know what the Facebook is going through. In case, if you are not familiar with it, let me explain you the whole drama. Recently, Facebook has been accused of selling user data to the third party. According to the founder, Mark Zuckerberg said that data wasn't sold but rather stolen from their server with the help of third-party apps which is for fun and totally fake like who will be your valentine, which celebrity you look like, etc. It was an app called "thisisyourdigitallife" created by  Aleksandr Kogan, a lecturer at Cambridge University. We have the habit of clicking on these apps once we see them. It is not a problem, the problem is we don't review what informations are we giving to them. As a user, we all have right to choose the information that we are ready to give to a certain app but most of us don't seem to use this feature. We just allow everything even if they take information which is not at all relevant to the app. The app was published in 2013 and recently it was closed. Facebook at that time hadn't had a good policy and control over these type of apps. It was later announced that the same data was used for manipulating people which led to Donald Trump being the president of United States. Later on the interrogation with the CEO of Facebook, it was revealed that the app had collected about 83 million user's data and was sold to a company named  Cambridge Analytica. Not only that he himself admitted that his data was also misused but he didn't clarify what actually was taken from his profile. This was all about Facebook, now let's talk about the real reason you are reading this. 

Recently, a topic was raised, if Facebook listens to us every time through our cell phones. This topic was something I was interested in. Facebook may have done that before but I don't think it does at this time. It is obvious that it records all the Facebook calls in the name of improving the quality. Now, they don't need to do so because they have WhatsApp for that. They bought WhatsApp so that they can get information on whom you contact and what you say. They run Ads based on that, which helps business organizations to find the appropriate customers for their product. Do you think they charge for a small banner? No, actually that banner may take less space on their server than some of our posts. They actually charge for finding the right customer based on their data collected from us. If you feel like you and your personal life is safe, think again. Not only Facebook but there are many like this namely: Viber, IMO, Telegram, Hike, etc. The list goes on and on. If you even have a cell phone, to think that your personal secrets are safe is a foolish thought. Even if you don't have anything installed, your service provider is listening to you.

Let's get back to the topic now. Although, Facebook has WhatsApp for this purpose, what about the time we are not using Facebook call or WhatsApp call and are enjoying a talk with someone in person or making plans with family and friends. It is told that Facebook listens to these conversations too and use it for targeting Ads. This may freak out some of you but this is actually true. Although they deny of having such ability in their Facebook app, they actually have it. Not only Facebook, not all but most of the social media does that and Google is not an exception. If you are not convinced totally, try it yourself. Get your headphone on and try to speak about something that you haven't searched or not even a topic of your interest. Speak about the topic a little and keep on repeating the word. Now, open your favorite Social Media or Search Engine and go to some random sites. News sites are the best as they have a high number of Ads. You should find at least one Ad related to the topic you talked about.

It's not a coincidence that Google Assistance activates when you say "Ok Google" or "Hey Google". Be honest, you use these words at least once in most of your conversations. We have heard many times people about complaining they have unwanted and unintended recordings in their Google history. Sometimes Google Assistant starts recording when you just say "Ok" or "Hey" or maybe there are other keywords for that or maybe it has some kinds of AI technology. This cannot be a mistake or any sort of coincidence, this is clearly a good move in their favor. Be careful, don't forget to turn your Mobile Assistant off.

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