Have you ever noticed how the ad’s on Facebook seem to be about things you just looked at on other sites. Well its not an accident because Facebook knows what you are doing on the web. Today’s post will cover How Facebook Knows What You Are Doing and what you can do to protect yourself.
When you have billions of users, you have a lot of influence online. If you are speaking of influence on the web, Facebook on the top of the list. So how does Facebook know what you are doing?
How Facebook Knows About You
Facebook has a couple of things it offers websites. They have 3 primary tools that collect what you do. All of the tools Facebook offers websites have 1 ultimate goal, to get as much data history as possible. According to the FB page – How does Facebook receive information
- Facebook Pixel and Facebook SDK. Facebook Pixel and Facebook SDK are tools that businesses can choose to add to their website or app. These tools allow the business to send information about people’s interactions on their website or app to Facebook, such as when someone makes a purchase or opens an app.
- Facebook Login and Account Kit. A business can add Facebook Login or Account Kit to their app or website, which lets you log in without having to create and remember a new password. When a business uses Login or Account Kit, we get some information from them, such as the type of device you’re using.
- With Facebook Login, you log into a business’s website with your Facebook account information.
- With Account Kit, you log into an app or website using your phone number or email address.
So knowing that Facebook is everywhere, what can you do? That answer has 2 parts.
How Do You Protect Yourself From Facebook Knowing
- If Facebook is tracking you how do you protect yourself? The 1st part of that answer is directly on Facebook and is known as Off-Facebook Activity. What is Off-Facebook Activity
Off-Facebook activity includes information that businesses and organizations share with us about your interactions with them. Interactions are things like visiting their website or logging into their app with Facebook. Off-Facebook activity does not include customer lists that businesses use to show a unique group of customers relevant ads.
Which is how Facebook shows you the ad’s about things you just saw or did. To review who has sent your information and to turn off this function
- Go to Settings
- Click on Your Facebook Information on the left side of the page
- Now select Off-Facebook Activity
- On the right side click Manage Your Off-Facebook Activity
Once you click on the manage link, you will be taken to the Off-Facebook Activity page.
From here you need to do 2 things, if you want to completely turn off this function
- Start by Clearing History. If you take a look at the history, you will see how much influence Facebook has.
- After clearing history, click on Manage Future History on the right
You will get an attempt by Facebook to not touch the setting. Click on Manage Future Activity on this pop up window
- Now select Future Off-Facebook Activity to turn off this function
- You will now see 1 more notice. Select Turn Off and you will have turned off this function.
- The second part involves your browser. More specifically the Firefox browser. If you use the Firefox browser, it includes a built in feature called Facebook Container. The feather
As explained with the Facebook Container, an icon that looks like a fence appears in the address bar when you visit sites that have functions to share info with Facebook.
The Facebook Container function will block the sites from sharing with Facebook and will let you know when it does.
Final Thought
The Facebook container function is built in to Firefox. Other browsers have similar plug-in’s but none currently appear as complete as the Facebook container function on Firefox. These are the steps to try and limit what Facebook can learn about you.
Source(s)
- Firefox – Info on Facebook Container Function
- Facebook – How Facebook Tracks Users Off-Facebook
How Facebook Knows What You Are Doing
