Political microtargeting is overblown, but still a danger to democracy - Business Insider

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Easily overblown, little-understood, and dangerous: Why we need to understand political microtargeting

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg leaving The Merrion Hotel in Dublin after a meeting with politicians to discuss regulation of social media and harmful content in April 2019.We learned this week that the Trump campaign may have tried to dissuade millions of Black voters from voting in 2016 through highly targeted online ads.

Microtargeting involves using the huge amounts of data consumers give away online about who they are friends with and what they like to target ads at them. And yet experts warn that while microtargeting is troubling, imputing the technology with mysterious abilities to persuade vast numbers of voters may be a distraction from real voter suppression. Ultimately, we need to understand the technology better.The very broad strokes of how microtargeting works go like this: Your behavior online generates a wealth of data about what you are like.

Although the Channel 4 documentary rightly pointed out that voter turnout among Black people fell in the districts where the Trump campaign deployed its "deterrence" campaign, Simon said this could be down to correlation rather than causation. Dr. Tom Dobber, an expert in political communication at the University of Amsterdam, agreed that the Channel 4 report did not prove the Trump campaign's attempt to influence Black voters had been a success. More generally he does believe microtargeting can be effective — but its efficacy can be blown out of proportion.

Jamal Watkins, vice president for the NAACP, told Channel 4 that the use of microtargeting to systematically disenfranchise voters was a disturbing part of the documentary's findings.

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Mark Zuckerberg is possibly a good programmer. But as a leader, he doesn't suit us, Facebook users. We need an independent leader, outside of politics.

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