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but ever since these companies started

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amassing our data the clock has been

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ticking in 2008 we showed you how you

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and your friends 'facebook data could be

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accessed by a rogue facebook application

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without consent in 2011 a researcher

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called Mikael Kaczynski warns that if

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computers could analyze enough Facebook

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data from enough people they could spot

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connections between the way you act

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online and your personality traits the

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type of person you are what's really

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world-changing about those algorithms

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it's that they can take your music

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preferences or your book preferences and

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extract from these seemingly innocent

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information very accurate predictions

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about your religiosity leadership

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potential political views personality

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and so on by having hundreds and

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hundreds of thousands of Americans

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undertake this survey we were able to

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form a model to predict the personality

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of every single adult in the United

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States of America by 2016 alexander nix

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was explaining how cambridge analytic

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could use this kind of research to find

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people of different personality types

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and target them with specific messages

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that might influence their behavior if

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you know that the personality of the

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people you're targeting you can nuance

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your messaging to resonate more

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effectively with those key audience

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groups because it's personality that

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drives behavior and behavior that

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obviously influences how you vote soon

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afterwards these techniques were used by

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two political campaigns that would rock

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the world

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yes your likes and dislikes your

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comments and posts your personal data

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they are valuable but it's what they say

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about you as a person that's where the

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real power lies no one knows exactly how

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much these techniques actually

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contributed to the results of the votes

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one of the first researchers to ask the

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question was Paul Olivier - hey

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he works on an article at the end of

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2016 that investigated what was

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happening and this week he was here in

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London to give evidence to MPs about the

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latest revelations sitting alongside him

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in the Commons Select Committee was

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Cambridge analytic a whistleblower

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Christopher Wylie and straight after the

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session Paul sat down with me this isn't

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just about Facebook and this isn't just

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about Cambridge analytic where is it

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this kind of data collection analysis

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has been going on for a long time

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and it's being done by lots of people

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right so it's in two ways it's not just

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about those companies Facebook enables a

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lot more companies than just camber

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charity care to suck out data in similar

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ways so that's the first thing and then

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Facebook is just one player in a big

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ecosystem of online advertising online

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profiling some of the companies you have

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heard of but some of them you just have

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no relationship with even if you fully

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understand the terms and conditions that

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you're agreeing to about what data

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you're sharing I don't think anyone

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really understood what can be inferred

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from the data so not the list of your

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friends not your likes and dislikes but

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the things that you've never talked

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about that now they can tell from your

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digital footprint yeah it's really hard

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to understand the inference power of

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this data what can be deduced from it

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that's true how people make decisions

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basically whether they think about about

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the issue but before making a decision

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or not another way to say this is that

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they were trying to find gullible people

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so if you are able to do that you can

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just make them you know buy into

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anything into any content it's easy to

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believe that Facebook managed to swing

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the u.s. election

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to swing brexit was only people on

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Facebook who saw these new ads that were

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targeted to them and then went out and

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possibly changed their votes is that

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what we're talking about or are we

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talking about Facebook just being used

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as a research tool that could then be

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applied to the wider community in in

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many ways whether people were

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individually convinced to vote

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differently I don't personally believe

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that's how it happens what I believe is

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that Facebook itself could be

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manipulated using those techniques to

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make some content go viral that would

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affect public discourse so that would

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steer the conversation basically and if

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you're able to do this more or less you

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know automated more less repetitive in a

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repetitive fashion then you've partly

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already won the election because you're

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steering the conversation around the

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election and that's precisely the point

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that Hillary Clinton has been making

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again and again about camera gigantica

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is their ability to steer the

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conversation on specific topics like

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emails and that's that had an impact the

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fact that some content was Reshard

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widely during the election had an impact

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on editorial decisions made by classic

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media more established media which in

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turn had an impact on you know other

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people's opinions Paul says that even

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though Facebook and Google have recently

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allowed us to download everything that

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they have on us it's not really

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everything so Facebook can collect data

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of people who don't have Facebook

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accounts

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yeah it's called shadow profiles yeah so

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that practice for instance has been

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forbidden in Belgium where I'm from they

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even people who do have an account are

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being tracked all over the web all over

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that same information is collected about

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them why can't they see it why can't

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they see all the web pages that Facebook

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knows they visited before making that

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transparent will have a very dramatic

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effect I think in making people aware of

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how much tracking goes on do you think

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that UK or EU regulation is strong

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enough when it comes to protecting

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our data that's what part of what I

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wanted to say in the committee we have

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very strong regulations around personal

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data that are going to get stronger but

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it's completely useless and actually

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worse than not having them if we're not

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going to enforce them they need to be

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enforced that's the critical point we're

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currently things are failing why are

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they not being enforced because the

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regulator's currently see their role as

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balancing commercial interests with

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Democratic interest around oversight of

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personal data and that balancing they've

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done so far was wrong or simply wrong

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too much on the side of commercial

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interests and not enough the

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counterbalances issue on Facebook's

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reputation and its wealth has taken a

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massive hit in the last couple of weeks

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with 80 billion dollars being wiped off

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its value so can the recently announced

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new privacy tools help to restore

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confidence this is the end for Facebook

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Facebook can still adapt their ways they

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can still change they will have to

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anyway because of the regulation that's

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coming into force it's an opportunity to

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revenge themselves if you want to say it

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that way