GenerationY will — paradoxically — pay a high price for giving up its privacy to Facebook.
Taos, New Mexico, Fall 2012. At 18, Tina Porter has been on Facebook for four years. Duly briefed by her parents, a teacher and a therapist, she takes great care not to put contents — remarks on her wall, photos, videos — that could expose her in a unwanted manner.
Still. Spending about 30 hours a month on the social network, she has become as transparent as a looking glass. It will impact the cost of her health insurance, her ability to get a loan and to find a job.
Denver, Colorado, spring 2018. Tina is now 24. She’s finishing her law degree at Colorado State University. She’s gone through a lot: experimenting with substances, been pulled over for speeding a couple of times, relying on pills to regain some sleep after being dumped by her boyfriend. While Tina had her share of downs, she also has her ups. Living in Denver she never missed an opportunity to go hiking, mountain biking, or skiing — except when she had to spend 48 gruesome hours in the dark, alone with a severe migraine. But she remains fit, and she likes to record her sports performances on health sites — all connected to Facebook — and compare with friends.
Seattle, winter 2020. In a meeting room overlooking the foggy Puget Sound, Alan Parsons, head of human resources at the Wilson, McKenzie & Whitman law firm holds his monthly review of the next important hires. Parsons is with Marcus Chen, a senior associate at Narrative Data Inc., both are poring over a selection of resumés. Narrative Data was created in 2015 by a group of MIT graduates. Still headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the startup now helps hundreds of corporations pick the right talent.
Narrative Data doesn’t track core competencies. The firm is more into character and personality analysis; it assesses ability to sustain stress, to make the right decision under pressure. To achieve this, Narrative Data is staffed with linguists, mathematicians, statisticians, psychologists, sociologists, neuroscientists. What they basically do is data-mining the social internet: blogs, forums, Twitter, and of course Facebook. Over the years, they’ve drawn a map of behaviors, based on language people use. Thanks to Narrative Data’s algorithm, everyone aged above 20, can have his or her life unfolded like a gigantic electronic papyrus scroll. HR people and recruiters love it. So do insurance companies and banks.
Of course, in 2015 no one will be dumb enough to write on his Facebook wall something like “Gee, bad week ahead, I’m heading to my third chemotherapy session”. But Narrative Data is able to pinpoint anyone’s health problems by weaving together language patterns. For instance, it pores over health forums where people talk, openly but anonymously, about their conditions. By analyzing millions of words, Narrative Data has mapped what it calls Health Clusters, data aggregates that provide remarkable accuracy in revealing health conditions. The Cambridge company is even working on a black program able to “de-anonymize” health forum members thanks to language patterns cross-matching with Facebook pages. But the project raises too many privacy issues do be rolled out — yet.
Tina Porter’s resumé popped up thanks to LinkedIn Expert, the social network’s high-end professional service. LinkedIn, too, developed its own technology to data-mine resumés for specific competences. Tina’s research on trade disputes between Korea and the United States caught everyone’s interest at Wilson, McKenzie. That’s why her “3D Resumé” — a Narrative Data trademark — is on the top of the pile, that is displayed on a large screen in the meeting room.
Narrative’s Marcus Chen does the pitch:
“Tina Porter, 26. She’s what you need for the transpacific trade issues you just mentioned, Alan. Her dissertation speaks for itself, she even learned Korean…”
He pauses.
“But?…” Asks the HR guy.
“She’s afflicted with acute migraine. It occurs at least a couple of times a month. She’s good at concealing it, but our data shows it could be a problem”, Chen said.
“How the hell do you know that?”
“Well, she falls into this particular Health Cluster. In her Facebook babbling, she sometimes refers to a spike in her olfactory sensitivity — a known precursor to a migraine crisis. In addition, each time, for a period of several days, we see a slight drop in the number of words she uses in her posts, her vocabulary shrinks a bit, and her tweets, usually sharp, become less frequent and more nebulous. That’s an obvious pattern for people suffering from serious migraine. In addition, the Zeo Sleeping Manager website and the stress management site HeartMath — both now connected with Facebook – suggest she suffers from insomnia. In other words, Alan, we think you can’t take Ms Porter in the firm. Our Predictive Workforce Expenditure Model shows that she will cost you at least 15% more in lost productivity. Not to mention the patterns in her Facebook entries suggesting a 75% chance for her to become pregnant in the next 18 months, again according to our models.”
“Not exactly a disease from what I know. But OK, let’s move on”.
I stop here. You might think I’m over the top with this little tale. But the (hopefully) fictitious Narrative Data Inc. could be the offspring of existing large consumer research firms, combined to semantic and data-mining experts such as Recorded Future. This Gothenburg (Sweden)-based company — with a branch in… Cambridge, Mass. – provides real time analysis of about 150,000 sources (news services, social networks, blogs, government web sites). The firm takes pride in its ability to predict a vast array of events (see this Wired story).
Regarding the “de-anonymizing” the web, two years ago in Paris, I met a mathematician working on pattern detection models. He focused on locating individuals simply through their cell phones habits. Even if the person buys a cell phone with a fake ID and uses it with great care, based on past behavior, his/her real ID will be recovered in a matter of weeks. (As for Facebook, it recently launched a snitching program aimed at getting rid of pseudonyms — cool.)
Expanding such capabilities is only a matter of refining algorithms, setting up the right data hoses and lining up the processing power required to deal with petabytes of unstructured data. Not an issue anymore. Moore’s Law is definitely on the Inquisitors’ side.
– frederic.filloux@mondaynote.com
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27 Comments
I can’t imagine it playing out this way. Prediction is hard not because we have too little data, but because the links between the data (and the future environment) are incredibly complex and non-linear. Thus, the more data we gather (especially about people), the lesser the signal and the greater the noise. So:
1. All of those complicated models pouring over every bit of data exhaust will, for the most part, have the accuracy of dart-throwing chimps.
2. We all have our quirks. The people without the migraines will have something else. In any case, those quirks are generally significantly less relevant to performance than more obvious traits.
3. I struggle to imagine the current ability to data-stalk (your ability to look at people’s information without them being notified that you were looking at that specific information) persisting indefinitely into the future. Put simpler, we will soon have lists of who looked at our Facebook profiles, what they looked at, and when.
This is tricky. A discrimination lawsuit can be easily triggered if someone is denied employment, at least I think in the USA, on forecasted online data about a person online’s activity that has no relation to their job performance. If we can’t ask you whether you’re pregnant in the interview, then how can we ask your Facebook page whether you’ll be pregnant with a 75% chance in a few months?
I don’t wish to be the firm that gets hit with a class-action on this one.
ouch!
I couldn’t agree more with Frederic Filloux. I have just launched a book (in English and Danish – and in January German) about it, Fake it – http://www.digital-selfdefense.com and I know that our advice using pseudonyms on eg Facebook is not enough. But I still believe it is better than using your real name on Facebook. At least for now. All kids signing up for Facebook should do that. It is outrageous that children have to reveal all about themselves as soon as they join FB, just because FB tells them to and it is FBs business model. Before FB children have played with other identities and know how to navigate with that. We should protect our children so they do not end up paying a huge price for polluting with their personal data like that
@aexpc Do not underestimate the power of the dark side, or, indeed, the next couple of generations of CPUs. Traversing incredibly complex and non-linear links is becoming trivially easy. We may all have our quirks, but those of us who are better at concealing them (by not sharing every tiny little detail of our lives on Facebook) will be at an advantage.
@Taariq If you read the article again, you’ll notice that Tina didn’t even know her resumé was being considered, so the company can put it in the discard pile without fear of consequences.
Addendum – two weeks prior to the meeting described above, McKenzie recieves a letter from an employment law firm retained by Tina, indicating that through predictive software systems developed for employment law firms at Stanford university, they are 94.3% certain that McKenzie hiring managers will be tempted to disqualify Tina based on predictions about her performance developed by Narrative Data Inc, and notifying them that a wrongful discrimination package is prepped and ready for immediated execution on her behalf should they decide not to hire her.
As of right now I have complete control over who and what can parse my facebook data. I find it odd that this allegedly well informed individual didn’t simply make it off limits except to explicit friends.
But yes, as soon as these techniques become public people stop using facebook or facebook takes steps to protect users.
Predictions doesn’t _need_ to work. It just needs to give an impression that they do. If your modelling of their social data shows a 20% increase in the chance of a serious disease, the chances of them getting hired just dropped much more than that.
Of course, the model might not be exact. Or even correct. And, after all, even if it is there is just an increase of a likelihood. Nobody really knows. And nobody will care.
That’s the point. It’s a scary one at that.
So? She did not get high-sttress job that would also leave a negative impact on her health. On the other hand she now has a better chance of getting a job offer that is more suited to her specific needs – there are companies that love young mothers and areas where you can easily switch people around so that people that are sharpest at this point in time can take the more difficult tasks while those that are currently down can relax but still do menial and simpler tasks.
The deeper you dig the more you discover that no person is perfect – everyone has strong and weak sides, personel management is about matching people with tasks and with each other.
You know what they say about statistics, damned lies and statistics… the fact is, it’s perfectly valid in statistics to ignore data that isn’t definitive… the problem with this is imho when the majority of data is what’s ignored it’s no longer truly representative of the whole. But try to tell a statistician that.
You missed something crucial in your story. As soon as companies like Narrative Data get a foothold I predict PDO (Personal Data Optimization) companies, very much like SEO (Search Engine Optimization) companies, will pop up all over the place and offer to manage your online social profile for a small fee. Companies like Narrative Data will then try to squeeze out whatever other legal sources of personal signals are left until the well dries up and we are back to square one asking for references and recommendation letters.
The kind of personal data optimization I’m talking about already exists in rudimentary form and like all things it is usually the rich that get the most benefits. If you have money you can start off by simply sending your children to a private school instead of a public one. In that private school your children enjoy benefits like small classroom sizes with no more than 10 students per teacher, private one-on-one tutoring in case they start lagging behind in any of their classes, tons of opportunities to be involved in extracurricular school activities, SAT prep, college admission essay “help”, direct access to admission committees at various higher education institutions, etc. And this is all simply because you sent them to a private school instead of a public one. You are also free to spend your money on various other enrichment activities for your kid once they are pre-accepted to a higher education institution of your choice.
@Random(42), I don’t disagree that it will be computationally possible to form a ‘full’ (descriptive) profile of each of us. Rather, my argument is that the descriptive profile will have very poor bottom-line predictive powers (even if no one does try to optimise-for or deceive the systems trying to form the descriptive profiles. In other words, while we may not be able to effectively manage things we cannot measure, not everything that can be measured benefits from being managed. For complex systems, global optimisation shares nothing in common with aggregating local optimisations.
I suppose some people may be caught out in the transition, especially within companies with particularly spineless and idiotic HR departments, but developing an antagonistic relationship with employees (where the employer tries to spy and the employee tries to disguise) and spending large sums on outside data analysts will translate to final productivity that is not better, and probably worse, than that of companies who will ignore this path. The company with the workforce free from migraines will not earn itself better financial performance.
You mean to tell me that no one learned over those years that working for companies who are more concerned about their performance than creating teams that their sums were greaert because of their brilliance they brought to the table are still a focus for people to work for?
As data shifts so does the rest of the world around them.
Imagine this, large corporations have been crippled and gone out of business because the voice of the people in social has been able to create momentum and buying power for more responsible businesses to grow and profit. There are not large businesses anymore, there are small groups and individuals that slide in and out of projects that are more fluid than any big business ever could be and being hired is about your reputation if results via social networks.
This is an interesting and well-crafted story. In summary, we can say this reïterates the adage that “if you’re not paying for a product, then you’re what’s being bought and sold.”
It’s feasible because it’s an evolution of what’s already ocurring. Some of the corelations you note may be difficult to make with high confidence via algorithm; that doesn’t mean decision makers won’t use data collected to arrive at their conclusions.
My favourite part was the “Be Sociable, Share!” links at the bottom.
Some poor conclusions here- that a little bit of information would instantly push a candidate aside- in fact a better business use would be to make a lower offer of salary, and ensure that the candidate is aware of the “family friendly” potential of a lesser tracked position. Thus getting a prime candidate for less money, with a longer exposure to the business, and the ability to “lock in” the candidate over the long run of five to ten years.
Your models are too short run and conclusions should be framed in a more subtle fashion- more information can easily obscure or can easily allow a more subtle fit. One of the things assumed is that a “perfect” candidate is always available- which in my mind does not usually exist.
Unless you are talking about a truly chronic disease and substantially subpar performance- one could look more at tailoring the work and compensation appropriately. Remember, more information provides a better basis to meet the employer’s needs- not necessarily a basis that needs to harm the putative employee.
Your mode of telling all in this piece of writing is in fact good, every one be able
to easily understand it, Thanks a lot.
All those who think this is too farfetched to be, or become, real should read the article about Recorded Future (link in the article above) and then try not imitating that famous ostrich.
The predator version of the human species is hard at work trying to control every possible detail of life on this planet and the only defense the prey version has is constant awareness (and the willingness to fight back).
“There is no safety for honest men except by believing all possible evil of evil men.” — Edmund Burke
“We’ve witnessed a fire sale of American liberties at bargain basement prices, in return for the false promise of more security… The America being designed right now won’t resemble the America we’ve been defending… The danger isn’t that Big Brother may storm the castle gates. The danger is that Americans don’t realize that he is already inside the castle walls.” — Wayne LaPierre
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Thank you for scaring me back to my ‘social’ sciences. Oh wait, will this ‘confession’ be used against me in 2020?
“she has become as transparent as a looking glass”. A quibble: looking glasses are not transparent. Otherwise, a fine article!
I respectfully disagree:
1) If a law firm is stupid enough not to hire a brilliant young women because of migraine, then another company will seize the opportunity to bring her in and leverage her intelligence and creativity. Why would you want to go work in a law firm that discriminates based on migraine? I have better things to do with my life, and probably so does Tina Porter.
2) As for the mention of “chemotherapy sessions”, it is not necessarily a problem to publish information about your health. What is a problem is the discrimination by insurance companies based on pre-existing conditions. We don’t allow that in France, and Obamacare is in the process of ending it in the US too. But will it stand the presidential election?
The issue may not be to enforce privacy, but to adapt the social and economic environment to the end of privacy. Pre-existing conditions and health insurance are a very good example of what the law can do in the Facebook age.
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