Facebook is just one of many online sites that track what you look at and focus on showing you content based on your social media behaviors and habits. While some people find this quite useful, others say it’s an infringement of their privacy. However, a new browser extension will now let you take a look at what Facebook sees when it infers what content you want popping up.
The new, free extension is called Data Selfie, and it lets Facebook users see how machine learning algorithms are used to give you a personalized experienced tailored to your wants and needs. As soon as the app is downloaded it starts to monitor your Facebook usage and begins to learn your social media patterns, including what you browse, when you do it, and how long for; what you like, click on and type.
All of these behaviors and habits are then plotted on a map to show how much time you spend per day on different activities. The algorithms then kick in and start to predict things such as your shopping habits or political views based on things you have typed or viewed. It may sound a little intrusive, and in some ways it is, but it’s only robots that will see this data – the rest that Data Selfie collects will be stored locally on your own hard drive. If you’re intrigued and want to have a go yourself, Data Selfie’s code is available on Github now, so why not check it out?
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