T he answer is a lot more than you think. If the advertisements that appear in your Facebook newsfeed appear remarkably relevant, it’s because they know you well, but is it too well? Facebook earned just under $30 billion in ad revenue in 2016 alone by using its vast data on its 1.86 billion users to sell targeted information to advertisers they use to offer products and services based on your personal Facebook habits and responses. Researcher Michal Kosinski devised a model that analysed a user’s Facebook “likes” to predict information such as ethnicity, sexual orienta- tion and political beliefs to both create and locate personal psychologi- cal profiles. Going back to Capitol Hill, it is believed that a similar strategy of data analysis may have helped Donald Trump reach the White House. Cambridge Analytica harvested data from an estimated 87 million Facebook users and used the information to send them targeted campaign ads that appealed to their personal needs and desires which is why Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg was called to testify before Congress. While the debate and questioning continues on what Facebook does with your data, it has become more and more disturbing how much data they have on their users and how it can be used. But howmuch is toomuch?Well, that is what is being asked on Capitol Hill these days.
E lon Musk’s Boring Co. raised $113 million in equity to dig tunnels and develop a high-speed transportation system known as the hyperloop. The financing round included 31 unnamed investors, according to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Musk is financing more than 90 percent of the project with the rest of the projects funding from employees, the Boring Co. said, adding that no venture capitalists or outside investors participated in the round of funding, which was the first private stock sale disclosed with the SEC for the year-old venture.
Musk, who is the billionaire technologist behind Tesla Inc. and Space Exploration Technologies Corp. is now developing a travel hyperloop, which would be a tube-based system to transport people from San Francisco to Los Angeles in a half hour.
76
SPOTLIGHT ON BUSINESS MAGAZINE • APRIL 2018
Made with FlippingBook - Online catalogs