Instagram’s head honcho, Adam Mosseri, has taken to the platform to dispel one of the internet’s most enduring myths: that Meta secretly activates your microphone to deliver uncannily relevant ads. In a recent post, Mosseri addressed this long-standing conspiracy theory, admitting even his own wife has questioned if Instagram is “listening” to their conversations. However, the timing of this denial is somewhat ironic, given Meta’s recent announcement that it will soon start targeting ads based on users’ interactions with its AI products.
The idea that our phones are secretly eavesdropping on us to serve tailored ads is a persistent one. We’ve all experienced the uncanny phenomenon of discussing a product, only to see an ad for it pop up in our feed soon after. Is it a coincidence, or is there some form of digital sorcery at play? Perhaps, it’s the influence of Mark Zuckerberg himself? Mosseri is quick to dismiss these notions, attributing the phenomenon to Instagram’s recommendation engine instead.
According to Mosseri, the engine uses advertiser data and lookalike profiles to predict what users will engage with. It’s a sophisticated algorithm that learns from our behavior, not our conversations. He even offered a practical reason why microphones aren’t involved: constant recording would drain our batteries and trigger the microphone indicator light.
Meta has denied the microphone myth before, with Zuckerberg himself swearing under oath in Congress in 2018. However, the company’s upcoming privacy policy changes, set to roll out on December 16, suggest a shift in its data usage. The new policy will allow Meta to tap into user interactions with its AI products, potentially providing even more insight into our preferences and behaviors.
This shift could be significant, as users often share more personal details with chatbots than they would in a casual scroll. It’s like handing the world’s most inquisitive ad machine an even bigger notebook filled with our deepest thoughts and desires. Moreover, it’s not just about the data we share; it’s also about the data we generate through our interactions with these AI systems.
Mosseri also offered a psychological explanation for why we might perceive ads as being too timely. He suggested that we might see an ad before discussing the product, but not consciously register it. Later, when we think about the product, we might assume our phone has read our mind, when in reality, it’s just our faulty memory at play.
So, Instagram isn’t secretly wiretapping your brunch plans, or is it? With Meta’s new AI-driven ad strategy, it might not need to. The microphone myth may fade, but it could be replaced by an even creepier feeling: that the algorithm knows us better than we know ourselves.
But is Meta’s new plan to use AI chat interactions for ad targeting really worse than microphone access? Or is it just a natural evolution of personalized advertising? The line between personalized and intrusive is blurring, and it’s up to each of us to decide where we draw the line.
