Facebook's Sexist, Ageist Ad-Targeting Violates California Law, Court Finds (arstechnica.com) 71
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Facebook may have to overhaul its entire ad-targeting system after a California court ruled (PDF) last month that the platform's practice of routinely targeting ads by age, gender, and other protected categories violates a state anti-discrimination law. The decision came after a 48-year-old Facebook user, Samantha Liapes, fought for years to prove that Facebook had discriminated against her as an older woman using the platform's ad-targeting system to shop for life insurance policies.
Liapes filed a class-action lawsuit against Facebook in 2020. In her complaint, Liapes alleged that "Facebook requires all advertisers to choose the age and gender of its users who will receive ads, and companies offering insurance products routinely tell it to not send their ads to women or older people." Further, she alleged that Facebook's ad-delivery algorithm magnifies the problem by using these required inputs to serve the ads to "lookalike audiences." Through its algorithm, Liapes alleged that she found that Facebook "discriminates against women and older people," by intentionally excluding them from seeing certain life insurance ads. This, Liapes alleged, caused harm by preventing her from signing up for deals that "often change and may expire" -- deals which she said were disproportionately being advertised on Facebook to younger and/or male audiences. As evidence, Liapes pointed to ads that Facebook did not serve to her -- allegedly because advertisers used the platform's Audience Selection and Lookalike Audience tools to exclude her -- as an older woman [...]. "As a result, she had a harder time learning about those products or services," Liapes' complaint alleged. [...]
Initially, a court agreed with Facebook's arguments that Liapes had not provided sufficient evidence establishing Facebook's intent or demonstrating harms caused, but rather than amend her complaint, Liapes appealed. Then, in what tech law expert Eric Goldman on his blog called a "shocking conclusion," a California court last month reversed that initial decision, finding instead that Facebook's ad-targeting tools are not neutral, discriminate against users by age and gender, and are not immune under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Goldman -- who joked that Liapes wanting more Facebook ads is "a desire shared by almost no one" -- said that the potential impact of this ruling goes beyond possibly shaking up Facebook's ad system. It also seemingly implicates every other ad network by finding that "any gender- or age-based ad targeting for any product or service (and targeting based on any other protected characteristics) could violate the Unruh Act." If the ruling is upheld, that could "have devastating effects on the entire Internet ecosystem," Goldman warned. "The court's single-minded determination to find a valid discrimination claim under these conditions casts a long and troubling shadow over the online advertising industry," Goldman wrote in his blog. "Who needs new privacy laws if the Unruh Act already bans most ad targeting?"
"The opinion never expressly says that the Unruh Act regulates ad targeting," Goldman told Ars. "It takes some reading between the lines to reach that conclusion."
Liapes filed a class-action lawsuit against Facebook in 2020. In her complaint, Liapes alleged that "Facebook requires all advertisers to choose the age and gender of its users who will receive ads, and companies offering insurance products routinely tell it to not send their ads to women or older people." Further, she alleged that Facebook's ad-delivery algorithm magnifies the problem by using these required inputs to serve the ads to "lookalike audiences." Through its algorithm, Liapes alleged that she found that Facebook "discriminates against women and older people," by intentionally excluding them from seeing certain life insurance ads. This, Liapes alleged, caused harm by preventing her from signing up for deals that "often change and may expire" -- deals which she said were disproportionately being advertised on Facebook to younger and/or male audiences. As evidence, Liapes pointed to ads that Facebook did not serve to her -- allegedly because advertisers used the platform's Audience Selection and Lookalike Audience tools to exclude her -- as an older woman [...]. "As a result, she had a harder time learning about those products or services," Liapes' complaint alleged. [...]
Initially, a court agreed with Facebook's arguments that Liapes had not provided sufficient evidence establishing Facebook's intent or demonstrating harms caused, but rather than amend her complaint, Liapes appealed. Then, in what tech law expert Eric Goldman on his blog called a "shocking conclusion," a California court last month reversed that initial decision, finding instead that Facebook's ad-targeting tools are not neutral, discriminate against users by age and gender, and are not immune under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Goldman -- who joked that Liapes wanting more Facebook ads is "a desire shared by almost no one" -- said that the potential impact of this ruling goes beyond possibly shaking up Facebook's ad system. It also seemingly implicates every other ad network by finding that "any gender- or age-based ad targeting for any product or service (and targeting based on any other protected characteristics) could violate the Unruh Act." If the ruling is upheld, that could "have devastating effects on the entire Internet ecosystem," Goldman warned. "The court's single-minded determination to find a valid discrimination claim under these conditions casts a long and troubling shadow over the online advertising industry," Goldman wrote in his blog. "Who needs new privacy laws if the Unruh Act already bans most ad targeting?"
"The opinion never expressly says that the Unruh Act regulates ad targeting," Goldman told Ars. "It takes some reading between the lines to reach that conclusion."
She doesn't want more ads (Score:4, Insightful)
This isn't like when cheap beer is marketed to men or Mimosas to women. This would be an attempt to limit the visibility of certain heavily regulated products in the hopes that less profitable consumers steer clear of you and/or are shut out from you. With the added bonus that if you are discriminating you avoid adding anyone as a customer who could sue you and therefore they never have standing.
I can see where the line of reasoning and logic comes from.
Re: (Score:3)
Would it be similarly unethical to advertise life insurance in teen magazines without also advertising it in magazines for retired people?
Re:She doesn't want more ads (Score:5, Interesting)
Would it be similarly unethical to advertise life insurance in teen magazines without also advertising it in magazines for retired people?
Good question. Perhaps the distinction might lie in the explicit control of distribution to specific individuals. Targeted online ads make decisions based on knowledge of one specific individual, whereas most other ad media attempt to do the same thing but in a fuzzy way. The magazine example would be illegal if the magazines were only handed out to teens, but since the distribution is not explicitly controlled, anyone could look at the magazine and ads.
The law only addresses actual discrimination and not intended discrimination. If the law addressed intent, then all forms of advertising would be illegal. Of course, since all advertising is probabilistic in reaching the target audience, a necessary question is how the probability threshold that distinguishes between legal and illegal behavior is defined. Unfortunately, although the probability threshold necessarily exists, the definition of that threshold is left to individual judges and therefore necessarily changes based on the judge and the sentiments of that judge on that particular day.
Re: (Score:2)
In that case, advertising health insurance only in a student newspaper would be illegal, but advertising a new suburb only in an ungated white neighborhood would not be.
Re: (Score:2)
In that case, advertising health insurance only in a student newspaper would be illegal, but advertising a new suburb only in an ungated white neighborhood would not be.
I'm not sure advertising in a student newspaper would be a problem, since print copies are generally freely distributed to anyone and online versions are available to a wide audience. Even though I graduated a long time ago I can still read my alma maters' online newspaper or pick up a copy when in town.
Re: (Score:2)
In this particular example, is it unlawful for life insurance companies to charge different premiums and/or fees based on the policyholder;s age, sex, or some other characteristics of a protected class?
Gee, older policyholders should expect to pay more, given the increased risks the carrier faces. Age seems to be an important characteristic. Now, tell me, is sex also?
We're not talking about pricing (Score:5, Informative)
A more obvious example might be that you build a nice little suburb in the 60s and only advertise it in white neighborhoods. This way you get fewer black applicants in the hopes that you get so few you can pass them off as outliers when they get denied.
That's the basic idea. Limit the number of applicants in a range you don't want so that it's easier to blame your lack of those customers on something else. If I have 1 customer out of 1000 it's much harder to establish a pattern of discrimination. Smaller class action size too.
Re: (Score:2)
True, redlining was and is plainly racist and illegal. But race is not objectively material to home ownership. Age could be construed as material to insurability?
Re: (Score:2)
Under the ACA (ObamaCare), pricing can depend on the decade of a person's age, but finer-grained age discrimination is not allowed.
So people aged from 40-49 get one rate, 50-59 another, then 60-69, etc.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not sure the racial comparison is the best one in this scenario. It would be reasonable for a life insurer to assume older would-be applicants are less likely to apply given the considerably higher premiums. Knowing that, wouldn't you want to spend your ad dollars going after those would-be applicants that are most likely to apply?
A better analogy might be if you would build a nice little suburb of $5,000,000 McMansions. Would you then spend your marketing budget advertising it to people Facebook be
Re: (Score:2)
A better analogy might be if you would build a nice little suburb of $5,000,000 McMansions. Would you then spend your marketing budget advertising it to people Facebook believes only make $30,000 a year?
Apparently Facebook either didn't get this memo or thinks I earn a lot more than I actually do, because I get ads for EVs and all sorts of other high-end consumer goods that I have no hope of ever affording. Aside from the issue that it wastes the advertisers' money, I'd probably feel a lot better not constantly being reminded of what I can't afford.
Re: (Score:2)
I haven't had a Facebook account in almost a decade, so this may have changed, but amongst other things that used to be included in the data download were all of the advertising tags they put on you. I'm assuming that's still available in some form and if you can find it they make for very amusing reading. Some of the tags they put on me were fairly accurate, vis-à-vis hobbies and such, others were totally off base.
I'd say at least half of the tags they assigned to me were dead wrong. Another 15 to
Re: (Score:2)
I couldn't find anything like that in my data downloads, the oldest being from 2018. Only thing was a list of advertisers with my contact info, only 3/20 I had actually ever done business with, and for some reason both Airbnb and Airbnb Japan, even though I've never been anywh
Re: (Score:2)
Would you then spend your marketing budget advertising it to people Facebook believes only make $30,000 a year?
Income level is not a protected class, so that would likely be legal.
If you get in trouble, it's likely because you're accused of using income as a proxy for race, since those below $30k would be disproportionately disadvantaged minorities.
Re: (Score:3)
I've never heard of a judicial or statutory precedent that extends protected classes to targeted advertisements. That's obviously a gray area, redlining ads for the new development by race would probably get you into trouble, but I don't think the Civil Rights Act and its statutory/case law successors ever envisioned extending protections to targeted advertisements sans context.
Since they're going after Facebook, not the life insurance company, I'm skeptical there's actual redlining in play here. I'm the
Re: (Score:2)
A more obvious example might be that you build a nice little suburb in the 60s
If you built a neighborhood of houses priced in the $60k range, you wouldn't need to advertise. That shit would go viral and sell out faster than discounted Taylor Swift tickets.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Age seems to be an important characteristic. Now, tell me, is sex also?
Every form of insurance except health insurance is allowed to rate men and women differently. The disparity is most obvious in automotive insurance where men of all ages can expect to pay a higher premium than women of an equal age, after you adjust for other rating factors like geography, vehicle make/model, driving record, etc. The industry justifies this with data that shows men get into more accidents and have more claims than women. For better or worse, society has decided to allow the use of gender
Re: (Score:2)
The ACA ban is clearly not based on objective factors, but rather is a matter of public policy.
Just an aside, but not long ago women tended to receive much less treatment for cardiac illnesses than men. Not because they had fewer cardiac problems, but because they were diagnosed with them far less often. Most reports of symptoms were interpreted as 'hysteria'. This persisted past the 50s, into the 60s, and may have been a more common practice even until recently, though I haven't researched it much more. My
Re: (Score:2)
It's not hard to say that women get the short end of the stick in the healthcare system. There are some frankly foolish omissions in the ACA's treatment of gender though. My favorite, the ACA mandates that health insurance cover birth control for women, including tubal ligation, with zero out of pocket cost, but it does not likewise mandate coverage for vasectomies. There's no good public policy reason for differing treatment here. The sole form of birth control currently available to men (condoms don't
Re: (Score:1)
there is another court case along this same theme and the issue there and here was that the web site required people who wanted to post an ad had to select an age and sex.
In both cases the court said that was illegal, federal law in the first, california law here.
With a magazine or tv show I get to know who the primary views are but that does not prevent someone outside that range from seeing it. with facebook it does prevent that, even if I go into the facebook site for those magazine I wo
Re: (Score:2)
Would it be similarly unethical to ...
It doesn't matter if it's unethical, only if it's illegal.
advertise life insurance in teen magazines without also advertising it in magazines for retired people?
It might be illegal for the insurance company to do that, but not for the magazine publisher.
The issue in TFA is that Facebook was the lawbreaker, not just the insurance company.
Re: (Score:2)
Would it be similarly unethical to advertise life insurance in teen magazines without also advertising it in magazines for retired people?
No, and the difference is anyone can read a teen magazine or AARP magazine and see the ads, FB via targeting prevented certain groups from seeing the ads.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
No, as long as those magazines are available to anyone to buy. They primary appeal of the magazines might be teenagers, but hey, if it can be viewed by anyone then I'd have a hard time to justify it as discrimination.
I mean, just been it's a teen focused magazine doesn't mean adults don't read them.
alternatively (Score:2)
it's also plausible that the response rate is significantly lower for certain demographics. E.g., perhaps women are only a third as likely as men to order insurance from a Facebook ad. Or people under 70 aren't likely to respond to an add requiring payment ofthree times the metal value to buy gold and silver as a "hedge".
And I doubt a woman would be any more interested in ED ads than I would be in those for feminine hygeine products.
wild conspiracy theory: Facebook financed the litigation, to force purch
Re: (Score:2)
The problem in general with ad targeting is that "target by gender" and "target by age" are not valid. There is no reason to target this way, but if you've ever... EVER... filled out a form somewhere and were prompted for your age, gender, income range, education, etc, that is exactly what is going on. They are profiling you.
Google/youtube constantly barrages you with surveys when you don't have third party cookies turned on. This is because it loses that data every session.
There are only three things that
Re: (Score:2)
"The problem in general with ad targeting is that "target by gender" and "target by age" are not valid. There is no reason to target this way, "
Methinks you don't know much about marketing.
In Marketing you literally always start by targeting people by gender, by age, by income and other factors.
Why?
Well, imagine you're selling tampons. Do you want to pay for all the times the ad is shown to men?
Or to menopausal women?
No. You want to target the ad to get to the people most likely to be interested in the prod
Re: (Score:2)
My real issue is with where the line is drawn between discriminating or not; are companies really required to advertise all products to all age groups, genders etc in all cases? So comp
Nobody wants ads. (Score:2)
>> she wants ads
Nobody wants ads.
That's not how I imagined the ad networks falling (Score:5, Funny)
But I'll take it.
Re: (Score:3)
It could serve as an example how anti-discrimination laws work in favor of people who are not a protected minority.
Re: (Score:3)
No, as in "don't complain about $law protecting $minority, as you can see it works in your favor, too".
Re: (Score:2)
In theory I'd agree with you. In practice, you know that this is not what anti-discrimination is about. There are groups that are being discriminated against.
Maybe you can answer me this: What protection does a 25 year old seeking employment get from laws against age discrimination?
I don't think Facebook ads are going away (Score:2)
Online advertising doesn't work. There's study after study showing that. You can get a little bit of brand recognition out of it (ENJOY COKE! PEPSI RULES!) but that's about it.
Magazine ads don't work either. This is why video game magazines are dead. Companies like Sega & Nintendo had enough data to see that it wasn't driving sales anymore (if it ever did) and that was that. Strangely the Internet didn't kill game mags, it was Big Data.
No, the only adver
Could I pretty please be discriminated against? (Score:2)
I will have to suffer not seeing all those ads for young, sexy people... but I think I can handle the rejection.
I got used to it by now *very fake sob*.
Oh no... (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
There are ads on facebook? *pats Adblock pro on the head*
Now about that f****ing Youtube adblocker ban. Still looking for a solution to that one, because holy shitballs youtube ads are *bad*
Re: (Score:2)
Well, aside of outlawing ads, it's the next best thing they could do.
Re: (Score:1)
Stop watching Fox, dipshit.
Re: (Score:2)
Well, ignoring a waste of lifetime, a waste of bandwidth, the occasional malicious ad that infected computer systems, the occasional mistargeted ad that tried to sell sex toys to kids, sure.
And if you don't find them annoying as all hell and their in-your-face attitude as not too offputting, you might want to work in retail. Most customers there will treat you just like ads treat their targets, as something they can pester and badger all day long as if they're entitled to that.
Re: (Score:2)
Well, aside of outlawing ads, it's the next best thing they could do.
Ads suck, but being nickel and dimed to death for every service on the internet would be worse.
Re: (Score:3)
I dare to disagree. First, the damn cheapskates that want everything for free would cease to exist. Because that behaviour has spread past the internet, where people simply expect to be entitled to free stuff because they exist. It's time people learn that nobody owes them anything just 'cause they show up. Second, a lot of services would cease to exist, yes, and I can't help but see that as an improvement. Some services only exist because they're "free" and nobody in their sane mind would waste a cent on t
Re: (Score:2)
Quick question, anyone here not familiar with the use of adblockers?
You think that anyone who doesn't want to see ads sees any here?
Not internet, just ads (Score:4, Insightful)
Sounds like it would have a devastating effect on the AD ecosystem, and it also sounds like it is a problem of their own making. Have fun with that.
Can't complain (Score:1, Troll)
"What do you do for a living?"
"I complain about corporations until money flows into my pocket, one way or another."
Re: (Score:2)
Sure beats the old scam of suing surgeons for imagined "damages", which led to doctor bills becoming insanely high so normal people had an increasingly hard time paying their doctor bills.
If ads become so prohibitively expensive that corporations can't pay for them anymore... I fail to see the problem. Actually, I could see a benefit in it.
Re: (Score:3)
Many states enacted tort reform for medical bills, which allows us to analyze the impact.
Studies on the result show that the impact on healthcare insurance premiums is around a 2% drop in cost.
It ain't lawsuits that are driving up the US healthcare costs.
This is a problem.. (Score:2)
..that government can't solve
FB sends me a LOT of useless ads, mostly scams. I VERY rarely see ads for legitimate stuff I'm in the market for
Requiring ads to be relevant and useful would be great, but government can't solve the problem
whatever ... (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3)
Adblockers don't work on FB.
Re: (Score:2)
uBlock doesn't, but F. B. Purity (https://www.fbpurity.com) does a good job of keeping up in the cat and mouse game of blocking.
This case was recently discussed here (Score:2)
Prior to the trial: https://tech.slashdot.org/stor... [slashdot.org]
Transitive closure (Score:3)
I call BS (Score:1)
Pretty sure ... (Score:2)
... that the reason that TV shows that old people like get the denture ads, while the TV shows that young people like get the high caffeine drink ads, is that advertisers do target their ads. All the time, everywhere, if they can.
Why is it so special "on the internet"?
Re: (Score:2)
... that the reason that TV shows that old people like get the denture ads, while the TV shows that young people like get the high caffeine drink ads, is that advertisers do target their ads. All the time, everywhere, if they can.
Why is it so special "on the internet"?
The ability to exclude ads from the non targeted demographic. While TV ads are constructed to appeal to teh target demographic and run on shows that have that audience; anyone can watch the show and ad if they want. FB can stop ads from going to specific groups; if tehy did it like TV they'd say "this FB group has x% of your demographic, run the ad there" and everyone in the group, regardless of their demographic, gets the privilege of being and ad and making FB money.
Re: (Score:3)
Directed demographic advertising... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)