Facebook’s Zuckerberg touts users’ data as ‘superpower’ as Covid-19 symptom survey set to roll out worldwide

20 Apr, 2020 15:24 / Updated 14 minutes ago

A Facebook survey allowing US users to self-report coronavirus symptoms (and reveal their own ‘presumed’ infection to the platform) is expanding globally, as CEO Mark Zuckerberg touts the data as a “new superpower.”

The social media giant’s symptom-checker tool, developed with Carnegie Mellon University, released its first set of data on US users on Monday, reaffirming what healthcare professionals treating its victims already know about the coronavirus – it appears to cluster in high-density, urban counties, and is vanishingly rare in rural regions. What the survey lacks in scientific accuracy, it will soon make up in global reach, as the tool is expanding worldwide on Wednesday.

Zuckerberg touted the data, harvested with respect for users’ privacy and human rights, he insisted, as humanity’s “new superpower” in a Washington Post op-ed published to coincide with the data release. The social media magnate claimed that the self-reported information collected from the survey will “get us started on the road to recovery.”

Mindful of the platform’s highly-publicized missteps with regard to user data, Zuckerberg was careful to point out that the fight against coronavirus “shouldn’t mean sacrificing our privacy.” But while the Carnegie-Mellon tool claims it does not share any information back to Facebook about what symptoms users report, the mere act of clicking on the tool tells the platform that a person has symptoms – a data point that could mark them for closer monitoring, given reports of potential tracking collaboration between Facebook and Washington.

https://www.rt.com/usa/486347-facebook-coronavirus-survey-data-global/