Risks of AI-Driven Behavior Targeting by Social Media

Should Social Media Companies be held accountable for behaviour targeting when it goes bad?

Lawsuits against social media giants like Facebook over data privacy and related issues are not news. In fact, there was a landmark case ruling in Canada back in 2014 on that very subject. Artificial intelligence is sparking a new debate because it now relies heavily on user behavior.

Have you ever talked about something with a group of friends, conducted research, or shopped online and been bombarded with tons of ads on your social media related to those subjects? It can actually give you a very uneasy feeling to realize that AI is listening and watching your online and offline activity. This is the new world we live in. The truth is, unless you live an off-grid lifestyle, you simply must accept behavior targeting as the new reality.

The verdict is still up for debate on whether artificial intelligencee will be considered a breach of trust and if any government will step in to create global laws governing its use. That is a story for another day.

What we are dealing with now is much more important because there are no rules for ad targeting based on individual behavior, and I think this is dangerous for some people.

Let’s face it, AI doesn’t always get it right. In fact, while it can listen to words and commands and make decisions based on logic, it cannot (at the moment) use instinct, morality, and emotions to create outcomes; therefore, determining behavior patterns is a risky strategy.

Let’s use real-life “data” to explain how behavior targeting can have an adverse effect. Gaming, gambling, and other nefarious websites are considered by most experts to be the backbone of the internet and the industries that generate the most income combined. Without them, the Internet could not sustain itself financially.

This makes a great deal of sense since all of these drive addictive behavior. Addicts have a difficult time online trying to avoid ads with spectacular offers to gain instant access to their negative behaviors, which are often driven by dopamine, the brain’s “natural pleasure drug.”

Now here is the part where we as humans need to decide if the risks and rewards of behavior targeting with AI are too high and if social media giants need to be held accountable for not taking action.

Joe is a thirty-year-old male looking at his family’s computer to find his local Gamblers Anonymous meeting. He simply forgot the time and logged on to the website to find it.

Joe has been struggling with online gaming for years but has recently begun working on his recovery.

After the meeting, Joe decides to take a quick look at Facebook to see what is happening with his friends, only to be bombarded with countless ads from casino websites. He is now seeing more ads than posts from his friends. Distraught and having a difficult time with his addiction, he decides to do what so many friends are telling him to do: go into your advertising interest settings and delete those types of ads.

But guess what? Gambling, entertainment or gaming are not categories of his ad topics (or mine). Is this on purpose? Is this targeted towards the user’s addictive patterns and behaviour, so the user does not have the option to opt out? Legally, social media companies must offer a “way out” option, but I don’t know if it needs to be standardized.

If the AI bot can target based on behaviour, the same can be true for opting out.

This is where the whole controversy gets tricky.

If behaviour advertising is damaging to addicts or people with mental health issues, where does the responsibility lie when someone gets harmed by this type of advertising delivery?

What happens when behaviour targeting happens by accident, such as with multiple users?  

While I am excited about the potential of Artificial Intelligence, I believe there needs to be a global AI body to discuss the potential harm it can do. What if someone uses it for nefarious reasons. Consider a mentally unstable individual being bombarded by advertisments that are directly harmful to them because someone thought it was amusing to deliberatly search for them. It could lead to a new form of unaliving.

I have seen all the Terminator movies. It does not bode well for humanity. Greed mixed with AI is toxic. Greed, AI and humanity is the recipe for extinction.