Facebook has confessed that its new Nearby Friends feature will eventually serve to support a common theme: using your information for marketing purposes.
Turning on the function to receive alerts about friends in the area is optional, and your data won't be going anywhere yet; however, TechCrunch has reported that the future purpose of Nearby Friends will be to further tailor advertisements to your location.
When questioned about the feature's potential for advertising, a Facebook spokesperson told TechCrunch, "at this time it's not being used for advertising or marketing, but in the future it will be."
TechCrunch writer Josh Constine wondered about ad targeting after noticing this description in Nearby Friends: "When Location History is on, Facebook builds a history of your precise location, even when you're not using the app. See or delete this information in the Activity Log on your profile."
When the optional feature is switched on, Facebook is collecting data about user location that could someday come in handy. The function would likely be similar to Apple's iBeacon system, another optional feature that tracks users as they walk around a store and tailors ads to their location. In one example, customers near the drinks aisle may receive ads and a coupon for a particular brand of soda.
For the new Facebook feature, Nearby Friends will use location history data to know when to send alerts, i.e., when you're in a different neighborhood and might want to see which friends are nearby or a new restaurant to try.
Users who are concerned about privacy but still want to try Nearby Friends can delete data on a regular basis.
"When you hit delete we remove data from the user interface immediately and start working to permanently delete the data from the system," Facebook said.
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