Facebook’s Ad Targeting Will Get Interest Data From Outside Websites (And New Options For Opting Out)

Facebook says it’s bringing more data into its interest-based ad targeting â€" specifically data from non-Facebook websites and mobile apps.

So even if your profile doesn’t say anything about your love of (say) soccer, and even if you haven’t Liked any soccer-related Pages on Facebook, the social network can still see that you’ve visited soccer-related websites and target ads accordingly.

In a blog post, the company describes this as “a type of interest-based advertising” that’s already practiced by “many companies”:

Let’s say that you’re thinking about buying a new TV, and you start researching TVs on the web and in mobile apps. We may show you ads for deals on a TV to help you get the best price or other brands to consider. And because we think you’re interested in electronics, we may show you ads for other electronics in the future, like speakers or a game console to go with your new TV.

A Facebook spokesperson emphasized that this doesn’t actually involve collecting new data. Instead, the company already has access to this information from websites that installed the Facebook pixel and apps that used the Facebook SDK â€" it’s just using the data in a new way.

This could make the ads you see on Facebook more relevant for users and better-targeted for advertisers, particularly if you’re not particularly active or if your Facebook profile only represents a small sliver of your personality, giving the social network less data to work with.

At the same time, some users probably don’t want to be targeting in this way, so the company is also introducing a couple of new ways for people to indicate that they’re not interested. First, Facebook says the ads targeted this way will include “the industry-standard Digital Advertising Alliance opt out” â€" namely, they’ll include those little blue AdChoices triangles that you’ve probably seen on banner ads. By clicking on those triangles, you can opt out of certain kinds of ad targeting.

In addition, Facebook is introducing a new ad preferences tool. Already, when you examined an ad in Facebook, you could say that you don’t want to see this ad or this advertiser again. Now you can also ask, “Why am I seeing this?” and Facebook will tell you that it was based on a certain interest. Then, a new dashboard will allow you to add and remove interests for that targeting, so if you’re tired of seeing soccer- or electronics-related ads, you can get rid of them altogether.