- The Mindfuck book , written by the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower, was released in bookstores this Wednesday, March 11.
- Christopher Wylie explains in particular the inner workings of this company accused of having collected the personal data of millions of Facebook users for political purposes.
- A testimony without filter on this machine which he designed himself, but whose projects escaped him.
It is the scandal that agitated the year 2018 and gave rise to hundreds of thousands of articles. The Cambridge Analytica affair has been dealt at length and cross by the media on the basis of journalistic and judicial inquiries, analyzes or even testimony from whistleblowers. Almost everything has been said. However, Christopher Wylie's book, Mindfuck, in bookstores this Wednesday , March 11 , sheds new light on the case.
The young whistleblower tells the story of the threads and cogs of the English company he joined when he was only about twenty years old and how it, originally responsible for fighting online religious radicalization has turned into a machine seeking to manipulate targeted groups of people on networks for political gain in various countries around the world. Anecdotes, personal analyzes, advanced explanations of manipulation techniques ... The young Canadian approaches the case through his own story, with humor, sometimes disgust and emotion.
"On the face this layer of dirt that leaves the transatlantic voyages"
Far from making a technical presentation, Christopher Wylie shares, throughout the twelve chapters of his work, his feelings, as during his first meeting with Steve Bannon, the man who would become the vice-president of Cambridge Analytica and the future adviser from Trump to the White House.
“I expected someone who seemed to work for a government or an agency. Instead, I had before me a scruffy guy who wore two shirts one over the other, as if he had forgotten to remove the first before putting on the second. He was unshaven, had oily hair, and that layer of grime on his face left by transatlantic voyages. His eyes were speckled with red, a discreet reminder of the rosacea that plagued the rest of his skin. Overall, it gave off waves oscillating between those of a used car salesman and those of a lunatic. "
"Facebook just let them use it"
But Mindfuck is above all the testimony of the main creator of Cambridge Analytica and therefore the one best able to explain its workings. Christopher Wylie recounts how the work of Cambridge University researchers inspired what was one of the basic Facebook data collection tools by Cambridge Analytica.
“Doctors David Stillwell and Michal Kosinski were working on huge amounts of data that they had legally collected from Facebook. They were among the pioneers of psychological profiling based on social networks. In 2007 Stillwell had developed an application called MyPersonality which allowed its users to obtain their "psychological profile" using the app. After giving the results to the user, the app retrieves the profile and stores it for Stillwell research. […] Kosinski and Stillwell told me about the gigantic datasets they had acquired during their year of research. […] "How did you get them," I asked them. They explained to me that, roughly speaking, Facebook had simply let them use themselves through the application they had developed. […] Whenever a person used their app, they received not only that person's Facebook data, but also that of all their "friends". "
In summary, with a thousand users of the app each having 150 friends, it is the data of 150,000 profiles that could be collected. Cambridge Analytica reproduced this scheme with an application installed on Facebook, on which users filled out tests for a small fee.
We had recreated her whole life on our computer and she knew absolutely nothing about it ”
In an almost surreal passage, Christopher Wylie says that once this application is launched, the team quickly finds itself with ultra-detailed files on its users. One of them is open at random.
“Everything we could know about this person who appeared on the screen. There, it's her photo, there, the place where she works, and there, it's her car. She voted for Mitt Romney in 2012, she loves Katy Perry, she drives an Audi, she has simple tastes, etc. We all had her on it - and for a lot of items, the info was updated in real time, so if she posted something on Facebook, we saw it live. Not only did we have all of their Facebook data, but we merged it with all of the administrative and business data that we had purchased, as well as with imputations made from census data. We had info on her mortgage, we knew how much money she was making, if she had a gun. We had access to her loyalty programs with the airlines, so we knew how often she flew. We could see if she was married (she was not). We had some idea of his health. And we even had a satellite photo of his house, very easily obtained through Google Earth. We had recreated her whole life on our computer and she knew absolutely nothing about it. "
"Facebook scrutinizes your relationships, accompanies you everywhere"
As a data specialist, the whistleblower also explains, throughout the book, how those informed on Facebook, like our actions, are much more telling about us than it seems.
“A Facebook page contains data on an individual's 'natural' behavior in his environment, without the fingerprints left by the researchers. Each scroll is recorded, just like each movement, each like. Everything is there - the nuances, the interests, the dislikes - and, even better, everything is quantifiable. This means that Facebook has a very high ecological validity, insofar as the data is not obtained thanks to the questions of a researcher - questions which, inevitably, introduce a bias or another. In other words, many of the benefits associated with passive and qualitative observation traditionally used in anthropology and sociology remain. "
“Facebook scrutinizes your relationships, accompanies you everywhere with your phone, and tracks each of your clicks and your online purchases. This is how the data in this cite reflects more who you are than your friends 'or family members' judgments. "
“ Cambridge Analytica wanted to provoke people, to encourage them to get involved”
It is thanks to the quality of this data that Cambridge Analytica was able to manipulate individuals on the networks for political purposes. Again, Christopher Wylie was at the forefront.
“A selected minority of people display characteristics that are at the same time narcissism (extreme self-centeredness), Machiavellianism (a brutal defense of their own interests) and psychopathy (a deep emotional detachment). […] The three traits that make up this "dark triad" are unsuitable, which means that those who demonstrate it are generally more inclined to adopt anti-social behavior or even to commit criminal acts. From the data Cambridge Analytica had collected, the team was able to identify individuals who had both a high score for neurotism [a tendency to experience negative emotions such as anger, hostility, depression, l 'anxiety' and the characteristics of the "dark triad", as well as those who were more prone to angry impulses and conspiratorial thoughts than the average citizen. Cambridge Analytica targeted them, introducing stories via Facebook groups, advertisements, or articles which the company knew, through internal testing, were likely to stir up anger in this very narrow segment. 'individuals with these characteristics. CA wanted to provoke people, to push them to get involved. "
“In the summer of 2014 Cambridge Analytica started developing fake pages on Facebook and other platforms that looked like real forums, real groups and real sources of information. It was an extremely common tactic that Cambridge Analytica’s parent company, SCL, had long used in its counterinsurgency operations around the world. […] Thanks to the way the Facebook recommendation algorithm worked, these pages appeared in the news feed of people who already liked similar content. When users joined the fake groups created by CA, they discovered videos and articles that threw fuel on the fire. The conversations were heated on the group page and everyone was complaining, this or that was so horrible or unfair. […] Now CA had users who 1) identified themselves as members of an extremist group, 2) formed a captive audience, and 3) could be manipulated with data. "
And the whistleblower to reconsider the manipulations which did not fail to blacken the pages of the newspapers: the influence of Cambridge Analytica in the results of the American presidential election and the possible intervention of the Russians in the campaign of Donald Trump, or the referendum for Brexit in Great Britain. He concludes his story with a rather sad observation: none of the great conductors of this scandal has really been punished. He lives with almost no electronic devices for fear of being tapped, has been banned from Facebook and never goes out without a wireless emergency alarm button.
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