Facebook’s latest app, announced earlier this week, is promising to pay users money in exchange for something even more valuable: data.
The new app, called Study, was created as a market research tool for smartphone users which could be used for the development of new apps in the future. In exchange for information, Facebook will be providing compensation to willing users, although there are no details yet as to how much the compensation will be.
Facebook says that Study will collect various information from its users, including the user’s other smartphone apps, app activity, and time spent on different apps. In addition to this, Study will also be able to access other kinds of information like the user’s device, network name, and even country location. Together with the data uploaded by the users themselves on their Facebook profiles, the company will be able to combine together all the different data to form a comprehensive view of the user as a consumer.
Despite this, Facebook promises that the new app will not solicit more information than necessary. It will also not be able to collect sensitive information like site usernames and passwords, nor private data like messages or photos. The data will also not be used by the company’s artificial intelligence software to generate targeted ads for Facebook users.
