Facebook, Google Deny Sharing Location Data With Officials in COVID-19 Response

Facebook and Google aren’t sharing location data with the government for tracking COVID-19, the companies said Thursday after reports of such industry consultation. Ed Markey, D-Mass., raised privacy concerns and other senators criticized the tech industry’s response to online misinformation.

Facebook briefed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention about the company’s data aggregation and de-identified data work with researchers, a spokesperson emailed. “There is no agreement to share people's location data with governments.” CDC supports Facebook’s research partnerships, the representative noted. “We have not received requests for location data from the US government.”

Google is “exploring ways that aggregated anonymized location information could help in the fight against COVID-19,” a spokesperson emailed. One example could be helping health officials determine the impact of social distancing, similar to Google Maps showing restaurant and traffic patterns, the company said. “This work would follow our stringent privacy protocols and would not involve sharing data about any individual’s location, movement, or contacts.”

Markey wrote the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy asking about Google, Facebook, IBM and other companies analyzing location data to help stop the spread of COVID-19. “We need assurances that collection and processing of these types of information, even if aggregated and anonymized, do not pose safety and privacy risks to individuals,” he said. The White House and IBM didn’t comment.

Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Reddit, Twitter and YouTube this week pledged their commitment to combating fraud and misinformation about the virus. The companies said they are “elevating authoritative content on our platforms, and sharing critical updates in coordination with government healthcare agencies around the world.”

Senators credited joint industry efforts. Several suggested the companies should have been collaborating on misinformation all along, not just because of the virus. “That would be my question," Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., told us. "Why haven’t they been doing it all along? If they can, they should have been.”

“We would hope that they would begin to band together against misinformation,” Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., told us. “When they know things are incorrect, and they still let it be posted, it doesn’t serve the public well.”

Social media companies banding together “would be a great sign,” Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner, D-Va., told us. Asked if he wonders why social media companies don’t do this on a rolling basis to combat misinformation, he said, “Yes.”

Twitter said it’s increasing machine learning and automation to combat disinformation. It expanded safety rules to include content that would leave users at a higher risk of transmitting the virus. Facebook banned ads for medical face masks, launched a virus information center, and removed misinformation on Instagram.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., criticized the White House for spreading misinformation about the virus. Many of the administration’s announcements have lacked scientific fact, sometimes blatantly, Blumenthal told us. Asked how Congress should respond, he said, “We’ll try to tell the truth to the American people.”