Facebook may start logging your cursor movements

Facebook wants to know not just where your mouse ends up, but where it's been.

by Casey Johnston - Oct 30 2013, http://arstechnica.com/business/2013/10/facebook-may-start-logging-your-cursor-movements/

• Social Media
• Startups

Caress this chipmunk's cheeks with your pointer? Facebook wants to know about it.

Facebook is considering collecting yet more data from users in the form of tracked mouse movements, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal Wednesday. Your scrolls, your hovers, your highlights, your right clicks: Facebook wants them all.
It’s not uncommon for websites to minutely track the items that users click on to see how they interact with different pages. A heat map of a page can show where most people end up clicking, giving sites an idea of how users’ eyes travel and parse the information there.
But Facebook’s tracking would be another level of tracking entirely. According to the WSJ, Facebook will be paying attention to the areas a cursor lingers over, even without a click or other interaction. This seems like a bit of a strange motion to track, as if users are out there lovingly tracing the facial profiles of their family members or ex-crushes like they might do on a photograph. But if there’s meaning to be had, Facebook will have it.
In addition to tracking mouse movements, Facebook will also be gathering mobile data. It can’t track finger-lingers over a touchscreen, thankfully, but the company will be noting when, for instance, “a user’s newsfeed is visible at a given moment on the screen of his or her mobile phone.”