El-Sayed for MI Senate is sending me private messages on Facebook.

[LeftInTX]

I'm not friends with him, I don't even like or follow his page. I've never contributed to his campaign.

I have been getting text messages from him, but I get text messages from everyone, but FB Messenger?

Oh well. I'm not upset, but what time and effort did he go through to look me up? I know they get phone numbers from VAN. They run huge lists that spit out names and numbers and then create an automated text through Hustle. (That's why everyone gets texts ad nauseum)

But FB Messenger? That's a new one.

It's not a spoof. It's a fundraising pitch.....
I do have Arabic FB friend that follows him. And I've got an Armenian maiden name, but if you try to search for ME people in VAN, because my married name is Hispanic, it lists my demographic as "Hispanic".

Oh well...

ETA: Maybe he used a tool in FB that targets demographics. My posts all indicate that I'm Armenian and that I'm a Democrat and that I'm involved in campaigns etc.

[kcoates]

1. Messenger text

I get these from about 15 politicians across country for last 6 months. I seldom go on FB but assume it's an algorithm that showed I was liberal Democrat.

[LeftInTX]

4. I've gotten a few from local politicians, but I already follow them.

One candidate, I wasn't following tried to friend me, then he sent me a message, but he was GOP, so he wasn't going to get anywhere.
(The race is non-partisan and his mom was the retiring board member)

However, he only lives a few miles from me and he probably knows my husband too. He was running for a local school board position. So that's a huge difference from a US senate campaign in a different part of the country.

[H2O Man]

8. Right.

It isn't a personal message. The politician has not taken the time to scroll through to find the author of the OP and sent a unique message. It is merely a product of an algorithm. Many of them will be getting an increasing number of them as the mid-terms approach. They are no more than a current version of robo-calls.

[LeftInTX]

9. Facebook? How do they obtain the bulk data?

The Democratic Party uses VAN.

I work with campaigns. I know how data is obtained.

Yes, you can boost ads on FB (targetting), but I've never heard of using it to send messages all over the country like they do with VAN, and Hustle. (SMS) The way Kamala sends texts...

I don't know if I have ever received a bulk ad on FB messenger. (Well except sex toy ads and nude webcam girls) But never a bulk political ad like this. Sometimes I've gotten messages after I liked a post. But I've never interacted with this candidate on FB.

[Cha]

2. Weird, I've gotten FB mesengers from

scammers pretending to be friends. So they could get my information.

[LeftInTX]

3. This links to his official page! Same number of followers. 138K

Must be alot of work to do this.

[Cha]

5. A little bit of an invasion of privacy is

how I look at it.

Like, what the heck... are you being solicited in Texas for a MI Senate race?

I'm glad they haven't done that to me.. or maybe they have, I never look at that app.

[LeftInTX]

6. I get regular text messages from candidates all over the country. However, they use VAN to obtain phone numbers in bulk

Then they run the numbers in a program called Hustle to spew out thousands and thousands of text messages at once.

But Facebook????

[Cha]

7. Right? smh