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Sheryl Sandberg's narrative on that Facebook spyware it paid teens to put on their phones is full of holes: gizmodo.com/sheryl-sandber…
Sandberg to CNBC: "It’s very clear to the people who participated. It’s completely opt-in. There is a rigorous consent flow and people are compensated. It’s a market research program." 
Sandberg also to CNBC on why Apple pulled their certs: "Well of course, as long, as soon as we realized we weren’t in compliance with the rules on their platform, we pulled it."
As we know from TechCrunch, Facebook did not submit this app to Apple's official TestFlight beta system -- probably because it knew that Apple would realize it was violating enterprise development certification policies. Instead, had users sideload. techcrunch.com/2019/01/29/fac…
TechCrunch also reported today that Apple told them they had yanked the app before Facebook could voluntarily pull it.
techcrunch.com/2019/01/30/app…
techcrunch.com/2019/01/30/app…
As of yesterday, Facebook was telling TechCrunch this did not violate the cert policies. A spox declined to comment to Giz very early this morning why the app was being pulled if that was so.
Sandberg told CNBC that Facebook didn't know this was a violation of policies (1), but that they quickly conceded that it was a violation of Apple cert policies (2), and that "we pulled it" (3). 1, 2, and 3 all appear to be not true.
as for "rigorous consent flow," Facebook does not appear to have been proactively seeking consent beyond parental consent forms. many legit market research forms take verification of parental consent very seriously for legal and ethical reasons. pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013…
*legit market research firms
I haven't seen Facebook claim that it or its third party partners took steps to verify the forms it gathered for this invasive monitoring app that tracked minors' online activity. Nielsen, which does not collect anywhere near that data, does MUCH more. thoughtco.com/interview-with…
Finally, this "consent flow" was so "rigorous" that a BBC reporter was able to sign up after submitting a birthday in 2005.
