Meta Platforms (META -4.13%), the company formerly known as Facebook, is facing some privacy-related challenges as it bolsters its ambitious business centered on the metaverse. Among those issues, the parent of social media stalwarts Facebook and Instagram is facing a lawsuit filed by the state of Texas over its facial recognition technology. In this episode of "The AI/ML Show" on Motley Fool Live, recorded on Feb. 16, Fool.com contributor Jason Hall asks if the tech giant is facing too many hurdles as it amps up its artificial intelligence (AI) initiatives.
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Jason Hall: I asked the question of you and Rachel Warren about Facebook. Is this an investable company? Has it become a value stock or is this like a hands-off business? I reached the conclusion that we're talking less than 16 times earnings. I think there's a lot of really compelling reasons to think about this as an investment, and then I started thinking more about this topic. With everything that they're trying to do and the fact that machine learning is going to be so important, particularly as it builds out its metaverse, where you have even that much more data. If you want to create really powerful immersive environments that respond to users when they're in them, you need those systems that are controlling them. They need to be learning. I really think that's going to be the case. But I think this is really the big question that I'm beginning to struggle with, is our privacy. You've got 50 states, the District of Columbia, just here. You have the European Union, you have the U.K., you have all of the member states. You have all of the different municipalities where a global company like Meta Platforms operates, and it has multiple platforms. Again, this is a consumer-facing company. This is where people share their most personal things on Facebook without even thinking about them, and this is an area where we've seen a tremendous amount of pushback from legislators, privacy advocates. I really struggle with this in terms of, is that going to be the biggest roadblock to the future of AI when it comes to the user experience, the consumer, is companies' ability to navigate this?
