By Ian Bush

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – Facebook knows a lot about us; it exists, in part, to make money with all that information.

KYW technology editor Ian Bush reports the social network is testing a new way to cash in on our profiles.

The column ads on Facebook’s website have made it many billions of dollars.

But translating mobile browsing to big bucks has been tricky.

Facebook is looking at using details such as your age, gender, location, and likes to place targeted ads for other companies – not on its smartphone apps, but on others, and on mobile web.

They would appear as banner or full-screen images; touching would take you to the advertiser’s site or to the app store.

The idea is that people are more likely to interact with marketing messages that seem personally relevant.

It’s the best of both worlds for Facebook, and – it hopes – for users: ads keep the service free with this test keeping its own app from getting bogged down with come-ons.