Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
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Re: Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
#2Another point to think about is that if facebook (or any of these other sites tracking you through social media buttons) receives a subpoena, it likely has nearly your entire browsing history on file since so many sites have those button.
Re: Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
#3So,,, at what point does this become accepted (as opposed to tolerated) business practice? Or, more optimistic, no longer tolerated. At one point it was ok to say, "This is all new and still being worked out." But, it is no longer new. It is very worked out. Entire sectors of the economy (and legal system) are devoted to knowing more about consumers then they sometimes know about themselves. The entire industry is being built on bait-and-switch and obfuscation practices. And, the tech industry, the supposed knight in shining armor come to save humanity from itself, is leading the way. Someone, at some point, needs to call a spade a spade. We need to own this, if this is our new society. Or stop closing our eyes, if it isn't.
Re: Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
#4I do have a Facebook account, primarily because I am studying abroad and I need to keep in touch with my family and close friends and Facebook is, thus far, the best way to share what is going on in my life. It kind of allow me to "broadcast" my life events.
Now, I really dislike what I just read.
I wonder if tech companies have a moral obligation to disclose to the user what are the terms of the contracts.
While ToS and Privacy Policy are public documents, I don't think they are close to anything readable for the layman. They are mostly pile of legal garbage and it is virtually impossible to go through them everytime you sign-up for a service.
That is why I would like to put the emphasis on clarity here. What if?
What if technology companies were forced to disclose clearly what signing-up for their product entails with respect to user privacy. I am thinking of something alongside this:
""" Hello r0naa,
Welcome on Facebook, we hope that you will have a great experience here.
Facebook will allow you to: - easily communicate with your friends
- share photos, videos and play games with your friends
- keep in touch with distant relatives
On the other hand, we will:
- keep a record of the messages you send to your friends
- keep a permanent record of the photos you have shared on Facebook
- keep a log of all the websites you have visited that contain a "like" button.
Moreover, you should be aware that we will disclose all your personal data to the US government if we are issued a NS letter.
Hope you have a great day,
"""
To be clear, I am not saying that this is the right solution. Only, I believe it is pretty obvious that there is a problem and that a lot of people who are not technically literate are not able to make a informed choice about whether or not they want to give up their privacy, even partially.
I hope it will spawn an interesting discussion, feel free to share your ideas and suggestions.
Re: Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
#5Another point to think about is that if facebook (or any of these other sites tracking you through social media buttons) receives a subpoena, it likely has nearly your entire browsing history on file since so many sites have those button.
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Re: Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
#6I do have a Facebook account, primarily because I am studying abroad and I need to keep in touch with my family and close friends and Facebook is, thus far, the best way to share what is going on in my life. It kind of allow me to "broadcast" my life events. Now, I really dislike what I just read. I wonder if tech companies have a moral obligation to disclose to the user what are the terms of the contracts. While ToS…
It's unfortunate we have to be tracked so much to use the services, but I guess if it's not free then we're the product; This site does a pretty good job of providing the tl;dr of TOS https://tosdr.org/
Sometimes I feel like ignorance is bliss though, especially with how much information these popular services actually collect from us
Re: Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
#7I'm not aware of the technical details of how the user is tracked. Is it possible to be tracked even if the user has logged out of the social network website (based on the browser or machine being used)?
Re: Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
#8I'm not aware of the technical details of how the user is tracked. Is it possible to be tracked even if the user has logged out of the social network website (based on the browser or machine being used)?
The technical details are simple.
When you are "logged in" to Facebook, your browser stores a unique token in a cookie that can identify you. That unique token is sent with every request the browser sends to FB, even requests you don't initiate directly.
These hidden requests happen all the time, like when a web developer embeds a FB like button on a page. The like button is actually generated and served by FB's servers (check your browser's dev console), and the request to show the button itself gets that cookie sent along with it regardless of whether you press it.
The tricky bit is that "logging out" might not actually be enough. I don't use FB so can't say for sure, but it is certainly possible to implement "log out" such that you can't see restricted resources or pages, but still have an identifying cookie on your machine. In this case the cookie itself would store a flag marking you as "logged in" or "logged out", but the cookie would still identify you all the same.
Re: Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
#9[deleted]
Re: Internet Companies: Confusing Consumers for Profit
#10So,,, at what point does this become accepted (as opposed to tolerated) business practice? Or, more optimistic, no longer tolerated. At one point it was ok to say, "This is all new and still being worked out." But, it is no longer new. It is very worked out. Entire sectors of the economy (and legal system) are devoted to knowing more about consumers then they sometimes know about themselves. The entire industry is be…
"If a business model wouldn’t work if users had to opt in, it deserves to fail." (last line of the article)
Since the invisible hand of the free internet appears to be arthritic, a more visible hand (fist?) is necessary. And we have it in the way of request blockers such as uBlock Origin, wich can compleltely block Facebook's and Google's tracking in their tracks. As more and more people turn to subversive solutions such as privacy oriented request blockers and ad blockers, we may finally turn things around.
My hope is on an open source browser that is entirely privacy oriented, easy to use and adopt by non-technical users.