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Anyone else find it ironic that the site has a twitter, facebook, g+, diaspora share bar hovering on the right hand side?
Anyone else find it ironic that the site has a twitter, facebook, g+, diaspora share bar hovering on the right hand side?
A few days ago, I posted "Unicorns aren't ad-supported" on HN.[1] There, I pointed out that, of a list of the top 50 "unicorns", non-public startups with > $1bn valuations, only three (Snapchat, Pintrest, and Vice) are ad-supported. This dot-com boom isn't driven by ads. It's driven by companies that provide a product or service for which their customers pay them. The companies that make their money from ads are from…
As for making the user the product[2], advertising is merely the most obvious and publicly visible way stolen user data can be exploited for profit. For example, I doubt Experian is using the search information they get from webmd[3] for targeted advertising.
[1] an actual service; abusing copyright to bypass first sale and other forms of rent-seeking doesn't count
[2] obBalkan: https://projectbullrun.org/surveillance/2015/video-2015.html...
[3] http://motherboard.vice.com/read/looking-up-symptoms-online-...
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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 serv…
I like to always use incognito browsing sessions when logging into Facebook. At some point I cleared all my cookies too. I remember a while back an article was posted about how to uniquely identify users without cookies though. I don't recall the exact method though, or if in this scenario it would require javascript and not just a link to a like button.
It's often nicknamed "pr0n mode" for that reasons, by people that didn't want pr0n websites showing up in their browser history.
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Basically you're using the specs the browser sends about the computer - OS, screen size, add-ons installed.. this gets pretty unique. I've been able to identify friends on a local site just by knowing them and their computers. Check yourself here: https://panopticlick.eff.org/
Was able to find it. Actually it's using etags. They work even if you disable cookies. Perfect identification, similar to cookies. Sites were using it before it came to light: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_ETag#Tracking_using_ETags
Stalkers gonna stalk, makers gonna make, founders gonna found. We nerds always knew that the Facebook, Google, etc. images were tracking beacons, and their business model was, to paraphrase Eric Schmidt, to get as close as possible to the creepy line. Fortunately, it is/was easy to opt out by DNS-blocking a few hosts. If this behavior becomes common, back-end data sharing and syncing will become the norm, and somethi…
"...their business model is...to get as close as possible to the creepy line."
I 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…
"keep a permanent record of the messages you send to your friends" "keep a permanent record of the photos you have shared on Facebook"
That's great! A free backup.
"keep a log of all the websites you have visited that contain a "like" button."
That's great! So I'll get feeds that better reflect my interests.
I haven't used Facebook since the EFF experimental app that showed all the actual, real information (real names in the graph) FB leaked to any game you clicked 'OK' to. But noone else cares, FB is still growing, and that's OK.
I'm OK with the way Google handles my personal information (doing the match making with advertisers and keeping my details private), and enjoy the benefits this enables.
I collected and sorted the results by [3rd party, 1st party] pairs: this allows to see at a glance the most ubiquitous 3rd parties out there, i.e. those which have the ability to build a profile of your browsing habits.[1]
Facebook (through `facebook.net`) was definitely at the top in the benchmark, when using EasyList, EasyPrivacy, Peter Lowe's.[2]
I personally doubt a majority of users care that there is a Facebook like widget on any page, except maybe for a handful of sites for those with a Facebook account. So disabling Facebook globally with exceptions where needed is a top advice to reduce privacy exposure.[3]
[1] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Blocking-mode#easy-mo...
[2] Followed by `googletagservices.com`, `twitter.com`.
[3] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering:-to...
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Then how is this scenario possible: Set up Google account with password "abc" on PC1, use chrome, set bookmark. Go to PC2, select "reset password" and reset Google account password to "123". Login to chrome with "123". The bookmark from before appears.
My initial comment was incorrect and has been updated. However, have you actually tried the scenario you describe? In the past, when I have changed my Google account password and logged into a new computer, I have had to enter my previous account password on the new computer to decrypt the data before Sync would work. Indeed, if you look in Chrome Sync's settings, you will see text that looks like this: "All data was…
So at least at some point in time Google did store all this data.
It seems to have been quite leaky in the past, and that doesn’t make Google any more trustworthy.
Solution: Use Firefox. Also, Firefox at least allows Cookies on localhost or other local domains.
Anyway, Google may not store any bit of my browser history in the US anyway, so I should probably go to court against them.
I 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…
I dunno. I automatically assume that everything that passes any third-party site unencrypted can be intercepted, retained and subsequently disclosed to advertisers, government, or whatever else. This especially applies to for-profit companies for which I'm not a paying client but the commodity being sold. I mean, I don't need to read TOS to assume this, it's just common sense to me. Probably I've been on the internet…
There are similar warnings on products like food, drugs etc...