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Apple hires one of the developers behind Signal

techcrunch.com

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Re: Apple hires one of the developers behind Signal

#111

Post by michaelbuckbee »

pmarreck wrote: post #106
ikeboy wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Here, Bonan Huang and Nan Huang allegedly got the information from their employer, Capital One, which was supposed to have exclusive use of the -- hey, wait a minute, does that mean that Capital One was allowed to trade on this data for its own profit? Wouldn't that be amazing? Surely the answer is no: I assume that Capital One signed agreements with retailers (or rather, with Visa and MasterCard, which signed agree…

If I set up cameras with visual recognition software in front of a statistically significant number of Chipotle branches to count the number of customers and base pre-earnings security purchase decisions on that, have I committed fraud? What they did seems equivalent to that, in a way. I mean, that's basically a company idea right there, if someone hasn't already done that

For a long time satellite imaging of things like WalMart parking lots (used a proxy for sales) have been a thing analysts and traders look at.

Re: Apple hires one of the developers behind Signal

#112

Post by pmarreck »

ikeboy wrote: post #104
pmarreck wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So basically, they did their homework and got penalized for it?

>Here, Bonan Huang and Nan Huang allegedly got the information from their employer, Capital One, which was supposed to have exclusive use of the -- hey, wait a minute, does that mean that Capital One was allowed to trade on this data for its own profit? Wouldn't that be amazing? Surely the answer is no: I assume that Capital One signed agreements with retailers (or rather, with Visa and MasterCard, which signed agree…

I see everyone's point, but they did write one hell of a SQL statement, and having written a few of those in the past (seems typical with ANY kind of "report" for some reason), it's too bad they got penalized for it instead of just reprimanded/most (but perhaps not all) of the profit confiscated. cleverness, if not overtly malicious, should not be penalized too harshly IMHO

Re: Apple hires one of the developers behind Signal

#113

Post by dang »

ianamartin wrote: post #3

I can understand how people want to put puzzle pieces together, but this is completely idiotic. Whatever remaining security holes there are with secure enclave, they have nothing to do with a software chat app. This is entirely coincidental and has nothing to do with anything. TechCrunch should be ashamed of itself (again) for being such a douchebag. Edit: I'm not saying Apple hiring the guy is stupid. I'm responding…

It's arguably a poor, baity article, but please don't rant like this on HN. It lowers the quality of the discussion and usually sets off a degrading spiral (as below).

Re: Apple hires one of the developers behind Signal

#115

Post by Angostura »

fnordfnordfnord wrote: post #86
Angostura wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is the NSA capable of doing it? YES Serious question - is it?

Serious question. Is it safe to assume that the NSA can't? NO The NSA might or might not share with the FBI, and the FBI might or might not be able to use what's shared in court, which could explain why they want new authority.

I was simply questioning the bald assumption that the NSA already has access to this, not suggesting that we should assume the opposite.

Re: Apple hires one of the developers behind Signal

#116

Post by jayarcanum »

the_ancient wrote: post #100
jayarcanum wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things of all kinds went wrong after Steve left us. They've lost their way.

In what way? You preferred the less secure work with the government in all things Apple? that is what Steve Jobs Apple was...

I preferred when the software didn't suck and got out of the way. I preferred when they built truly world glass hardware with out of this world materials. I'll keep all the downvotes fuckers, no prob.

Re: Apple hires one of the developers behind Signal

#117

Post by ianamartin »

dang wrote: post #113
ianamartin wrote: post #3

I can understand how people want to put puzzle pieces together, but this is completely idiotic. Whatever remaining security holes there are with secure enclave, they have nothing to do with a software chat app. This is entirely coincidental and has nothing to do with anything. TechCrunch should be ashamed of itself (again) for being such a douchebag. Edit: I'm not saying Apple hiring the guy is stupid. I'm responding…

It's arguably a poor, baity article, but please don't rant like this on HN. It lowers the quality of the discussion and usually sets off a degrading spiral (as below).

I apologize for the rant. It was misplaced here. If you feel like it needs to be deleted, I'm okay with that.

Re: Apple hires one of the developers behind Signal

#118

Post by dang »

ianamartin wrote: post #117
dang wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's arguably a poor, baity article, but please don't rant like this on HN. It lowers the quality of the discussion and usually sets off a degrading spiral (as below).

I apologize for the rant. It was misplaced here. If you feel like it needs to be deleted, I'm okay with that.

No, but thanks. We really appreciate your understanding.

Re: Apple hires one of the developers behind Signal

#119

Post by uxp »

michaelbuckbee wrote: post #111
pmarreck wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I set up cameras with visual recognition software in front of a statistically significant number of Chipotle branches to count the number of customers and base pre-earnings security purchase decisions on that, have I committed fraud? What they did seems equivalent to that, in a way. I mean, that's basically a company idea right there, if someone hasn't already done that

For a long time satellite imaging of things like WalMart parking lots (used a proxy for sales) have been a thing analysts and traders look at.

It's still a different scenario. Cops, up until a few years ago, used to think they could stick GPS devices on people's cars without a warrant because they were legally allowed to tail and observe people driving in vehicles without a warrant. The GPS device, like a lot of technology, allowed them to "observe and tail" hundreds of vehicles all at once.

The SCOTUS stepped in and said that the practice was illegal without a warrant because, despite a vehicle moving around a city in plain and public view, being allowed to monitor hundreds or even thousands of vehicles from a central location with only a handful of officers was outside of the scope that allowed them to hop into a vehicle and follow someone else, which would require hundreds of officers and hundreds of vehicles observing with their own eyes.

It's the same idea. Getting access to data that is not public (in reference to the credit card transaction data, not satellite imagery), in order to profit from a publicly traded stock, does not create a level playing field. Semi-realtime satellite imagery, on the other hand, may not be completely public, but it's publicly available data (with a fee, possibly, from the operators of the satellites, which is a device or technology that wasn't built to specifically observe walmart parking lot capacity). I would argue that it's still a grey area, as you can only interpolate sales based on a tangental dataset like parking lot capacity. But getting access to actual transaction history from the stores is a direct correlation to their sales and revenue model, which drives their eventual stock price.

I don't see how anyone could argue that they were "just doing their homework". They were subverting a system for financial gain. They weren't taking data that anyone could obtain and doing a novel approach to interpret tangental sales figures.

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