Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Not OK, Google

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

421–430 of 594 posts

Re: Not OK, Google

#421

Post by Esau »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #4

What I think is interesting is that many of us nerds have probably innocuously fantasized about having a Star Trek-like AI assistant with us, but now that they're taking the first steps towards that, we're starting to realize that in order for it to do everything for us, it has to know everything about us, too.

I have to admit this is true -- I used to dream of a Star Trek like computer where you can just speak to it but I never imagined that such as system would be strife with privacy and security issues.

Re: Not OK, Google

#422

Post by Sylos »

Ph0X wrote: post #245
Eupolemos wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fear you will be unable to recognize when that burger was your choice and when it was a reaction. You probably won't notice. And that is harmless. I also fear you will be unable to notice in which areas of life and information the distinction between choice and reaction is harmless and which it isn't. Of course, I'm not talking about "You" you, but just people. Me as well. I feel we are widening the field of uncons…

I'm sorry but that just sounds like blind fear mongering. What you're saying is vague and doesn't really mean much. It's like saying we shouldn't use prescription glasses, or medication, or cars, because it's not "us". Humans invent all these tools and systems to improve and optimize our life. Make our vision better. Make our health better. Make us move around faster. In the case of AI, make us do perform certain thi…

What he's saying is that this is not "humanity inventing something to make life better". It's a company inventing something to make money.

And it's not a simple product like glasses where you pay with money and then they improve your vision. It's a product which goes far beyond your understanding and for which you don't pay money.

Google isn't interested in making your life better. What they are interested in is getting you to believe that they want to make your life better and to then recommend going to that bar, because the bar owner has given Google money to advertise for the bar.

Yes, you might actually like that bar, but Google isn't going to recommend going there in intervals which are beneficial to you. They'd rather have you go there a few too many times. Because that's what makes them money. It's not improving your life, which makes them money. Their AI will always work against you, whenever it can without you noticing.

Re: Not OK, Google

#423

Post by nevir »

CyberShadow wrote: post #409
nevir wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sure, and to illustrate your point, I have an email very similar to someone else's. I very frequently get their emails (invoices, church events, travel itineraries, purchase receipts). Google thinks they're _my_ trips, and updates me about flight times. Fun story there. Because Google's internal privacy safeguards are so strict, the people working on features like that can't look for example emails to train their M…

> and almost no one forwards along positive nor negative examples One time, when I marked a bunch of incorrectly-classified emails as "not spam", the Gmail web UI asked me if I wanted to send these emails to the Gmail spam team. Was this what you meant, or something else?

Yeah, that sort of thing - by giving permission on a per email basis, they are then allowed to look at that particular email to see how/why the model is miss classifying it, AFAIK

(That's different than just marking an email as spam, though)

Re: Not OK, Google

#424

Post by RodericDay »

Spooky23 wrote: post #297
ubercore wrote: post #11

Google Now has done the same for me, told me how long it will take to get to a bar I frequent. My reaction was quite exactly "Oh that's neat, thanks!" and I went and had a great burger that night. Totally OK for me Google. I respect that people have different privacy thresholds, but I think the fact that it's different for everyone is being lost in articles like this.

"Hi Ubercore, Google and your health insurance company here. We are worried that you are frequenting a facility that serves too much alcohol and wings. We care."

I really wish this was up top. I can't believe that the top rated comment on HN is a thinly veiled "if you don't have anything to hide, you don't have anything to worry about".

Re: Not OK, Google

#425

Post by RodericDay »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #343
bhauer wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel your message is the most important in this thread because it's the crux of the whole concern about privacy and the cloud. Where technology has failed us most is in the utterly stagnant evolution and maturation of secure private networks. The following is a utopian notion, but had private networks seen as much R&D as the public clouds, they would be significantly less cumbersome than today's clunky VPNs. Imagin…

>Where technology has failed us most is in the utterly stagnant evolution and maturation of secure private networks. Not just secure private networks, but secure and programmable personal computing in general . The amount that I can actually do with my workstation PCs, let alone laptops or mobile phones, is now thoroughly restricted compared to problems that require a full-scale datacenter. I originally enjoyed compu…

People at work keep asking me why I reinvent a few wheels here and there on my personal projects. "Why are you wasting your time with WebRCT? Why are you not using phaser.io?"

idk man. Computers are powerful. I like seeing what I can do with them.

Re: Not OK, Google

#426

Post by VLM »

criddell wrote: post #355
adrusi wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its one thing to be under surveillance by a grocery store's security cameras and another thing when those cameras are sending all your data to the same central organization. Right now we aren't that great at integrating all that data — knowing that I'll be in a certain bar on Sunday nights is a little disconcerting, but if I knew that was the limit of AI assistants' invasiveness I'd be embracing it for the convenienc…

There's privacy in decentralization but you have to recognize that for many of us, there's value in openness. I'm very optimistic about Google making my life better in lots of little ways. I have virtually no concerns about my openness to Google causing me trouble.

"making my life better in lots of little ways"

I think that's a common goal and widespread belief and find its implication of having given up on "bigger ways" troubling.

Our industry was going to change the world. Rewrite the cultural rules of socializing. Rebuild the economy in a new form. Encourage major cultural and political shifts by empowering the little guy. Bring knowledge to the ignorant, companionship to the lonely, power to the powerless, jobs to the jobless.

What we have now is, well, maybe, with some luck, timidly, sometimes google can analyze the last time I went to a gas station, the number of miles I've driven at various speeds since then, the time of my next appointment, then it can adjust my google now card to encourage me to leave home earlier so I'll have time to fill up the tank and it'll find the cheapest advertised price along the way. That's nice ... but wheres my revolution?

Even worse in context of the article, OK well say I have to give up all privacy and go hard core 1984 telescreen big brother is always watching, to save endangered species and house the homeless and feed the starving and bring peace to the victimized. Well OK I'll think about it. Oh wait, we don't get any of that, all we're offered is slightly better appointment scheduling. Eh, no thanks.

Nothing is ever really new, and this era is likely similar to pre-quantum era Physics around 1890 where nothing is left to discover other than adding a few more decimal places here and there. The meme and speech patterns are all the same (although I'm not quite that old)

Re: Not OK, Google

#427

Post by throwaway98237 »

mojuba wrote: post #374
throwaway98237 wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps we need to start normalizing encrypted email. Just like https everywhere is no longer considered necessarily "tin-foil hat" SOP, moving this direction for email needs to be socially normalized. Going further, given that an encrypted email to Gmail will simply be unencrypted and then available to GMail, include in the protocol authorized (via both white and black list means) agents of the recipient. So, if you…

Sure, except the recipient will read your email in Google Chrome, while sitting on a Google Sofa sipping Google Coffee? :)

ha, so true. one prob at a time :)

Re: Not OK, Google

#428

Post by a_lifters_life »

DanBC wrote: post #411
a_lifters_life wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Im with HillaryBriss here. There aren't enough repercussions for leaking pii data.

UK regulators recently fined TalkTalk £400,000 for a large data breach. https://ico.org.uk/about-the-ico/news-and-events/news-and-bl... That's not company ending, but it should get the attention of directors.

400k is nothing for a lot of companies in USA

Re: Not OK, Google

#429

Post by ethanbond »

dsacco wrote: post #356
ethanbond wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about if the system is working exceptionally well, you're a depressed person, and the next ad you see is auctioned off between a therapist, a pharma company, and a noose supply store in the 100ms it takes to render your MyFaceGram profile? The awful success cases are far more interesting than the awful failure cases.

I have no problem with ads for therapists or pharma companies competing for advertising space in front of me because they have algorithmically determined that I am a qualified lead. That actually sounds great from a mental health perspective. Your noose example is pretty contrived, however.

Obviously the first two aren't the problematic ones. The issue is that an algorithm wouldn't know what distinguishes those from the third, obviously.

How about sleeping pills? Opiates? Local extortionist cult?

Re: Not OK, Google

#430

Post by TheRealDunkirk »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #343
bhauer wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel your message is the most important in this thread because it's the crux of the whole concern about privacy and the cloud. Where technology has failed us most is in the utterly stagnant evolution and maturation of secure private networks. The following is a utopian notion, but had private networks seen as much R&D as the public clouds, they would be significantly less cumbersome than today's clunky VPNs. Imagin…

>Where technology has failed us most is in the utterly stagnant evolution and maturation of secure private networks. Not just secure private networks, but secure and programmable personal computing in general . The amount that I can actually do with my workstation PCs, let alone laptops or mobile phones, is now thoroughly restricted compared to problems that require a full-scale datacenter. I originally enjoyed compu…

And with UEFI-level code on mainboards and baseband software on phones, the era of "owning" a computer is basically over. All you can do is hope and trust that the manufacturer isn't co-opting your experience or data somehow. As someone who grew up hacking on a C64 in grade school, and never stopped, I find this utterly depressing.
Post reply on HN