So the American TV show "Person of Interest" really isn't that far off the mark. If FB is a known and readily available commercial product, imagine what DARPA, NSA, NGIA, etc. must have.
God bless George Orwell.
Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
221–230 of 302 posts
Re: Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
#222The is some kind of disconnect happening here. The tone and content of many comments here reflect an attitude that it's a given that FB having data about, anything, is bad. (Not universally in this comment thread, there are some dissenting views, but I'm reference what I see as the general rhetorical tone.) My guess is that your average civilian does not view the fact that FB is acquiring vast amounts of data about t…
> if it was decided by the executive or legislative branches that it was absolutely essential that Facebook turn over all their data to the intelligence agencies, due to the need to crack down on dissent, social unrest, then, yes this could be bad.
This already exists, it's called the patriot act. Snowden showed that the US government has its hands in facebook and google's data. And you may have heard of the foreigner who got refused entrance on US soil at the border based on their facebook private messages.
> It's interesting to note that so far FB and Google haven't suffered massive data breaches.
More like such data breaches have not had much if any media exposure. IIRC gmail suffered a few of those from China and Russia alreaddy, and both facebook and google were tapped by the US agencies.
Re: Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
#223Earlier quoted context omitted.
Unethical: lacking moral principles. Moral: of, relating to, or concerned with the principles or rules of right conduct or the distinction between right and wrong I think it is "clearly wrong" that Facebook creates shadow profiles, because it is violating the freedom of people who have not signed up for their service, in the same way that it is clearly wrong for me to take away your favorite pet for ritualistic sacri…
I doubt that he doesn't understand what "unethical" means. The question is how does what Facebook is doing qualify? You've said it is because it violates the freedom of people Facebook is making inferences about who are not users of Facebook's services. That just shifts the question to how does it violate their freedom? That is not at all obvious to me. (NOTE: this does not mean that I'm saying it is OK...just that I…
I was reared that it is in poor taste and even wrong to talk about someone. Period.
You may not violate a freedom but the bigger question to me is why would you even contemplate the thoughts to infer, etc.
What is "wrong" is that people think it is ok to talk about others.
Next time you get together in a group take a poll on how many conversations are just talking about people.
Re: Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
#224In computer security, every time machines become fast enough to breach the limits of an algorithm we invent something new so that “hard” problems remain “hard” and therefore encryption is still secure. There has been no corresponding increase in the difficulty of invading privacy. 30 years ago, even though you probably “could” observe somebody for a long time and eventually connect some dots about them, it would not…
I would love if someone made a Chrome extension that encrypted all the posts and messages you put on Facebook. That is, any post you made would be made as a ciphertext, the extension would swap keys with all your friends in the background, and would decrypt their posts when displaying them to you. Sure Marky Mark still sees when you post, who you send messages to, etc. but it's a much better situation than what's goi…
This is missing the point as metadata is way more sensible than actual message content. Besides, being contrary to ToS you'd get your facebook account blocked or banned.
Look at how fast AdNauseam got the boot from google to get an idea.
Re: Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
#225Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm skeptical as to how worthwhile your effort is as long as the outcome is just another alternative to FB. We've seen countless examples of how these alt-social nets failed. But I do see a lot of value in the tech you might be developing, and if in some way we could embed it into existing social nets, that would be amazing. Fingers crossed!
How easy would it be for Zuck to just update the TOS to say "encrypted content is against our TOS" and ban you? Zuck can't add any encrypted content to your personal profile, which means he doesn't make any money off you. And Zuck can do pretty much whatever he wants in his castle, I'd say.
Content is mostly irrelevant, metadata is way more interesting. In other words they do not care what you say, but who you say it to, when you say it, from where, at what time, and so on.
Re: Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
#226Earlier quoted context omitted.
I run design collective (group of designers and design students) we have been looking for social media projects to help. Is your project aimed to be opensource or it is comercial bussiness? We could might be able to help. Even just with small things like design analisys and testing.
Both; there will be ads and the source will be publicly available, license TBD. Please get in touch, email is in my profile.
Ads means tracking a.k.a. no privacy.
Re: Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
#227Earlier quoted context omitted.
Unethical: lacking moral principles. Moral: of, relating to, or concerned with the principles or rules of right conduct or the distinction between right and wrong I think it is "clearly wrong" that Facebook creates shadow profiles, because it is violating the freedom of people who have not signed up for their service, in the same way that it is clearly wrong for me to take away your favorite pet for ritualistic sacri…
I doubt that he doesn't understand what "unethical" means. The question is how does what Facebook is doing qualify? You've said it is because it violates the freedom of people Facebook is making inferences about who are not users of Facebook's services. That just shifts the question to how does it violate their freedom? That is not at all obvious to me. (NOTE: this does not mean that I'm saying it is OK...just that I…
Imagine a gentleman decides to follow you for the rest of your life. He is always wihtin a distance but when you leave your home, there he is and see you him with his pen and paper recording your every move. You get it you car, he gets in his and follows. You stop by your lover's home. There he is the back recording. You go pick your child, save. You go to the grocery store, there he is recording again. So on and so forth.
Would you say there is absolutely nothing wrong with this?
Re: Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
#228Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're so close to what I am currently building that I feel like I have to chime in. I left Apple's security team a few months ago to go solo and build an app that is similar to Facebook/Instagram and Snapchat in terms of functionality and UX but uses the Olm protocol (similar to Signal) to protect all content. So, fear not - something is being done, and I'm sure I'm not the only one working in this problem space. I…
How are you going to recreate the main selling point of facebook, i.e. the Newsfeed ? If things are encrypted, how are you going to determine relevance, etc.
The selling point of facebook is not the newsfeed. The selling point is that every other person is already registered on facebook.
Re: Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
#229Earlier quoted context omitted.
Security breaches are bad for one party's capital, good for another party's capital. It's interesting to contemplate WHY is there a difference between the two. Security and Private both nasciently have something to do with "info I'd like to keep to myself", but I'm not sure I can come up with a hard delineation between the two, at least when you try to go above "A/S/L" and below "user/pass".
A security breach allows to use the victim's resources: from CPU and bandwidth to money directly on your bank account. A privacy breach allows... what? Where's a direct threat? A privacy breach can be a first step to a security breach, though. Social engineering is all about it. Social networks can be, too.
Privacy is the basis for fundamental freedoms.
Re: Facebook's tentacles reach further than people think
#230In computer security, every time machines become fast enough to breach the limits of an algorithm we invent something new so that “hard” problems remain “hard” and therefore encryption is still secure. There has been no corresponding increase in the difficulty of invading privacy. 30 years ago, even though you probably “could” observe somebody for a long time and eventually connect some dots about them, it would not…
Great explanation. Would love to see more companies that understood this - we would buy their products! :)