Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads • Hacker News Board

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#291

Post by aembleton » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:31 PM UTC

myrandomcomment wrote: post #242

So this never really bugged me. It is a damn good free service. I also love how it picks up on plane tickets, hotel reservations, etc and puts them in the calendar. Makes life simpler. If ad companies fix something please fix the I searched for something and bought it but I get adds for it for the next 4 weeks. That bugs me.

Frustratingly, by reading my emails Google should know that I've bought something and so don't need ads about it.

But hey, they don't seem to have used that data.

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#292

Post by meanderer » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:33 PM UTC

morganvachon wrote: post #270

skrause wrote: post #33

I never understood the argument that some automatic scanning for keywords is like "reading" your mail. By that same logic isn't Gmail's spam filter still "reading" your mail? It is classifying your mail based on content after all...

The problem is that it's not just your email. If you send an email to a Gmail user, Google is now building a profile on you (or was until this move) as well as your recipient. Did you give explicit consent to Google? Did you sign a EULA or SLA with them allowing this? No, they just did it anyway. Even someone who makes a point to keep themselves off of Google's radar will end up indexed and sold to the highest bidder…

Building profiles of senders can be necessary, e.g., for detecting spammer accounts.

Also, email is transmitted in plain text. Sending an email is more like shouting to your friends in the street, rather than putting a letter into an envelope mailed to the recipient. Thus, I don't think an explicit consent is needed.

That said, I understand that fair use of such information is a concern.

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#293

Post by 65827 » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:35 PM UTC

chicob wrote: post #204

jikeo wrote: post #164

I know I shouldn't be surprised, but it seems weird that the reporter nor any of the 140+ comments so far seemingly don't mention the recently published proposal for a new ePrivacy directive in the EU that will make it a lot harder for Google to scan e-mails in the first place. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eu-privacy-idUSKBN14U1FL https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/10/whatsapp-... http://www.kempli…

That directive might be related to what's happening. But let's not be naive: if Google will stop reading our emails in order to send us personalized ads, that's because it doesn't really need to. People share just enough outside their email environment for Google to do its thing. Another sign of which those worrying about privacy should be aware.

Yeah it's all inevitable and we are just powerless peons in the face of the purely efficient and all knowing machine.

That's certainly the bullshit narrative Google wants you to believe.

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#294

Post by e12e » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:36 PM UTC

sebastian wrote: post #263

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would you search your inbox? Or filter spam?

Some type of proof‐of‐work for email addresses that have not been previously white-listed. Similar to what BitMessage does[1]. Sending emails to new/random contacts shouldn't be that easy anyway. [1] https://bitmessage.org/bitmessage.pdf

Encrypting email to a single recipient is (a weak) proof of work.

There's a big difference between sending 10k copies of a plaintext email, and retrieving a public key and encrypting to 10k recipients - not to mention that filtering out all non signed/not-signed-by-trusted-key should be a decent start for a whitelist/greylist.

I'd be curious if anyone ever got gpg-encrypted spam?

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#295

Post by CaptSpify » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:45 PM UTC

fserb wrote: post #265

dingaling wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like my accountant reading my receipts to create my tax return versus a sleazy salesman sneaking a peek at them to find new ways to sell me stuff.

if you accountant was a computer. We have to stop this madness of thinking that "John READS my diary" means the same thing as "The function fread() READS nitems objects". Those don't mean the same thing except in a metaphorical sense. It's insane.

why does it matter? Google has access to read my email, and if they want (or are pushed to), they can single me out and then go and read them. Sure, 9/10 times it's a bot reading my emails, but there's nothing stopping them from doing it.

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#296

Post by jszymborski » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:47 PM UTC

Propen wrote: post #238

DerfNet wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there any reason not to go with ProtonMail? They seem to be the big recommendation lately for encrypted email service.

I'd really love to support ProtonMail but one thing I can't swallow is that there's no server-side search of email bodies (only to/from & subject) because it's encrypted. This kills the possibility of searching through years of newsletters & stuff :/

[I'm stupid they have 2FA, ignore this comment.]

Another huge problem is the lack of two-factor authentication. How can a security-oriented service not offer TOTP or even SMS 2FA.

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#297

Post by drusepth » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:47 PM UTC

Will there still be a way to opt-in?

This seems like one of those decisions that is a net negative for functionality in favor of quelling some misguided privacy concerns. Hopefully this doesn't lessen the quality of ads by much.

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#298

Post by sqeaky » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:48 PM UTC

patkai wrote: post #275

Google will stop reading my emails for Gmail ads because I will stop using Gmail. It's kind of a sad story, because they are the good guys, but once they built a huge company they started to focus on maintaining it, possibly at any cost. This is a cautionary tale: power corrupts. You, me, everyone. And yes, the web will produce dictators we never imagined possible, because the Internet is so powerful it will enable t…

I agree that the web is extremely powerful.

I also think this power is symmetric in who it enables. Unlike land ownership or TV broadcasting entry isn't expensive and the needed tools can easily be smuggled. Anyone can easily gain immensely from this free-flowing font of knowledge and communication.

A potential dictator must take great pains to use gain that huge power in the Internet era and I think you are right that we will see some insanely powerful dictators. However, I think we see fewer than in previous eras though.

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#299

Post by calibration263 » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:50 PM UTC

fserb wrote: post #265

dingaling wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like my accountant reading my receipts to create my tax return versus a sleazy salesman sneaking a peek at them to find new ways to sell me stuff.

if you accountant was a computer. We have to stop this madness of thinking that "John READS my diary" means the same thing as "The function fread() READS nitems objects". Those don't mean the same thing except in a metaphorical sense. It's insane.

It's not about who reads it, it's about who has access. If a system has access to read my email as plain text, it means anyone who owns or can get access to that system can read my email.

Some one wrote fread, it could've been john, and john absolutely could be reading your email. Look at the what happened with ubers god mode.

That said the value of gmail for me exceeds the risk of people I care about reading my email getting access or having access. However my(and probably your) subjective view on the value of your emails is absolutely subjective.

Re: Google Will Stop Reading Your Emails for Gmail Ads

#300

Post by stockmania » Fri, Jun 23, 2017, 10:55 PM UTC

jszymborski wrote: post #296

Propen wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd really love to support ProtonMail but one thing I can't swallow is that there's no server-side search of email bodies (only to/from & subject) because it's encrypted. This kills the possibility of searching through years of newsletters & stuff :/

[I'm stupid they have 2FA, ignore this comment.] Another huge problem is the lack of two-factor authentication. How can a security-oriented service not offer TOTP or even SMS 2FA.

2FA has been out for almost 6 months.