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Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

nautil.us

181–190 of 360 posts

Re: Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

#181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YouTube suggesting extremist videos to people in order to maximize views is giving you “information”? Can we stop pretending Google is somehow more useful to the average person than Facebook?

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Your reply is amusing. Do you call presenting examples cherry-picking whenever they don’t suit you?

Facebook, too, provides many useful features to many people. But your puerile comment insists we see things as black and white, and that we can only say “Facebook bad, Google good.”

Facebook allowing people to communicate is good; leaking their data, not so much. Google allowing people to find what they’re looking for is good; uploading their locations without meaningful consent, not so much.

Nice try with the logical fallacy spiel, but you should really be back in class.

Re: Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

#182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why use paid privacy-by-policy systems when you can use free privacy-by-design systems like Tor and i2p?

Because they're slow as shit, difficult to configure correctly, and make you more conspicuous to most three-letter agencies.

> Because they're slow as shit,

Tor isn't that bad actually for browsing, while i2p needs more love regarding speed.

> difficult to configure correctly,

For Tor: You just download the Tor Browser. Already pre-configured.

> and make you more conspicuous to most three-letter agencies.

Good argument for actually using them.

Re: Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

#183
post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has anybody actually seen an ISP tracking user behavior? I've worked for a few 1998-2005 and never witnessed it.. however I wouldn't be surprised if they had transformed in the years since. Just curious if anyone has ever leaked info about such a program.

No comment, just googling. https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/2016/12/comcast-s... https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/04/how-a-banner-ad-...

Ads yes, but tracking?

Re: Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

#185

Your ISP tracking your every move is scarier than all of them after the ISP privacy bill passed. At least Facebook and Google give you something for it and you can route around them if you desire. No routing around ISPs unless you use a VPN but even then they are blocking those. Broadband/cable/telcos capture everything you do and can now sell that information and do[1]. That bill was the pre-cursor to removing net n…

> Yet Facebook and Google at least built products you wanted that you willingly gave up privacy to use and at least got something for it I never agreed to FB collecting data on me. I have no account with them. I do not use their services. Yet here we are.

You can easily block Facebook and Google via host loopback or blocking their scripts.

I have never seen so many pro ISP tracking/privacy people on HN.

Re: Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

#186

Your ISP tracking your every move is scarier than all of them after the ISP privacy bill passed. At least Facebook and Google give you something for it and you can route around them if you desire. No routing around ISPs unless you use a VPN but even then they are blocking those. Broadband/cable/telcos capture everything you do and can now sell that information and do[1]. That bill was the pre-cursor to removing net n…

Uh, Google and Mozilla and a handful of organizations are converting all web traffic to HTTPS through subtle manipulation of standards and user interface. They even proxy mobile traffic from their search engine. ISPs can't even see what IP you're visiting because it's all fronted by CloudFlare. Even your DNS is being hidden by an HTTPS tunnel in the browser. Your ISP soon won't be able to see anything you do online.…

There's still SNI in TLS. Hopefully that changes in 1.3, but I don't know how prevalent that is yet.

Re: Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

#187
post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No comment, just googling. https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/2016/12/comcast-s... https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/04/how-a-banner-ad-...

Ads yes, but tracking?

Ad networks are tracking by design including ISP injected ones.

Re: Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

#188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YouTube suggesting extremist videos to people in order to maximize views is giving you “information”? Can we stop pretending Google is somehow more useful to the average person than Facebook?

.

There's been evidence, admittedly anecdotal AFAIK, that YouTube recommendation algorithms can tend towards increasingly extremist content from quite innocuous starting points. For example:

* https://twitter.com/zeynep/status/973716995521748992

* https://twitter.com/Limerick1914/status/972837152940855296

This doesn't mean YouTube staff are purposefully designing the algorithm to specifically trend towards extremism: this can fall out naturally from human psychology and ML algorithms that note which videos increase engagement and recommend videos based on user interest and recommending videos that will increase the user's time on site.

I think this is worth looking into in a more methodical manner. You can dismiss it as cherry-picking, but I think it's something reasonable people can be concerned about. And these services and products should be looked at separately, determining which parts are good and which parts are bad.

Re: Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

#189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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Your reply is amusing. Do you call presenting examples cherry-picking whenever they don’t suit you? Facebook, too, provides many useful features to many people. But your puerile comment insists we see things as black and white, and that we can only say “Facebook bad, Google good.” Facebook allowing people to communicate is good; leaking their data, not so much. Google allowing people to find what they’re looking for…

[deleted]

Re: Is Facebook Really Scarier Than Google?

#190

Your ISP tracking your every move is scarier than all of them after the ISP privacy bill passed. At least Facebook and Google give you something for it and you can route around them if you desire. No routing around ISPs unless you use a VPN but even then they are blocking those. Broadband/cable/telcos capture everything you do and can now sell that information and do[1]. That bill was the pre-cursor to removing net n…

Uh, Google and Mozilla and a handful of organizations are converting all web traffic to HTTPS through subtle manipulation of standards and user interface. They even proxy mobile traffic from their search engine. ISPs can't even see what IP you're visiting because it's all fronted by CloudFlare. Even your DNS is being hidden by an HTTPS tunnel in the browser. Your ISP soon won't be able to see anything you do online.…

You don't think ISPs inject ads/tracking into requests after the page is rendered on subsequent requests and override ad networks? [1]

> For years, Comcast and other large telecommunication companies around the world have injected javascript into your web browsing experience to serve advertisements and account notices. Their ability to do this stems from their upstream position as your Internet Service Provider (ISP). While Comcast is only currently using their javascript injection ability to serve customer account related information, the same message sending vector could be used to serve phishing expeditions, or other types of attacks. Not to mention that whoever your ISP is has access to your browsing history, your search history, your entire internet history unless you use a VPN. Some, like AT&T, even brazenly sold parts of this information for advertising profit unless you explicitly paid them not to – a pay-for-privacy scheme.

Why do you think ISPs like Comcast lobbied so hard to bribe their way into the ad/tracking market instead of winning it on the market with products people want? Do you think they did that so that to waste profits? Or to gain them?

We pay ISPs for secure and private internet access, not to also sell off our private data.

Google and Facebook are ad/marketing companies, you expect tracking and they use your data and give you a free service in exchange.

ISPs we pay for internet access and privacy, noone expects ISPs to be selling your data or would call them ad networks, though that is what they want to be and are building with this privacy law change.

[1] https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/2016/12/comcast-s...

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