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Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

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Re: Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

#181

Post by GyYZTfWBfQw »

kome wrote: post #79
reacharavindh wrote: post #61

So, this happened and we have confirmed about the dark patterns whether consented or not. What are good alternatives in this "Network effect" age? Facebook - I hardly use anymore. It exists undeleted because it serves as a kind of Social ID. I don't have the App installed anywhere, neither do I access it from my regular browser. The thing I'm struggling to get alternative for is WhatsApp. How could I talk to all my c…

Also: Facebook works on every platform, while at Signal they have a strange cellphone fetish. I would love to use Signal, but I have to use Telegram. The Telegram desktop app is awesome, and it doesn't need a cellphone.

Wire works on every platform (you don't need a cellphone to sign up, only e-mail), and they released their server code a while ago as well, and documentations on how to set it up is work in progress, which means that in the future (actually even now, but most people don't know how to set it up :P) you won't even have to rely on their servers, you can easily self-host one.

https://wire.com/en/download/

https://github.com/wireapp/wire-desktop

https://github.com/wireapp/wire-server

https://wire.com/en/security/

Re: Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

#182

Post by austincheney »

mk89 wrote: post #159
austincheney wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is nothing to suggest dark UX patterns were at play here. People simply gave Facebook access to everything because it was fashionable and convenient. People simply do not care about their privacy if its in conflict with convenience. It has been common knowledge for years that Facebook will directly use that data against you and still people, completely aware of this, didn't care. The only thing that made people…

I think the statement > People simply do not care about their privacy if its in conflict with convenience is only partially correct. So far I have been able to distinguish these kinds of people: - people unaware - people aware that try their best to keep privacy (if they are on facebook, they limit their usage - more or less like "lurkers") - people aware and still posting stuff on FB/giving some permissions and they…

> However, what about last week's scandal with Cambridge Analytica?

This isn't news to me. Any data submitted by a user to Facebook is forever surrendered to Facebook who then owns it. Facebook can do whatever they want with their property.

The only surprise there is that users so happily agree to this madness only to be shocked by the result. What did they think was going to happen? Still, I don't blame Facebook for this.

It reminds me how people (Twitter addicts) were shocked at this website 10 years ago: http://pleaserobme.com/

Re: Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

#183

Post by briandear »

austincheney wrote: post #151
akuji1993 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm still completely convinced that this whole scandal will not damage Facebook a bit, in the long term. Yeah, the stock is going to be a bit lower for some weeks, some people will leave, but the largest part of the Facebook users has not even realised the scandal in full scale. They're not going anywhere, they're going to continue as is, since there really is not alternative for Facebook right now and tbh they would…

It is an easily testable premise. Ask anybody if they have deleted their Facebook account. If they are hesitating they probably won't.

Actually deleting the account doesn't matter -- if you don't use the account, that's what matters more and here's why.

Facebook's revenue is almost exclusively from advertising. Advertising costs on Facebook depend on reach, PPM, and/or PPC. Facebook advertisers don't pay for "active users" or even "users" -- they pay for PPM/PPC. In other words, your data is relatively worthless if you aren't around to be targeted based upon it.

Despite having a profile, if a user isn't there to see the ads, that means less reach and fewer clicks. When advertisers realize the apparent ineffectiveness of FB advertising, ad rates will decline, reducing revenues for FB. It's unlikely FB would actually run out of money because with reduced scale comes reduced costs -- eventually the entire platform might be operated by Zuckerberg at at a WeWork rented desk after having laid off everyone else.

My point is that your data is pretty much useless if you aren't there to be exploited because of it.

Facebook and Google are huge really for one main reason -- self-service advertising. Some local bike shop can experiment with $200 in PPC super-easily. That local bike shop can't as easily run a radio ad or TV ad and measure the results as easily. So Google and FB have made advertising something that is accessible to those with both lower budgets and lower sophistication. The Coca Colas and General Motors of the world don't care about FB or Google at all -- they have the resources to sponsor the Olympics or national TV shows or pro baseball teams.

Re: Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

#184

Post by vanderZwan »

groestl wrote: post #139
vanderZwan wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Even though legally they are in the right Even that is dubious. Law is interpreted by judges for this exact reason: people pushing it to extremes.

What Facebook acquired from their users was "expressed consent", which is notoriously easy to get using dark UI patterns. But the technical community has been using "informed consent" in their definition of malware for a while now, and it is highly questionable if dark UI patterns and "informed consent" are compatible concepts. The legal system (at least in US and EU) needs to catch up to this, but it does. In the EU…

> We will see how judges interpret that.

Judges are getting more tech-savvy, and I think lawyers are also getting better at explaining the deceit. There is hope, the question is how long it will take at this point.

Re: Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

#185

Post by Broken_Hippo »

anilakar wrote: post #83

I suspected this many years ago when familiar faces from our customers started to appear in the friend suggestion box. I've never installed the FB app on my phone, but our less privacy oriented customers probably have. What pisses me off is that while I can choose what information I share, I haven't given other people nor Facebook permission to read phone call logs that involve me.

To be fair, I get weirdly familiar faces from different times in my life coming in my suggestion box... and I've never had facebook on my phone. I do have Instagram, but this was a trend before it was installed on my phone.

Not to mention that I rarely use my phone's "phone" features, including SMS. I live an ocean away from most family and have never had many friends. I have a couple here in the country outside my spouse, and we talking is sporadic at times since they both have young children.

Re: Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

#186

Post by vincnetas »

Joeri wrote: post #134
fimdomeio wrote: post #122

I feel in a way very disturbed by all these news coming out. Not by their contents, I don't feel there's nothing new here, but by the way way they are written. Since when is it not known in the tech world that facebook's business model exists around the idea of making a piece of legal spyware. At least where I live it's unpolite to give someone's contacts to anyone without asking the person first. I don't see why is…

Well, the users of facebook do get the facebook service in exchange for the data they provide. TANSTAAFL. If you don’t pay with money, you’re paying with something else. Facebook is not a charity. The question is not whether they’re allowed to obtain (non-monetary) payment for using their service, it’s whether it was (and is) clear what the price is. What irks me is why non of these services allow monetary payment. W…

FB income : 15,920,000,000$ [1]

FB users : 2,129,000,000 [2]

$7.47/year

This is quite affordable. Curious how would marketing companies react to such idea.

[1] https://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/fb/financials?query=income-sta... [2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/264810/number-of-monthly...

Re: Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

#187

Post by rando444 »

adventured wrote: post #155
mk89 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait until GDPR is here, then we might discuss about it. I really wonder how they will pass all those "privacy checks".

It doesn't matter. They have the money, people and time to throw at compliance. GDPR won't dent Facebook in the least. They'll bend where they have to, and no further. They'll pay occasional fines and that won't matter either. If you take it to an extreme and the only thing they can do is show non-personalized advertising and do zero tracking, they'll still print billions in profit in the EU market. That's what ownin…

It does matter because if/when they comply with these new regulations, it diminishes large portions of reasons to be mad at them because it will help curb all of the shady stuff they have been doing for more than a decade.

So yes, it does matter, and them being compliant is a good thing.

Re: Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

#188

Post by mtgx »

dm319 wrote: post #154
ponderatul wrote: post #66

I think we are talking differently about this permission concept. Legally yes, they had permission. But the fact that they used those dark ux patterns to request that permission should not be forgotten. Even though legally they are in the right, we as users should make this fact irrelevant and just abandon the platform. Let them be right, let them win the argument but lose the battle with the general public.

I think the business sector needs to have a look at the way consent is done in the medical field, where huge terms and conditions with nasty stuff hidden away isn't ok. The concept in medicine is that consent for treatment is done in a simple way that encompasses things that are commonly an issue (but often a minor inconvenience), things that are rarely an issue but are disastrous, and things that might specifically…

I imagine that's exactly what the business sector doesn't want to do.

I remember when Google and Microsoft changed their privacy policies 2-3 years ago to become much more generic and "unified" - as in they could now use your data however they found fit from across all of their services and products. Great piece of PR that "unified" trick, though, so props to the PR team, I suppose.

The tech media mostly treated it with a shrug even when there was something that sounded quite suspicious in there, and had a tone of "yeah, but that's probably just used for X, and it's unlikely Google/Microsoft will use it for other nefarious purposes. It's just for legal reasons, you see."

No, those provisions weren't put in there "just for legal reasons" and they were put in there on purpose because they were meant to be used. Also, if they put it in there "for legal reasons" it's also because they intend to use it and need the legal cover. It's weird how the media took out exactly the wrong message from it back then.

It also bares repeating, because the media didn't cover it much back then, and it was quite a sneaky thing for Google to do - Google changed its privacy policy to no longer keep your data "anonymized." Many people even on HN like to defend the companies' data collection "because they anonymize it", which in itself has always been a joke, as studies have proven, but they no longer even do that:

https://www.extremetech.com/internet/238093-google-quietly-c...

Re: Facebook denies it collects call and SMS data from phones without permission

#189

Post by austincheney »

briandear wrote: post #183
austincheney wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is an easily testable premise. Ask anybody if they have deleted their Facebook account. If they are hesitating they probably won't.

Actually deleting the account doesn't matter -- if you don't use the account, that's what matters more and here's why. Facebook's revenue is almost exclusively from advertising. Advertising costs on Facebook depend on reach, PPM, and/or PPC. Facebook advertisers don't pay for "active users" or even "users" -- they pay for PPM/PPC. In other words, your data is relatively worthless if you aren't around to be targeted b…

Technically that is correct, but I don't really agree in reality. Most users lack the discipline to simply walk away from a still available account when Facebook is a savage drug addiction for so many people.

I downloaded my Facebook archive this weekend and it was a massive 12kb. I know entirely what it means to have a living account and not feed the beast, but I am also the rarest exception that disproves the norm. Deleting a Facebook account means the drug addict cannot relapse.

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