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

Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

theintercept.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 315 posts

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#121

Post by Aunche »

394549 wrote: post #116
tomlagier wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree so much. How about we hear from some Chinese people about how they feel about the developments? The few comments I've seen have expressed excitement and highlighted the extreme issues with Baidu. The outrage seems to be coming entirely from people with no real stake in this news. I absolutely believe there's a discussion worth having about the extent capitulating to authoritarian demands is morally and practi…

> How about we hear from some Chinese people about how they feel about the developments? How open do you think a typical Chinese person is going to be with you about how they think about their government's censorship? Unless they know and trust you really well, they're probably not going to criticize it to you even if they hate it . There are strong Chinese cultural taboos against criticizing your in-group in front o…

I know plenty of Chinese people who aren't a fan of censorship, and none of them have anything bad to say about Google.

> The Chinese government has shown increasing willingness to strong-arm Western companies actions in the West by holding their Chinese operations hostage.

If that's the real reason everyone is angry, then they should support Trump's tariffs and boycott everything manufactured in China.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#122

Post by skybrian »

pcwalton wrote: post #105
skybrian wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do realize that anything you do for your employer belongs to your employer? And that protecting trade secrets is part of practically every employer agreement? There are whistleblower exceptions, but generally, if you can't be trusted to keep secrets, you're not a professional.

This is whistleblowing.

That's unclear. Google hasn't launched, so they haven't done anything wrong yet, as far as users in China are concerned. This is all internal politics, which seems to be getting increasingly nasty.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#123

Post by zerealshadowban »

jarym wrote: post #102

Honestly at this point I wonder how much there is between what US agents can do with a FISA warrant and what Chinese agents can do with their surveillance - if there is a difference it’ll be pretty small I imagine. I’m not trying to justify Dragonfly but just pointing out that tech companies are being pushed into more censorship and tracking by governments all over the world.

Are there major Chinese companies currently investing in the development of systems specifically tailored to help total surveillance of US citizens by the US government?

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#124

Post by quickben »

tomlu wrote: post #43

Disclaimer: I work for Google. I also think that there is an anti-Google bias on hacker news, holding Google to a standard not applied to others and taking any excuse to roll out the same old tired rants in response to almost any Google post (DAE Google Reader etc). If what I read is true then this is the first thing that has truly rocked my confidence that the company generally tries to do the right thing (while mak…

"I also think that there is an anti-Google bias on hacker news".

Nah mate. When a company isn't paying me, I am unrestrictedly free to be objective.

The problem, with companies (and with mafia, etc) starts once you take the money.

So, from that perspective, what you read from most of us, is more objective than anything you read on your internal mailing lists.

We, unlike your HR, don't care about morale, perception and corporate tracking pixels of stuff one isn't supposed to see or read.

HN crowd for the most part are smart and informed people. So, don't look at it as bias, look at it as assessment.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#125

Post by contem »

tomlu wrote: post #43

Disclaimer: I work for Google. I also think that there is an anti-Google bias on hacker news, holding Google to a standard not applied to others and taking any excuse to roll out the same old tired rants in response to almost any Google post (DAE Google Reader etc). If what I read is true then this is the first thing that has truly rocked my confidence that the company generally tries to do the right thing (while mak…

https://www.acm.org/membership/google

https://www.acm.org/code-of-ethics

> A computing professional should...

> 4.1 Uphold, promote, and respect the principles of the Code. The future of computing depends on both technical and ethical excellence. Computing professionals should adhere to the principles of the Code and contribute to improving them. Computing professionals who recognize breaches of the Code should take actions to resolve the ethical issues they recognize, including, when reasonable, expressing their concern to the person or persons thought to be violating the Code.

> 4.2 Treat violations of the Code as inconsistent with membership in the ACM. Each ACM member should encourage and support adherence by all computing professionals regardless of ACM membership. ACM members who recognize a breach of the Code should consider reporting the violation to the ACM, which may result in remedial action as specified in the ACM's Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct Enforcement Policy.

Please voice your concern. Your voice as a Googler is louder than mine.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#126

Post by jbigelow76 »

JoshMnem wrote: post #95
jbigelow76 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't really use Google's browsing device (Google Chrome) without providing your identity, if you ever want to sign into a Google website. That makes total sense. Google is in the business of selling ads, this requires getting as much information as possible on users, through any means possible, software downloads, online services, it's all the same in the end.

I'm not sure if you are defending their abuse of users or just stating the reasons why they do it.

The reasons as to why they do it defend the reasons as to how they do it, the end justifies the means.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#127

Post by bduerst »

IBM wrote: post #107
bduerst wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. Apple moved their keys to be stored locally on state-owned servers, meaning that Apple has given the Chinese government access to Chinese user data. Apple even updated their TOS for it.

Not according to Apple [1]: >Apple says the joint venture does not mean that China has any kind of “backdoor” into user data and that Apple alone – not its Chinese partner – will control the encryption keys. [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-apple-icloud-insigh...

That was back in February. Since then there's been some shuffling of the companies who own the servers with the keys so that China now has access.

From July 2018:

>Fast forward to today: China Telecom, a government owned telco, is taking over the iCloud data from Guizhou-Cloud Big Data. This essentially means that a state-owned firm now has access to all the iCloud data China-based users store, such as photos, notes, emails, and text messages.

https://mashable.com/article/china-government-apple-icloud-d...

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#128

Post by yuhong »

JoshMnem wrote: post #97
_red wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well there is already vivaldi, iridium, and ungoogled-chromium. But a better choice, IMO, is to install Brave since they are not just removing spy-features, but enabling new ideas to incentivize support for a more privacy focused internet.

The ad model is fundamentally broken, because all roads there eventually lead to tracking and online garbage. Monocultures are bad, so I don't think people should only use Chrome-based browsers. Google once tried to do ads without going down the wrong path, but that clearly hasn't worked out. I think that Firefox Quantum is a better alternative.

Yea, that was what my essay/overview was about, including tracing these problems back to Larry/Sergey. It is probably worth posting a link here: http://yuhongbao.blogspot.com/2018/09/google-doubleclick-moz...

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#129

Post by jhayward »

thisgoodlife wrote: post #75
lph wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that this appeasement will make Google a contender in China is blazingly ignorant of Chinese politics. No foreign company will ever be allowed to gain significant market share; it would be seen as a national security threat. The only way for Google would be to forge an equal partnership with a Chinese tech giant---Tencent, Alibaba, Huawei, or maybe one of the two dominant cell carriers. Google is selling out…

That's bs. Apple is making billions from China each year without any bs partnership.

Apple has less than 10% of the market share in China.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#130

Post by mercer »

jbigelow76 wrote: post #126
JoshMnem wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if you are defending their abuse of users or just stating the reasons why they do it.

The reasons as to why they do it defend the reasons as to how they do it, the end justifies the means.

That doesn't answer JoshMnem's question. Justifies the means to whom? If the answer is google, I'm not sure what the point of your comment was, as that's pretty obvious...
Post reply on HN