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Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

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Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#221

Post by 3pt14159 »

grey-area wrote: post #188
munchbunny wrote: post #139

I can see why they thought this was a good change. It makes the UX for G-suite apps much more pleasant, almost like you get the full functionality of G-suite productivity stuff as part of installing Chrome. For most people, that's a good thing. I think as tech people we systematically tend to under-think the second-order effects of the systems we build. Case in point, Chrome and G-suite being that closely integrated…

I can see why they thought this was a good change. It's a good change only if you are permanently logged in to google services, which is probably why it seemed like a great idea to the Chrome team, who probably have no idea how much distrust Google has started to build up. It moves the browser closer to an app runner for google services - I'd understand that if this was on Chrome OS or a specific 'Google' app, but in…

Just use different browsers for different things man, this isn't even hard. I seriously do not understand the outrage over this. Half the websites we visit host their fonts on Google domains, where is the outrage over that?

Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#222

Post by lrem »

tedivm wrote: post #214
lrem wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a process where external launches need to be approved by a separate privacy team. If you're certain you can do a better job, you can find some listings on https://careers.google.com/ (just search for privacy).

I don't think that using this incident as a recruitment pitch is a good idea.

"Somebody should do a better job!" "Why don't you try yourself?" Seems like a somewhat reasonable train of thought. A lot of good things can come out of outrage, as long as people are willing to take action (no, I don't claim going through Google recruitment to be the optimal strategy, but it is an option)(I actually got my first job as a result of my technical complaints, obviously not in Google).

Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#223

Post by avodonosov »

If I'm logged into gmail I'm logged into Chrome? Horror. I don't know what is a worse mistake: this or the idea to violate standards and ignore autocomplete=off, or deprecating sync XMLHttpRequest because "it's bad for UI and you don't need it".

Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#224

Post by grey-area »

3pt14159 wrote: post #221
grey-area wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can see why they thought this was a good change. It's a good change only if you are permanently logged in to google services, which is probably why it seemed like a great idea to the Chrome team, who probably have no idea how much distrust Google has started to build up. It moves the browser closer to an app runner for google services - I'd understand that if this was on Chrome OS or a specific 'Google' app, but in…

Just use different browsers for different things man, this isn't even hard. I seriously do not understand the outrage over this. Half the websites we visit host their fonts on Google domains, where is the outrage over that?

Why use Chrome at all? I'm not outraged, just voting with my feet.

Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#225

Post by lurker456 »

twblalock wrote: post #129

Are there any lawyers here who can tell us if this is actually a GDPR violation? Most of the discussion here is about why people don't like the new Chrome feature -- but is it actually in violation of the GDPR?

It may be a GDPR violation (insufficient consent), we'll need a ruling to be certain. It may also be an antitrust violation (chrome is close to 60% market share in the EU).

Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#226

Post by ItsMe000001 »

hrktb wrote: post #201
manigandham wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a bad example. In technical progress, Chrome is the complete opposite of IE (which seems to be replaced by Safari these days) and way better than the rest in pushing forward new features. Also 99% of the time Firefox and Edge work just fine. EDIT: Yes, IE was great in the beginning, but then it stagnated and earned the wide reputation of being terrible obsolete anchor that it is now known for. It's with this l…

IE at its core was technically very advanced, way faster than Netscape, and pushed a ton of new features. Dynamic HTML as it was called, CSS, encryption, and so much more stuff came to IE before any of the competitors. Then it became the IE6 we all came to know. The analogy with Chrome starting as a trail blazer and progressively taking the same trajectory is perfect, really.

That is known, but the point is that IE stopped. That has been reported somewhere, can't find a useful link right now but I remember the discussions. It was reported - and what was observable matched the description - that as soon as Netscape was out Microsoft stopped pretty much all their efforts, and IE became the laggard that due to its market share prevented innovation and became a huge obstacle for quite a long time, until loss of market share and the rise of the web app forced their hand.

Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#227

Post by allenz »

adtac wrote: post #153
allenz wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the tech-savvy community has influence. We set up computers for our friends and families. We write IT policies. We are web developers, tech reporters, and more. At least for me, Google's behavior means that I can no longer recommend Chrome.

I can't imagine the impact is significant even if we consider two degrees of acquaintances (you tell someone to not use Chrome and they tell someone else).

The world is very small, and privacy is a mainstream concern these days. The impact of one story or one action is limited, but in the end, users do get their say. Otherwise, we would still be using Internet Explorer.

Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#228

Post by entropie »

mulmen wrote: post #132

Chrome has been the new IE for years. "just use chrome" is an endless refrain from webdevs who don't want to test on Firefox. Not sure why it is so hard for people to see what is going on here. Google has a massive conflict of interest with their web development efforts. This is classic Microsoft-esque Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.

> "just use chrome" is an endless refrain from webdevs who don't want to test on Firefox.

Not at all. I used to start developing while netscrape was still a thing. Chrome is (and it was) a bless for developers. I try firefox like once a year and see no reason to switch.

THe actual case is also no reason to switch (for me) but ill watch it.

Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#229

Post by tedivm »

joshuamorton wrote: post #206
tedivm wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Bob logs into Alice's computer and forgets to log out all she has to do is hit the "sync" button and she can now view everything that's his synced with his account. Previously she would have at most his email, now she has that and more. To me that seems like a decrease in privacy.

I don't want to get too far into specifics because I'm not an expert, but I'm pretty sure there are a number of inaccuracies in this comment. Notably, synced data would have been visible in myaccount.google.com already, and if he had syncing disabled, I don't think there wouldn't be any data synced with his account to view. In other words, assuming Alice was nefarious, yes this is still terrible, but I don't think it…

> Notably, synced data would have been visible in myaccount.google.com already, and if he had syncing disabled, I don't think there wouldn't be any data synced with his account to view.

That makes no sense at all unless syncing is an account wide setting instead of a browser setting, and it's pretty clear that this is a browser setting. Bob could have syncing enabled on his primary computer, log into gmail on Alice's computer where it then logs him in to her browser but without syncing enabled, and then Alice can later on come in and enable syncing by hitting the blue button.

Frankly it sounds like what Google should have done is created a better security system rather than a better notification system. This solves nothing, creates more problems, and pisses people off at the same time.

Re: Am I logged in or not? GDPR case study on the example of Chrome browser change

#230

Post by magicalist »

tedivm wrote: post #219
joshuamorton wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How is sending my personal passwords to a server under Google's control an increase in my privacy? If this change did that, I might be inclined to agree with you. But as far as I know, it doesn't. You still have to explicitly opt in to syncing. Which is a no-op compared to the old behavior.

According to the Privacy Policy (even after the changes from this weekend) this change gives Chrome permission to upload data. > The personal information that Chrome stores won't be sent to Google unless you choose to store that data in your Google Account by signing in to Chrome. If what you are saying is true- and will remain true for the future- why didn't they change that language to say something like- > The per…

FWIW, that's exactly what the updated [1] says. Maybe they missed that sentence.

[1] https://www.google.com/chrome/privacy/#signed-in-chrome-mode

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