Facebook's seized files published by MPs • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#411

Post by TheForumTroll » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 7:45 PM UTC

dylan604 wrote: post #304

mpweiher wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> this is their users' data > No, it's not - short of a change in law it is Facebook's data. Er, actually it is. Under GDPR, and under previous data protection rules that lacked meaningful enforcement, users own their data. Companies at most get to "borrow" and/or keep it safe for them. Alas, this fundamental fact seems to not have quite made it everywhere yet.. https://digitalguardian.com/blog/tackling-gdpr-challen…

What about data that Facebook generates about you, but you did not provide? Is that information required by the GDPR to be provided to you, or does the GDPR only state that any information you provided to them must be returned? There's no way I'm reading the GDPR nor would I even understand all of it if I did. We know that FB makes connections between you and other users even if you've never made those connections yo…

It doesn't matter where the data came from - uploaded, downloaded, generated. If it is PI it is the property of the identified user, not Facebook's. If they slurp 100 images of my face then that data is mine and it is my right to have it deleted and told who they shared it with and for what.

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#412

Post by Yhippa » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 7:46 PM UTC

TAForObvReasons wrote: post #343

raverbashing wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's official, Mark Zuckerberg is the new Bill Gates. As in "we don't care about ethics"

This was known for a very long time. The "Dumb fucks" comments were brought to the public attention many years ago. The problem is that Silicon Valley gave Facebook a pass on all of the ethical transgressions for years (most likely since they minted many millionaires and billionaires in the valley)

I perceive the tech community to be okay with this as long as Facebook keeps giving us excellent open source tools.

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#413

Post by eitland » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 7:47 PM UTC

SheinhardtWigCo wrote: post #386

hkt wrote: post #73

Sometimes, even amidst the Brexit madness, I love our Parliament. Publishing and seizing documents like this is a move that proves politicians have the spine to look after people's interests. Time to get serious, act on this, and break up Facebook forever.

I don't think this move achieved much of anything, other than to encourage business executives to use ephemeral messaging for their confidential internal communications.

WikiLeaks or someone has said that part of their purpose is to make sure the fear of leaks cripples the internal processes of certain organisations.

If Facebook were forced to mostly use ephemeral communication that would be somewhat crippling.

Also I think there exist regulation as to what kind of documentation must be archived and how (SOX?).

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#414

Post by NeedMoreTea » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 7:50 PM UTC

drewblaisdell wrote: post #384

mindslight wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At its foundation, Faceboot is a man-in-the-middle attack dressed up to attract users. The standard "web 2.0 defense" was that these companies would remain benevolent in the interests of their users to maintain their own profits. The onus was really on them to demonstrate that trusting third parties with our communications is a reasonable thing to do. The more time passes, the more blatant the evidence gets that this…

> The onus was really on them to demonstrate that trusting third parties with our communications is a reasonable thing to do. In general, I agree, but the context here is dozens of HN commenters claiming that FB is a bad actor/net negative for the world. These commenters cite lists of gripes about the company, many legitimate, some illegitimate, but get hand-wavy when someone asks about the "net" in "net negative". I…

> net negative

How do you weight the individual criticisms, or individual benefits to achieve an objective positive/negative score? How do you weigh "installing spyware to see what companies we might buy" against "share photos with nan"? How does the Facebook "only visible to people you interact with enough" algorithm affect the previous question's balance?

Without the weighting I think we've easily reached the point where the number of negative revelations is incessant and the benefits declining (thanks in part to that previously mentioned feed algorithm).

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#415

Post by TheForumTroll » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 7:50 PM UTC

ddalex wrote: post #85

johnnyfaehell wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sharing or not sharing data with another app is likewise not an unusual decision. FB is not a public utility - they can not work with other apps for any reason, or no reason at all. And this is a particularly ironic thing to point out, considering that the main thrust is complaining that they _did_ share data with other apps. So it's bad if they do share data, but also bad if they don't? To me, this would be Facebo…

> is not Facebook's data Look at the T&Cs sometime. Once you upload something, it's theirs. Once they sniff something off your phone, it's theirs. Once you look at something in another tab while FB is open, it's theirs.

You cannot sign your rights away in a T&C so what it says is unimportant.

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#416

Post by drewblaisdell » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 7:53 PM UTC

mindslight wrote: post #409

drewblaisdell wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with much of what you wrote, but disagree that the question is nonsense. From a specific utilitarian perspective, "wasted human potential" only matters in so much as it impacts human suffering. If we want to maximize pleasure and minimize suffering, the units are still the same in both opposing points you mentioned - it is just really, really hard to measure. In practical terms, coming up with qualitative poi…

> If we want to maximize pleasure and minimize suffering, the units are still the same in both opposing points you mentioned - it is just really, really hard to measure. It's not hard - it's impossible. Even we fully agree on a specific metric, a situation still has to be weighed against possible alternatives and integrated on timescales longer than our lives. A very basic example of this is a company optimizing for…

> Heuristics are the only way to tackle this.

Yes. This is why every single comment of mine in this thread recommends a specific heuristic with which to tackle this exact problem.

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#417

Post by blibble » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 7:58 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #347

timthorn wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From: https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201213/cmselect/cmli... : "If a Select Committee wishes to require the attendance of a witness, an informal request is issued. If the witness is unwilling, a period of negotiation usually follows. If it is clear that the witness is not willing to attend, and the Committee wishes to insist, an order for attendance is made by the Committee, signed by the Chair, and then ser…

People don’t think that ‘order’ actually has any effective legal power though. https://www.consoc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Select-... https://www.google.co.uk/amp/www.theweek.co.uk/93679/can-mps...

that may be the case, but snubbing reasonable requests from an institution with essentially unlimited power in its own domain is unlikely to end well for you if you want to remain operating there

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#418

Post by PavlovsCat » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 8:00 PM UTC

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #414

drewblaisdell wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The onus was really on them to demonstrate that trusting third parties with our communications is a reasonable thing to do. In general, I agree, but the context here is dozens of HN commenters claiming that FB is a bad actor/net negative for the world. These commenters cite lists of gripes about the company, many legitimate, some illegitimate, but get hand-wavy when someone asks about the "net" in "net negative". I…

> net negative How do you weight the individual criticisms, or individual benefits to achieve an objective positive/negative score? How do you weigh "installing spyware to see what companies we might buy" against "share photos with nan"? How does the Facebook "only visible to people you interact with enough" algorithm affect the previous question's balance? Without the weighting I think we've easily reached the point…

I think that may be the the point, to get too many people from acting on what they have enough of, to "let's talk some more first".

Such discussion wasn't required of anyone before they were allowed to express support or praise, so why would it be required from anyone who reached the point of boycott or criticism, before they are granted that they have reached that point?

I mean, it's fine to ask people why they think what they think of Facebook, but why refuse to accept others are moving for good reasons, maybe for better reasons than others have for not moving -- and ask them questions while letting them pass, without attempting to delegitimize them until they "explained themselves"?

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#419

Post by PavlovsCat » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 8:03 PM UTC

patejam wrote: post #373

PavlovsCat wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think "giving information about friends" is kind of a stretch. Facebook has that information. Clicking something so Facebook does something with it isn't quite the same as, say, entering all that info into a text field. Maybe it is legally, but morally, from a commen sense perspective, FB gives the info out. Allowing API access is giving info. We all know how servers work. You can't "take" something, it always gets…

That's why I said "very easily". I'm not saying it's necessarily the friend's fault, but the trigger is one of your friends clicking "Accept" on one of these apps. I'm also just clarifying what happened, because people don't seem to understand how any of it works. "Facebook sells your data" is very far from reality, and yet the reality can be considered just as bad.

> "Facebook sells your data" is very far from reality, and yet the reality can be considered just as bad.

Yeah, but those are the cases where it's especially important to not mix things up, so thanks for elaborating!

Re: Facebook's seized files published by MPs

#420

Post by PavlovsCat » Wed, Dec 05, 2018, 8:06 PM UTC

drewblaisdell wrote: post #416

mindslight wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If we want to maximize pleasure and minimize suffering, the units are still the same in both opposing points you mentioned - it is just really, really hard to measure. It's not hard - it's impossible. Even we fully agree on a specific metric, a situation still has to be weighed against possible alternatives and integrated on timescales longer than our lives. A very basic example of this is a company optimizing for…

> Heuristics are the only way to tackle this. Yes. This is why every single comment of mine in this thread recommends a specific heuristic with which to tackle this exact problem.

The heuristic is the sum of what individuals are willing to put up with or not -- not something you can calculate and then just prescribe for everybody.