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Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

gizmodo.com

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Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#141

Post by smelendez »

drdaeman wrote: post #135
nlh wrote: post #112

I was talking to a friend today who said, fairly succinctly, that Facebook's single biggest problem is that they Totally and Royally Suck(TM) at PR. I wonder what would happen if they were just straightforward about this. "Friends you May Know is really cool! We use your phone's location data and do cross-checks on your address book to make the most intelligent suggestions. We even use some unique features of your ca…

> Friends you May Know is really cool! I've got over 9000 suggestions and not a single accurate one. Maybe they have the best technology and all the data out there, but I'm skeptical they can really use all the data they supposedly have on me. Same goes for any targeted advertisement, not just Facebook. Some come close (based on simple topic preferences), but in all those years I've yet to see any large number of the…

Interesting! It works pretty well for me.

At worst it's usually people I don't know but logically could: friends of friends, people who worked somewhere I worked before or after me, people who went to my high school I never really knew.

Occasionally it's full of apparent shady accounts: usually fake looking accounts of attractive women I have no friends in common with, then they'll disappear. I'm guessing scammers upload fake contact lists of random phone numbers to get on people's suggestion lists

Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#142

Post by EGreg »

beatgammit wrote: post #129
pxeboot wrote: post #6

by comparing the accelerometer and gyroscope readings of each phone, the data could identify when people were facing each other or walking together. More evidence we need far more privacy controls in mobile operating systems.

I don't want privacy controls, I want complete control. I'm stoked about the Librem 5 project, and I hope it succeeds enough to not disappear in a couple years. I just bought a phone, but I'll likely buy the next rev if the first one works out. I don't need much from my phone, and as long as I can make/receive calls/texts, browse the web, and can get consistent security patches from the community (e.g. some Linux dis…

Complete control is easy. End to end encryption. Don’t let them see what you’re doing.

MAIDSAFE network!

Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#143

Post by metildaa »

zoul wrote: post #139
glandium wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that I could prevent the app from using the GPS says the OS does have the tight controls already. This is not a problem of permissions model. Also, the only non Android phones are essentially from Apple, and they are too big for my taste. (also, ridiculously expensive ; also, my wife uses iPhones, they all ended their (short) career with a swollen battery; not sure what she does with them)

iPhone SE is small and fairly cheap.

Its also a redheaded stepchild that Apple has discontinued without a replacement, not a great place to migrate to if you want a new phone of similar size in 3 or 4 years running iOS.

Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#144

Post by sah2ed »

drusepth wrote: post #120
gdulli wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always been floored that people leave their location services turned on by default. I have mine on for no more than a few minutes a month. I only turn it on when I'm in an unfamiliar location, don't have my bearings, and looking at the map alone isn't enough to help without GPS.

On the other hand, I've had mine on 24/7 for the past 2-3 years and routinely visit my timeline on Google Maps to look back on exactly where I went on particular days. Looks like this, and I find it extremely awesome/useful: https://i.imgur.com/jxxjg1g.jpg

Might be a good idea to obscure the full URL in your screen shot.

Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#145

Post by a11595 »

hawaiianbrah wrote: post #115
a11595 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this isn't about privacy. I literally charge my phone less, because not only does gps coming on randomly eat up battery - when it has data to collect from random apps they make a data connection and send stuff home. I could care less about going back, tracking my location history, and correlating it with other data. I have a life, and gps on, after a day of the phone sitting there on standby, eats an extra 5% of batt…

off topic but it always irks me when people get it wrong: it’s “I couldn’t care less”

actually, it's the same as your vs you're.

the correction you're giving here, everybody already knows very well. sometimes we make a mistake in both typing and speech. but people like you assume everyone is an idiot and jump right in to correct them.

If you see someone deep in thought walking, and they cross on a red light - are you equally helpful to tell them red means stop and green means go?

I guess if you need to make yourself feel superior without actually being superior, you are always free to pretend errors of attention are lack of knowledge.

Let me ask you this - I'm on the toilet right now listening to news in French, and typing this in English. Sometimes a french word will sneak into my post. No, I don't proofread because I'm not typing a newspaper article, and I have a life. Will you point out to me that in an English sentence, words should be in English?

I'm guessing what always irks people is you. Now, it's bed time. How do I brush my teeth again?

Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#146

Post by steve_gh »

staplers wrote: post #124
gdulli wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always been floored that people leave their location services turned on by default. I have mine on for no more than a few minutes a month. I only turn it on when I'm in an unfamiliar location, don't have my bearings, and looking at the map alone isn't enough to help without GPS.

Cellular carriers sell your real-time GPS location even if you turn off your phone (GPS chips operate outside the network) Proof: https://www.zdnet.com/article/us-cell-carriers-selling-acces...

Generally, carriers only have access to the RAN metadata (cell sector, signal strength, etc), not GPS.

And in Europe they can't sell or pass on personal data. They can aggregate it, and sell aggregated data (e.g. for transport planning purposes)

Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#147

Post by Nasrudith »

rhizome wrote: post #16
a-dub wrote: post #9

I'm not really sure if that's a scary facebook thing or merely just an inconvenient reality of the world we live in now. There's quite a few papers out on fingerprinting/identifying cameras from images taken with them using intrinsics (dust, scratches, slight offset of image sensor with respect to lens).

I'm not really sure if that's a scary facebook thing or merely just an inconvenient reality of the world we live in now. These aren't mutually exclusive. The reality of the world may just be acquiring more scary things, and ones that are created for profit.

Well I think this specific thing is just an inconvenient reality in that it is finger-printable in the first place - if one notices a distinct image distortion across all sets that would form a 'fingerprint' of sorts like if on one setting a few pixels are always black to oversimplify the principles. Facebook didn't create that reality to be analyzed.

However if Facebook gathers a large data set of known signatures to work with or worse does so from the hardware without your knowledge or consent as opposed to anyone working with your posted photo galleries is a scary Facebook thing.

Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#148

Post by plttn »

sah2ed wrote: post #144
drusepth wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, I've had mine on 24/7 for the past 2-3 years and routinely visit my timeline on Google Maps to look back on exactly where I went on particular days. Looks like this, and I find it extremely awesome/useful: https://i.imgur.com/jxxjg1g.jpg

Might be a good idea to obscure the full URL in your screen shot.

I'm 95% sure that URL is safe.

Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#149

Post by gsich »

staplers wrote: post #124
gdulli wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always been floored that people leave their location services turned on by default. I have mine on for no more than a few minutes a month. I only turn it on when I'm in an unfamiliar location, don't have my bearings, and looking at the map alone isn't enough to help without GPS.

Cellular carriers sell your real-time GPS location even if you turn off your phone (GPS chips operate outside the network) Proof: https://www.zdnet.com/article/us-cell-carriers-selling-acces...

GPS chips are receive only.

Re: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

#150

Post by pferde »

BigJono wrote: post #119
AlexandrB wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm always confused by comments like this. Not only is corporate surveillance always one NSL away from being used by the government, but corporations aren't democracies. As a user I can't vote on what data Facebook choses to collect. Facebook's shadow profiles also put to rest the idea that you get to choose whether or not to participate in corporate surveillance.

Ask me and the other citizens of Australia what democracy has done to save us from government mass surveiallance. It may possibly be one of the worst guards against it. 99% of the population don't understand it and don't give a shit. Co-incidently that's the only reason Facebook and Google get away with it too, or it'd be far more profitable for them to back off and play the "we value your privacy" PR card. Literally…

> Literally the only difference is that Facebook is headed by software engineers and governments are headed by a bunch of people with tons of power and no knowledge. You tell me which is more dangerous. You can't act ethically if you don't even understand the domain you're acting in.

On the other hand, you can do a lot more damage if you have the knowledge, and do not care about ethics.

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