Color me just so incredibly surprised.
Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
21–30 of 54 posts
Re: Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
#22I understand that centralized systems are much more efficient than P2P when it comes to high bandwidth communication. But as of today, it would be possible to create a completely decentralized Snapchat (signed ephemeral videos that are shared between two parties). The routing would be the only non-trivial component of this, but it could be solved with a DHT. Why do we continue to trade convenience for privacy? Such a…
What happens when one peer doesn't have internet access for a moment and a snapchat is delivered at that moment? How do you build "retries" into a decentralized infrastructure? If no server is storing the content, couldn't someone fill up my phone storage simply by sending me videos repeatedly? The infrastructure forces my phone to instantly download the content, because no one is paying for storage of it before it g…
> What happens when one peer doesn't have internet access for a moment and a snapchat is delivered at that moment?
The video will be on the sender's device until the recipient confirms that they have received a 100%. So this prevents a phone storage clogging situation.
> The infrastructure forces my phone to instantly download the content, because no one is paying for storage of it before it gets routed to me right?
Yeah, that would be accurate. There could be intermediaries that charge low prices to cache snaps for you so you didn't have to download it ASAP, but that would negate the ephemeral nature built into Snapchat)
Re: Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
What happens when one peer doesn't have internet access for a moment and a snapchat is delivered at that moment? How do you build "retries" into a decentralized infrastructure? If no server is storing the content, couldn't someone fill up my phone storage simply by sending me videos repeatedly? The infrastructure forces my phone to instantly download the content, because no one is paying for storage of it before it g…
It wouldn't make sense for your phone to be part of a P2P network. It's only connected to your radio tower, and not really anything else. Also, you could define a maximum file limit size, and at that point your phone would be considered backed up, and then if no other route is found, the transfer is cancelled after a certain timeout.
Well, these days a lot of phones are part of P2P networks such as BitTorrent, so that's not a blocker.
Re: Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
#24Complying with legal requests, fighting child pornography is not optional. Unless you are of course Mastodon etc. I don’t understand the article it quotes unnamed “former” employees who might very well could have been the ones who got fired for improper access.
If SnapChat is storing anything, they have to be sitting on one of the biggest collections of underaged nudity in the world. I've never figured out how they get around that problem without the FBI being at their throat.
Re: Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
#25Really shocked by the allegations. Has any unethical behavior like this ever happened in a Silicon Valley startup before? Would there have been any way to see this coming?
Uber and their "God Mode"/"God View" comes to mind. E.g.: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2014/10/03/god-view...
Huh, you always hear so much about the good Uber is doing it’s hard to accept that’s a true story.
Re: Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
#26Really shocked by the allegations. Has any unethical behavior like this ever happened in a Silicon Valley startup before? Would there have been any way to see this coming?
This post really needs a /s on it for full effect.
I think without an /s it acts as a great sieve, sorting between the idealists and the cynics. Personally, I got the satire right away (cynic).
Re: Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
#27Really shocked by the allegations. Has any unethical behavior like this ever happened in a Silicon Valley startup before? Would there have been any way to see this coming?
This post really needs a /s on it for full effect.
I’m getting a lot more serious replies on it than I hoped lol.
Re: Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
#28Really shocked by the allegations. Has any unethical behavior like this ever happened in a Silicon Valley startup before? Would there have been any way to see this coming?
Not sure why you're surprised. Startups often don't have much in the way of insider controls for data in their database at launch. Debugging production issues when you don't have root can be pretty inconvenient. Employees are trusted and insider threats tend not to be part of the threat model until they have more employees and more to lose.
But Snapchat has been around a while and clearly does have some internal controls over this. Not good enough, apparently.
Re: Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
What happens when one peer doesn't have internet access for a moment and a snapchat is delivered at that moment? How do you build "retries" into a decentralized infrastructure? If no server is storing the content, couldn't someone fill up my phone storage simply by sending me videos repeatedly? The infrastructure forces my phone to instantly download the content, because no one is paying for storage of it before it g…
Have the receiving phone send an acknowledgement message back and if the sender's phone doesn't get one after a few seconds, show a "{name} failed to receive your message. Maybe they're offline." dialog. Allow the sender to try again later.
I like this idea and the features being brainstormed in the thread a lot
Re: Snapchat Employees Abused Data Access to Spy on Users
#30I understand that centralized systems are much more efficient than P2P when it comes to high bandwidth communication. But as of today, it would be possible to create a completely decentralized Snapchat (signed ephemeral videos that are shared between two parties). The routing would be the only non-trivial component of this, but it could be solved with a DHT. Why do we continue to trade convenience for privacy? Such a…
most people wouldn't understand or care about the benefits and P2P is inherently more fragile and complex to program than server-client