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Facebook Portal – Privacy review

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Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#51

Post by mokus »

lostlogin wrote: post #43
dmitriid wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was a programming mistake. Only a few accounts were affected. Inadvertently. Only 300 000 users affected. We're committed to privacy as always and in the coming year well take steps to make sure this never happens again. Our estimations were incomplete and a tad off, 270 million accounts affected, possibly more. Our users are at the center of all we do and will do everything in or power to protect their data.

I’d this a joke lacking /s, or a genuine post?

I had trouble telling from the first sentence or so, but after reading to the end I’m pretty confident it’s a sarcastic take on a (hypothetical?) press release.

Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#52

Post by recursivecaveat »

You know your brand is toxic when a generic/faceless version of your product would have been received better. Someone else here mentioned that it should have been "Instagram Portal", which I totally agree with, or maybe even better: "WhatsApp Portal". It seems like Facebook is trying to resuscitate its reputation by releasing this obviously invasive device and swearing on a stack of bibles that they won't touch the data. That's not how it works though. Once people realize you're an untrustworthy megacorp who's mining and selling data, there's nothing you can do to disprove it except get out of the data game altogether; the cat is already out of the bag.

Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#53

Post by input_sh »

School-Cotton wrote: post #40
danShumway wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it is. The difference is that Gmail/Amazon aren't hated the same way as Facebook is. People aren't smart about surveillance, they're not smart enough to realize that giving Instagram access to their phone is a bad idea. But, there are 2 perfectly capable home assistants on the market today that (right or wrong) aren't part of the same consumer-level narrative about privacy, and people like simple, strai…

Why is owning an Echo device any more of a privacy nightmare than owning a smartphone? The Echo is not always listening/recording; it is activated by a wake word.

So, in other words, Echo is always listening for that wake word?

Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#54

Post by schwartzworld »

cryptozeus wrote: post #49
dpcan wrote: post #7

I cannot even think of a single person in any of my networks of people who would buy this and put it in their home. It has "hell no" written all over it. It's almost arrogant or bizarre that they would try to launch such a product given how people feel about Facebook and privacy. I suppose it's simply to satisfy shareholders who think Facebook needs to compete in this market???? It's the Zune of the Living-Room Assis…

You are clearly not their target audience. Really zune if living room space, come on man.

Zune was awesome. It was a phenomenal device, and anybody who owned one would tell you that.

https://medium.com/@shiriendamra/why-the-zune-failed-1327845...

TLDR: iPod already dominated the market, and the zune wasn't marketed aggressively enough.

Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#55

Post by myrakle »

School-Cotton wrote: post #40
danShumway wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it is. The difference is that Gmail/Amazon aren't hated the same way as Facebook is. People aren't smart about surveillance, they're not smart enough to realize that giving Instagram access to their phone is a bad idea. But, there are 2 perfectly capable home assistants on the market today that (right or wrong) aren't part of the same consumer-level narrative about privacy, and people like simple, strai…

Why is owning an Echo device any more of a privacy nightmare than owning a smartphone? The Echo is not always listening/recording; it is activated by a wake word.

There were multiple instances of Echo waking up when the user didn't utter the wake word.

Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#56

Post by School-Cotton »

myrakle wrote: post #55
School-Cotton wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is owning an Echo device any more of a privacy nightmare than owning a smartphone? The Echo is not always listening/recording; it is activated by a wake word.

There were multiple instances of Echo waking up when the user didn't utter the wake word.

And smartphones are immune to misrecognizing "Hey, Siri" ?

Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#57

Post by rock_hard »

earino wrote: post #20

This title is somewhat problematic. It makes it sound like the portal has "privacy not included" and yet that is the name of the blog. In fact, the Portal meets the Mozilla Foundation's "Minimum Security Standards". It gets a yes for encryption, security updates, strong password, manages vulnerabilities and a privacy policy! This is honestly kind of cruddy. You can feel however you want to feel about Facebook, but th…

Yeah, the politics around Facebook are tiring...turns out when they gave everybody the power to connect they also gave the tinfoil hats that power

We have two portals here at home and almost everyone I know who wants to stay in touch with their families has one too. Specially the kids love it!

Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#58

Post by cbsks »

bronson wrote: post #39
dmitriid wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was a programming mistake. Only a few accounts were affected. Inadvertently. Only 300 000 users affected. We're committed to privacy as always and in the coming year well take steps to make sure this never happens again. Our estimations were incomplete and a tad off, 270 million accounts affected, possibly more. Our users are at the center of all we do and will do everything in or power to protect their data.

> [we] will do everything in or power to protect their data. Cambridge Analytica and other recent events show this statement to be meaningless. Facebook could have done a lot more to protect customer data but chose not to.

Whoosh

Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#59

Post by [deleted] »

School-Cotton wrote: post #40
danShumway wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it is. The difference is that Gmail/Amazon aren't hated the same way as Facebook is. People aren't smart about surveillance, they're not smart enough to realize that giving Instagram access to their phone is a bad idea. But, there are 2 perfectly capable home assistants on the market today that (right or wrong) aren't part of the same consumer-level narrative about privacy, and people like simple, strai…

Why is owning an Echo device any more of a privacy nightmare than owning a smartphone? The Echo is not always listening/recording; it is activated by a wake word.

[deleted]

Re: Facebook Portal – Privacy review

#60

Post by FussyZeus »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #5
FussyZeus wrote: post #2

Saw an advertisement for this in a theater some months back. The wife and I turned to each other and said "Hell no." She isn't even that security aware, it's just... why. What is this for? What problem does this solve? Our iPhones do this already without constant surveillance and probably have superior hardware. This feels much to me like Stadia did to Google: It's a company inserting itself into a position it didn't…

This is for video conferencing users that are not tech literate. This is something I would get for my grandmother, or my wife's grandmother, instead of an iPhone for video conferencing. If it was not offered by Facebook. I would trust Mozilla (perhaps partnered with the EFF) or Apple to offer such a product if they would charge for quality hardware, reliable infra, and long term support. Sell your trust as the featur…

> This is for video conferencing users that are not tech literate.

So why does it increasingly feel like privacy and security are reserved for those who can afford it and/or know how to do it themselves? Why is every poor person who doesn't have the time to learn technology basically hung out to dry in terms of data protection?

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