121–130 of 176 posts
The writer doesn't mention which apps he installed, nor which phone. I'd be interested in the details, does anyone know this underlying data?
I have not named apps / companies I that were not relevant to this feature. I found other things, but I had to focus on a clear story.
One downside to the security model in popular mobile OSes is that once someone does gain superuser access there's really nothing the user can do short of rebuilding the device since they often don't have it themselves.
Let’s not beat around the bush here: this is a uniquely Android problem. Sure, there are some iOS jailbreaks out in the wild, but these are very few and far between. There was one for then-recent iOS versions earlier this year, but it came many years after the previous jailbreak of that kind. Superuser access to my iOS device isn’t something I need to worry about. But if I ran Android? It would be a real threat.
Users "rooting" their Android phones also usually doesn't involve any sort of real exploit either. Android devices don't come with the ability for apps to run as root by default, and can have their firmware flashed to add a means of doing so. Doing this requires that the user unlock their bootloader, which wipes the device and often requires manufacturer authorization. Rooted devices have weakened security by being rooted, but this doesn't affect ordinary non-rooted devices.
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> The chaos it would cause for US B2C businesses would be large. Literally who cares? Let them deal with it. It doesn't matter how much money they lose. They should have considered the consequences of abusing people's trust and violating their privacy under questionable consent. Corporations are vastly more powerful compared to individuals. Courts obviously need to favor the latter in the vast majority of cases. To d…
It was not a value judgement, just a prediction. Some judges do look at the impact of a ruling. I personally don't think they should be legally binding (as I suspect most HN readers do). "doesn't matter how much money they lose" -- of course it does, these companies employ people and generate lots of government revenue (even if they skirt corporate taxes).
The writer doesn't mention which apps he installed, nor which phone. I'd be interested in the details, does anyone know this underlying data?
Writer: Samsung Galaxy S7. I guess over 70 apps in navigation, weather, games, prayer apps, or relevant due to listing location companies in privacy policy. I have not named apps / companies I that were not relevant to this feature. I found other things, but I had to focus on a clear story.
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I think without said "security" model, we wouldn't have so much malware. Because getting your exact location extracted and send to marketing firms and government contractors is worse than quite a few trojans you could get on your local computer by executing random and even malicious code. It is time that security experts get honest about this and that "experts" lower their voice a bit.
Are the experts experts or are the experts "experts"? In my experience, security expert generally are honest about this and should, if anything, raise their voices more .
There is a technically correct argument that a locked down environment hinders the execution of malicious code, but for overall security, especially privacy and illegal data access, the current "security" solutions for smartphones perform very badly.
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Thanks, I don't like Twitter for long form content. It's not designed for this.
I agree with you, but a hacky workaround is @mythreadreader
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What isn't understandable?
Being able to read the words doesn't mean the comment makes sense. Reading it over and over again, yeah sure I can understand it, but I don't see any "point" or relation to the original comment. Some people just seem to feel "smart" by wording things as convoluted as possible, using fancy words and references. The truth is, it is much harder to express thoughts clearly with simple, yet elegant words. Mostly because t…
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> The chaos it would cause for US B2C businesses would be large. Literally who cares? Let them deal with it. It doesn't matter how much money they lose. They should have considered the consequences of abusing people's trust and violating their privacy under questionable consent. Corporations are vastly more powerful compared to individuals. Courts obviously need to favor the latter in the vast majority of cases. To d…
It was not a value judgement, just a prediction. Some judges do look at the impact of a ruling. I personally don't think they should be legally binding (as I suspect most HN readers do). "doesn't matter how much money they lose" -- of course it does, these companies employ people and generate lots of government revenue (even if they skirt corporate taxes).
There are political and economic concerns, not judicial. The fact the company is important does nothing to remedy the fact that it exfiltrated private information to foreign intelligence agencies.
The thread also mentions https://nrkbeta.no/2020/12/03/my-phone-was-spying-on-me-so-i... which would be a better link than twitter.
> For the sum of 35,000 NOK (3,300 EUR / 4,000 USD), we got access to location data showing where tens of thousands of Norwegians had travelled in 2019. > One of them was 31-year-old Karl Bjarne Bernhardsen from Stavanger. The information made it easy for us to identify him in the data that – according to the data provider – had been anonymised. Here’s that article: https://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c…
Why is "track and trace" a challenge when this exists?