201–210 of 315 posts
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I own some of their stock and I keep buying more. Reason: FB is doing a great job with advertising and they are not just Facebook but also Instagram and other things.
Counterpoint: Facebook is taking your invested money and doing terrible things with it. Why fund that?
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well yea, they aren't "really" the same thing. It was just phone numbers weren't considered all that private back then.¯\_(ツ)_/¯ just a hot take
Back then you could ask the phone company to unlist your number... and they actually did it.
"The Facebook spokesman said the social media company *was not confident it had full visibility on which users would need to be notified*." @Facebook here you go: https://haveibeenpwned.com
They can’t assume that, or trolls or unscrupulous competitors would start creating ‘Facebook’ data dumps left and right.
I do wonder what EU regulators will say about their viewpoint that they do not have to inform their users, though.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, unless and until, companies like Facebook are fined appropriate amounts they’ll never stop. Quite literally, every business school on the fucking planet will tell you do something if it’s cheaper. It is cheaper for them to not give a fuck, than to give one. Unless they are fined upwards of $20-50bn it’ll never stop because it’s always going to benefit their bottom line. Full…
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, unless and until, companies like Facebook are fined appropriate amounts they’ll never stop. Quite literally, every business school on the fucking planet will tell you do something if it’s cheaper. It is cheaper for them to not give a fuck, than to give one. Unless they are fined upwards of $20-50bn it’ll never stop because it’s always going to benefit their bottom line. Full…
I have a strong suspicion that, if a government tried to fine a company in billions, that company would simply leave the country forever. I'm not saying that this is a good thing or a bad thing. It's just an intuition that I have.
That said, I think the parent comment that suggests “20-50B” fines is dramatically overestimating what it would take to promote more depositor behaviour here. Even much smaller fines with the threat of larger ones would likely be sufficient.
For years companies have been steadily asking, mandating or even trickling users to give them their phone numbers under the excuse of security (while the real reasons were different), now what? How can they be trusted anymore? This also strikes a great point about the data sharing between Facebook and WhatsApp. Linking data between services augments the dangers and the consequences are not obvious to the end user. I…
Certainly I cannot be the only one who finds phone numbers, email addresses, and many other things quite inconsequential compared to name and address. In particular, there could easily be a postal system implemented where the sender would not need the actual physical address of the receiver. The receiver could easily ask the postal service to generate an arbitrary key which could either be single use, or multiple use…
- Names, addresses, and phone numbers were published by the phone company in a book and given to everyone.
- Hospital admissions/discharges were published in the local newspaper.
- Social Security Number was used for everything. Many people included it on their pre-printed checks. Engraving it on valuable personal posessions was encouraged, for help identifying them if they were stolen.
None of this was considered a real violation of privacy, or at least I never heard anyone really express any concerns about it. Unlisted phone numbers were a thing, but very few people had them and it cost extra to have one. Most people wanted to be in the phone book so others could contact them.
I guess the big thing that's changed is identity theft is now a thing. That's because it's become possible to "identify" yourself by providing enough information about yourself without actually being physically present. Also online harassment/doxxing. All of which is only a problem because everything and everyone is online now. That is the real problem, not the information itself. Of course there's no putting the genie back in the bottle.
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> If Facebook has since deleted some of those accounts or associated phone numbers, they may no longer have a way to contact those users That would totally defy logic. I don't think that Facebook deletes anything ever .
I deleted my account a few months ago and was pleasantly surprised to find that it didn't surface in the breach. It could just be hiding in a different datastore of course, but it's definitely more fucks than I thought they gave.
On the other hand, everyone used to get a book delivered to their house every year with the information that is contained in this leak. I remember when you were considered a bit of a crank if you had your number as unlisted in the phone book.
This huge leak has definitely killed the SMS text messaging service. Sender can be spoofed and spam/scam/phishing have reached an intolerable level. The fact that they can cross reference you and then produce a more personalized content is huge. Changing password is easy (ok less easy if you recycle it) but changing phone number is something that I am not even relaxed to do.
Can anyone on HN please explain why, why, WHY are we still using SMS/telephony which has exactly 0 encryption wh---I guess that's the reason? It's insane. I've heard banks using SMS!!!! To send a code. We have TOTP for that! Or even perhaps a push notification or something better than bloody SMS. I refuse to use the networking system altogether. No phones, no calls. Of course you do 'need' a number so I keep one hand…
Even installing and using a TOTP app, and configuring it to work with an online login, is a hurdle that a non-negligible number of users cannot pass.
It's better than nothing.
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> If Facebook has since deleted some of those accounts or associated phone numbers, they may no longer have a way to contact those users That would totally defy logic. I don't think that Facebook deletes anything ever .
I deleted my account a few months ago and was pleasantly surprised to find that it didn't surface in the breach. It could just be hiding in a different datastore of course, but it's definitely more fucks than I thought they gave.