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Amazon Sidewalk

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Re: Amazon Sidewalk

#42

It's a real shame that human selfishness means everyone has to have their own mini WiFi point rather than all sharing. I wish the 2.4Ghz band had some kind of "at least half the bandwidth of any network connection over 2.4Ghz must be available for use by any member of the public, for free". That would effectively be the licensing cost for your use of the WiFi band - you use up bandwidth in 2.4Ghz, but provide for fre…

Yeah but wifi's not only used for the internet - would've exactly want everybody accessing everybody's stuff (printers, webcams, NAS, etc)

Obviously there are solutions to that but a layperson won't manage it

Re: Amazon Sidewalk

#44

I love how insidious Amazon are with their products, get the hardware into their homes then just change what it does to what you want. What you didn't read the EULA in the last update?

The latest Firestick software update is a great example of this. The new UI/UX aggressively de-prioritizes apps from content producers in favor of a "feed" that lets them push their own content and intermediate content producers from their customers. They even go as far as to deliberately hide your saved items/watch next items three levels deep in a menu.

Re: Amazon Sidewalk

#45
post #10

"when you share your Bridge’s connection with Sidewalk, total monthly data used by Sidewalk, per account, is capped at 500MB" Given that it's US-only, where most internet plans have pretty high caps, it's hard for me to get upset about this. I would have expected my Echoes alone to use more than that during normal monthly operation, playing music, fetching news, etc.

My main concern with sharing like this isn't the bandwidth usage, but what happens when someone abuses the connection (downloading/sharing child porn as an example). I don't want anything to do with it if there's even the slightest chance I'd end up on the hook for someone else's crimes.

Or run a spam bot from your IP and get you in trouble with Google.

Re: Amazon Sidewalk

#46

Please don’t support Amazon from creating another network-effect product that creates vendor lock-in, and privacy issues. Convenience should not be the end-all goal, as the ad blatantly states, but instead interoperability and open-protocols.

Threw out all Echos some years ago. Tired of Alexa not understanding what I wanted.

Re: Amazon Sidewalk

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that when you share your internet with a neighbour partaking in illegal activities, you may get yourself in trouble.

Not true, see the link in my sibling comment.

>> Not true, see the link in my sibling comment.

Only "not true" if there is some evidence it is not true. I looked at the sibling link and found this:

>> Will opening my network make me liable for others' illegal actions? +

>> This one is a bit more complicated, but the short answer is, "We don't think so." Click here to find out more.

"dont think so" is not convincing. Also not convincing is the broken link on the "Click here to find out more."

I dont think this should be treated lightly -- there is no reason to assume that openly sharing an internet connection is safe given the consequences of illegal use.

Re: Amazon Sidewalk

#48
post #9

I wouldn't mind opening up even higher b/w wifi. I've got way more than needed so seed linux distros all day long anyway ...however if someone does something illegal with it that'll still trace back to my IP and police will kick down my door, correct?

Use Tor to proxy those connections.

To proxy someone else’s use of your own network, use which you (generic ‘you’) may not know is happening in the first place because not everyone reads Hacker News or the EULA?

Re: Amazon Sidewalk

#49
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My main concern with sharing like this isn't the bandwidth usage, but what happens when someone abuses the connection (downloading/sharing child porn as an example). I don't want anything to do with it if there's even the slightest chance I'd end up on the hook for someone else's crimes.

My understanding is that you aren’t sharing a general connection to the internet, you’re specifically letting Amazon devices tunnel some data back to Amazon’s parent servers. You’d also likely have a pretty good case against Amazon if using their product as directed caused your trouble with the po po

Ah right, so this is more of service channel that Amazon devices can use to connect Amazon HQ? That's not so bad then, but the headline is pretty click-baity.

Re: Amazon Sidewalk

#50
So, if I buy a so called Smart-TV (not because I like it but because traditional ones are getting harder to find) but don't set up it on my home network so it can't phone home, it could scan around anyway and find other open devices more than willing to participate in my personal data exfiltration? If the Amazon project succeeds, I would expect in a few months most home devices manufacturers, to partner to implement it so they have a way to circumvent users choices.
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