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Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

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Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#371

Post by lrvick »

darth_avocado wrote: post #192
lrvick wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consider the overwhelming majority of users are technically illiterate. Everything is just magic scrolling machines people learned to trust from watching people they trust use them.

I would sympathize with all of the illiterate users. But the person who reported this and the people on HN discussing the article would be considered a little more technologically literate I would assume.

It is our obligation as those that build technology to call out risks to the technically illiterate masses and be advocates for them.

Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#372

Post by CodeSgt »

rowanG077 wrote: post #364
CodeSgt wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. I know specific people that use porn, and among those that I know who use it excessively, they have a hard time forming relationships. No where does that say or imply that "It's harder for everyone to form relationships today than it was in the past" as you for some reason are consistent on believing I said. Those are two very different statements with very different meanings.

I'm not the person that originally replied to you. Besides that's not what that person said. You just conjured the everyone out of thin air. That was not mentioned in your post and neither was it in theirs.

They said:

> but then in the next breath make the assumptions that difficulty forming relationships today is significantly greater than in the past

The implication being that I made the claim that it was broadly more difficult for most people today. I didn't realize that me adding "everyone" would so drastically change the meaning of their sentence. Please give me your interpretation of that if it isn't basically what I said.

Am I crazy? I say that people with chronic porn addictions have a hard time forming relationships and all of a sudden I'm accused of making blanket statements about how difficult it is for people to form relationships today compared to the past.

Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#373

Post by navanchauhan »

rullelito wrote: post #95
navanchauhan wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you want to cripple the entire app industry? Apps built using React Nativ / Flutter e.t.c use the WebView to render themselves. So they’re basically already running “in-app browsers” But then how do you differentiate when the app is rendering its own view rather than another website? You could apply some restrictions like has nowadays where you need extra security privileges (I think) to render pages / execute scr…

It's a big difference between browsing your own pages in-app, and opening any link in an in-app browser and tracking it.

I am not defending the practice. Maybe, Apple can addd it in their app store policy

Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#374

Post by navanchauhan »

joshstrange wrote: post #191
navanchauhan wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you want to cripple the entire app industry? Apps built using React Nativ / Flutter e.t.c use the WebView to render themselves. So they’re basically already running “in-app browsers” But then how do you differentiate when the app is rendering its own view rather than another website? You could apply some restrictions like has nowadays where you need extra security privileges (I think) to render pages / execute scr…

I think the clear answer is to only allow local/whitelisted domains that you can prove you own. I work on Capacitor/Cordova apps regularly and only allowing local code would allow for them to continue to work and close this loophole. Anytime I open an external page I do it in SFSafariViewController which doesn't have the ability to inject code or snoop.

That sounds like a plausible solution

Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#375

Post by lrvick »

wonderbore wrote: post #145
woodruffw wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the GP is saying that Meta should have ignored a lawful order. I think they're saying that they shouldn't have put themselves in the position of being able to render that information, and only have done so because it's profitable for them to do so.

It’s really painful to see all of these encryption holes in every product we use daily. Apple claims privacy, yet your whole phone sits unencrypted on their server ready to be served to anyone who asks (assuming you back up your phone to iCloud)

End to end encryption is only useful when the software on each end is open source and deterministically built/distributed by third parties with accountability.

Even Signal or Google/Apple could ship a bad Signal app update to targeted devices to dump convos if ordered. If you use Matrix with a client from an F-Droid build or a reproducible build from debian etc, then the Matrix developers literally could not comply with orders to obtain your plaintext content.

Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#376

Post by Forgeties79 »

graham1776 wrote: post #152

I've meant to write a blog post about this, but here goes: In-app browsers allow users to view inappropriate content, often against the wishes of sensitive individuals. People especially at risk for this include addicts and children. Nearly every app, even "safe apps" including children-rated apps, allow access to an in app browser. Even when iOs has locked down all access to Safari, a parent has removed access to al…

> Yes they are long, inefficient paths to reach the internet, but curious (or motivated) individuals or children will use almost any app to reach the internet.

I don’t think this can be overstated. How many people tell you stories of watching signal-scrambled porn on TV when their parents are asleep? How many of us waited until our parents are asleep to play video game late at night? How many millions covertly downloaded Napster/Kazaa/etc. and downloaded 30 versions of a song before they finally got the one they wanted?

Being “motivated” as a kid or a teen is a low bar.

Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#377

Post by sh4rks »

munk-a wrote: post #350
jacquesm wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brilliant insight. Could you please convince my children's school that they do not need a smartphone? Because they f'ing mandate it and I have not found a way around this yet.

Flip phones still exist and allow access to call in emergencies as well as text with friends.

Not sure if bait but I'll bite. Flip phones in this day and age? Nobody even uses sms to text each other anymore. You'd be isolating your kid by not giving them access to WhatsApp and other messaging apps.

I pray you never have kids because from your other comments it seems like you had painfully low self esteem in school and now you've tricked yourself into believing that that's the norm.

Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#378

Post by rowanG077 »

CodeSgt wrote: post #372
rowanG077 wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not the person that originally replied to you. Besides that's not what that person said. You just conjured the everyone out of thin air. That was not mentioned in your post and neither was it in theirs.

They said: > but then in the next breath make the assumptions that difficulty forming relationships today is significantly greater than in the past The implication being that I made the claim that it was broadly more difficult for most people today. I didn't realize that me adding "everyone" would so drastically change the meaning of their sentence. Please give me your interpretation of that if it isn't basically wha…

> but then in the next breath make the assumptions that difficulty forming relationships today is significantly greater than in the past

A pedant would say that a extreme impact on a subset of a group means there is also a significant impact on the average of the entire group. But that's not the point.

This statement calls back to your claim that (excessive) porn use severely impacts their ability form relationships. It's not a blanket statement you now make it out to be. Someone doesn't need to repeat back to you word for word the entire context of the conversation.

Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#379

Post by filmgirlcw »

mschuster91 wrote: post #270
chadlavi wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a child of the 2000s: just let them look at the horrifying underbelly of the internet. One trip down grossout lane isn't going to undo all your parenting and make them some kind of perverted monster. Children aren't prisoners.

Back in the early 2000s we didn't have people actively recruiting young frustrated men into incel and far-right terrorist groups though. We didn't have people thinking it was cool and edgy to make jokes about gassing Jews. Hell even the pedo/grooming problem wasn't much of a thing. Yes there was porn and vile gore floating around and you had to take care to not fall victim to dialers changing your dial-up information…

I don’t disagree that things are more extreme now and that the algorithm reinforces the most toxic stuff, but as someone who has been on the internet for most of my life , I can assure you that being a woman on the internet has always been terrible (I had pedos trying to get photos from me in AOL chat rooms in 1994 when I was 10 years old), there have always been edgy shitlords making Holocaust jokes, and the whole modern grooming discourse literally started with chat rooms in the early to mid 1990s.

Yes, it is absolutely worse in some ways now, not just because some stuff has become desensitized and de-rigeur, as well as the aforementioned algorithm, but let’s not create a hagiography around the halcyon days of “online” that never actually existed.

Like Bane, I grew up in this pit of darkness and was molded by it, and I have true love and affection for it, but like, this element has always been here. Always.

Re: Instagram can track anything you do on any website in their in-app browser

#380

Post by b3morales »

CodeSgt wrote: post #250
graham1776 wrote: post #152

I've meant to write a blog post about this, but here goes: In-app browsers allow users to view inappropriate content, often against the wishes of sensitive individuals. People especially at risk for this include addicts and children. Nearly every app, even "safe apps" including children-rated apps, allow access to an in app browser. Even when iOs has locked down all access to Safari, a parent has removed access to al…

I'm glad to see someone mention addicts. I feel as if internet addiction, and especially subsets of it such as porn addiction, aren't given enough weight by either the addiction treatment community or the technical community. Before someone accuses me of being a conservative religious zealot as tends to happen when anyone denounces porn, I'll say that I'm far from a puritan and am extremely liberal in my social views…

Granting the facts, your hypothesis is equally plausible if reversed, to wit:

People who have difficulty forming intimate relationships will often turn to habitual pornography viewing.

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