Red flags in the Threads privacy policy • Hacker News Board

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#71

Post by epistasis » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 5:48 AM UTC

jjaken wrote: post #65

epistasis wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is Apple at fault for what an ad-ridden article claims without evidence? Seriously I could barely even find the claim you speak of, when every other sentence is punctuated by a half-screen advertisement. Why accept the claims of such obvious click-bait without evidence? There's no reason to believe anything said in the article, particularly when it's claims can easily be checked and shown to be false.

It’s not from the article. It’s clearly stated on the app store page for Threads: https://imgur.com/a/Lk8Olb6

And yet again, this is not data that is coming from your phone's store of health data.

This is data that is linked to you, and the spamminess of the ads on qz.com is likely doing far more invasion of people's privacy than Threads could even dream of.

This comment thread was about Threads taking health data "from your phone," Which is does not do, and which that sceeenshot does not say it does.

This sort of data linking is absolutely pervasive in the web advertising industry, and it is bad. But let's not falsely say it's coming from the store of data on your phone, it's coming from advertising networks like those that pay for qz.com's hosting bills and profits.

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#72

Post by dylan604 » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 5:50 AM UTC

epistasis wrote: post #56

dylan604 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a huge dose of benefit of the doubt you're giving to the Zuck. Do you for a second believe that granting the Zuck access to your Health & Fitness data that he will stop at just getting the information to geolocate you or would it be more like "let's just suck in all of the data we are given access to and then maybe at a later date we can use it beyond what we originally needed"?

I have an iPhone, I can see which apps access Health & Fitness data, and must in fact explicitly give apps access to that data. Threads does not have access to that data and I can not even find some way to get it to ask me to access that data. So what are we really talking about here?

> So what are we really talking about here?

The very first thing in the listing for the app in the AppStore. Why are you so obtuse to this?

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/threads-an-instagram-app/id644...

DATA LINKED TO YOU The following data may be collected and linked to your identity:

Health & Fitness Purchases Financial Info Location Contact Info Contacts User Content Search History Browsing History Identifiers Usage Data Sensitive Info Diagnostics Other Data

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#73

Post by jay_kyburz » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 5:50 AM UTC

yoaviram wrote: post #57

TylerE wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right to be forgotten has some really nasty edge csaes.

Such as?

such as the ability easily support redaction of personal data?

Errg: sorry folks. I miss read the thread and thought the "such as" was responding to the comment next to it about the design flaw of not being able to delete personal data.

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#74

Post by jay_kyburz » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 5:53 AM UTC

epistasis wrote: post #56

dylan604 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a huge dose of benefit of the doubt you're giving to the Zuck. Do you for a second believe that granting the Zuck access to your Health & Fitness data that he will stop at just getting the information to geolocate you or would it be more like "let's just suck in all of the data we are given access to and then maybe at a later date we can use it beyond what we originally needed"?

I have an iPhone, I can see which apps access Health & Fitness data, and must in fact explicitly give apps access to that data. Threads does not have access to that data and I can not even find some way to get it to ask me to access that data. So what are we really talking about here?

Perhaps a feature that has not yet been turned on in the app itself yet.

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#75

Post by jjaken » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 5:58 AM UTC

epistasis wrote: post #71

jjaken wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not from the article. It’s clearly stated on the app store page for Threads: https://imgur.com/a/Lk8Olb6

And yet again, this is not data that is coming from your phone's store of health data. This is data that is linked to you, and the spamminess of the ads on qz.com is likely doing far more invasion of people's privacy than Threads could even dream of. This comment thread was about Threads taking health data "from your phone," Which is does not do, and which that sceeenshot does not say it does. This sort of data linki…

I think the ambiguous display of these things on the store, when few other apps show this, is cause for questions and concern. Everything you just said is equally speculative.

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#76

Post by wahnfrieden » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 6:01 AM UTC

serf wrote: post #23

brxck wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The App Store page for Threads lists “Health & Fitness” under the Analytics and App Functionality sections of App Privacy. I am completely unfamiliar with what that implies or what access would actually be allowed, but I can see how that would raise concern.

I sort of wonder about that, too -- it's not well reflected in their privacy policy.[0] An altruistic guess -- maybe another way for them to achieve geolocation if other methods are hindered? [0]: https://terms.threads.com/privacy-policy

lol no

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#77

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 6:03 AM UTC

jay_kyburz wrote: post #73

yoaviram wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such as?

such as the ability easily support redaction of personal data? Errg: sorry folks. I miss read the thread and thought the "such as" was responding to the comment next to it about the design flaw of not being able to delete personal data.

[deleted]

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#78

Post by lopkeny12ko » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 6:04 AM UTC

I must be missing something obvious here. Allegedly Threads has launched to the public by now, which is how all these revelations are being uncovered. But threads.net still points to a generic landing page with a QR code, no obvious way to create an account, sign in, etc. How am I even supposed to access this?

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#79

Post by hoppyhoppy2 » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 6:05 AM UTC

lopkeny12ko wrote: post #78

I must be missing something obvious here. Allegedly Threads has launched to the public by now, which is how all these revelations are being uncovered. But threads.net still points to a generic landing page with a QR code, no obvious way to create an account, sign in, etc. How am I even supposed to access this?

It's app-only for now, no web version

Re: Red flags in the Threads privacy policy

#80

Post by epistasis » Fri, Jul 07, 2023, 6:06 AM UTC

dylan604 wrote: post #72

epistasis wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an iPhone, I can see which apps access Health & Fitness data, and must in fact explicitly give apps access to that data. Threads does not have access to that data and I can not even find some way to get it to ask me to access that data. So what are we really talking about here?

> So what are we really talking about here? The very first thing in the listing for the app in the AppStore. Why are you so obtuse to this? https://apps.apple.com/us/app/threads-an-instagram-app/id644... DATA LINKED TO YOU The following data may be collected and linked to your identity: Health & Fitness Purchases Financial Info Location Contact Info Contacts User Content Search History Browsing History Identifiers Us…

When you read "data linked to you" don't think about the store of health data that's *on your phone.£

Think instead of all the data that all huge number of advertising networks, like the one paying qz.com's bills, that have massive hoards of data about you, without your consent, that gets bought and sold every single day.

This is not a trivial distinction! The health data on an iPhone is secure, and Threads is not getting access to it. What this is talking about is Threads linking up with all the data that all the other advertisers are already doing!

I deleted my Facebook account circa 2012 when I heard what some of their ML engineers were up to at a casual meet up, like geolocation all photos and and doing facial recognition to place which bars everyone had been in over the weekend. Back then, before the deep learning revolution, this was a mind-blowing capability. These days, I have no idea what ad networks are up to but rest assured, by getting all of HN to load the ads that are served from qz.com the advertisers have now gained far more than they did when I installed Threads (because I already have an instagram account and that does all these same things. Five years after deleting my Facebook account I was ready to give in because the rest of the networks had the data anyway).