Live data from Hacker News

Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

github.com

261–270 of 374 posts

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#261
post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

except it's always listening for you to say "siri" or "google assisstent". Some androids also show what music is playing nearby. You can thankfully opt-out but the ability to is still there.

They do that with local processing. For the music thing it calculates a hash locally and send it to their servers.

Actually there are no servers involved; it uses an on-device database:

> When music plays nearby, your phone compares a few seconds of music to its on-device library to try to recognize the song. This processing happens on your phone and is private to you.

https://support.google.com/pixelphone/answer/7535326?hl=en&s...

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#262
post #23

ChatGPT for Google was #1 on HN earlier this year. Check out the GitHub repo now: that person sold the extension. I had a small side project extension, ~25,000 installs & free to use. I got enough inbound interest trying to "help me monetize" that I thought it would be worth cataloguing all the different unsavory avenues: https://mattfrisbie.substack.com/p/the-ugly-business-of-mone...

The most galling offer we saw on the mobile app side was something that would turn on the user's microphone, and listen for ads on tvs around them to track what they'd been exposed to offline. Adtech is such a thoroughly gross field.

When I worked at Meta, the execs said that many users think they're being spied on when they see ads based on a conversation they've had in real life, but the execs categorically denied that this could be happening, and said it's all just a coincidence. I thought this was a completely unfounded denial, since Meta had no way of auditing 3rd party apps on the user's phone, and it's perfectly plausible for another app to spy on their conversations and then use that to provide targeted ads to the Facebook account associated with the individual's email.

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both iOS and Android show when your microphone is active so the whole conspiracy theory about it always listening to you and sending it back is pretty bullshit. And no one has yet found evidence of such network traffic either.

True, but the theory is far older than the indicators. So maybe Facebook stopped being sneaky once those controls came in? Not saying I believe them, but there's still room for doubt there.

Facebook doesn't have to be the one doing it - a 3rd party that controls an app on users' phones could be selling transcribed data to companies that want to run individually tailored ads on Facebook.

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But every time this comes up the threads are flooded with people saying it doesn't actually happen and the ad companies just work out what you're interested in by what you're browsing.

I can’t speak for Android. But exactly how does a mobile app turn on your microphone on iOS without you giving it explicit permission? I just did a virtual visit with a doctor that used a video conferencing service that work without an app on iOS and just used Safari. I had to give the page explicit permission to use my microphone

What makes you think they don't get permission from the user?

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#265

I don't know what the solution to this is, but I know a few trusted/legitimate companies that sell their user data for around £20/year even after having monetized their users with actual money I will never do this because violating privacy goes against the core of my beliefs, but there is a conflict I can't seem to work out. On the one hand, I KNOW that the vast majority of users prefer to sell their privacy than pay…

The Internet has no easy to use fully-anonymous cash equivalent. If you pay for something, you're giving away your identity information anyway. The value exchange is definitely lopsided, but if I have to share my identity AND pay to get X, I'm out money AND shared my identity info. If I share my identity info and get X for free, at least I'm not out the money.

It also effectively has a minimum payment amount due to the credit card transaction fee structure.

And also unlike cash a service can keep billing you.

And, for better or worse, the risk is partially put on the business in the form of increased cost (or payment service denial) when a credit card transaction is considered too risky (charge backs).

Also there is a fair amount of friction to giving payment info than say pulling out your wallet or phone (but this is improving with “digital wallets”).

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#266
post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Advertising, by its very nature, is emotional manipulation with the goal of getting you to give up some of your money for something you most likely don't really need and won't improve your life all that much, if at all. To me, that's evil. Sure, there are varying degrees of this evil, but IMO even the least-objectionable advertising out there still can't be called "good". In my experience, the case where advertising…

>you most likely don't really need and won't improve your life all that much, if at all People are spending money because they see that they are getting value from something. If people didn't want it or thought it was worthless they would not buy it.

>If people didn't want it or thought it was worseless [sic] they would not buy it.

Thinking something is "worthless" and not wanting something are opinions. A lot of modern advertising attempts to change peoples' opinions, so that they do want something, and think something has worth. It's just like propaganda, which actively attempts to sway peoples' opinions.

Of course, there's only so far you can take this. Convincing anyone who isn't seriously mentally impaired that a sandwich made with literal shit isn't worthless is probably not going to work. But away from the extreme end, there's a lot of room to manipulate people.

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But every time this comes up the threads are flooded with people saying it doesn't actually happen and the ad companies just work out what you're interested in by what you're browsing.

Nielsen has sent me about $30 so far begging me to wear a microphone that records me all day. They repeatedly call and have started fedexing me letters instead of USPS. I open them to get my increasing amount of cash. That data must be valuable???

Put the microphone on your cat while you're gone for the day.

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#268
post #88
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two different things. The popular conspiracy theory is that the phone listens to and presumably transcribes your conversations, sending them to a third party. The example the OP gave is specifically listening for TV content: they’ll have hashes of known ads/shows/whatever to compare against rather than do something like live transcription. Don’t get me wrong it’s shitty and gross. But they are different things.

The only reason they don't do that is because our devices aren't powerful enough to do it all the time.

A dedicated chip?

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#269
post #262
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most galling offer we saw on the mobile app side was something that would turn on the user's microphone, and listen for ads on tvs around them to track what they'd been exposed to offline. Adtech is such a thoroughly gross field.

When I worked at Meta, the execs said that many users think they're being spied on when they see ads based on a conversation they've had in real life, but the execs categorically denied that this could be happening, and said it's all just a coincidence. I thought this was a completely unfounded denial, since Meta had no way of auditing 3rd party apps on the user's phone, and it's perfectly plausible for another app t…

Realistically, in a simple statistical way, plain "coincidences" have a significant "expected value". I.e., if you simply take the billions of people across the planet, and look even across a single day, lots of coincidences occur.

Now, add in psychological effects - "synchronicity", "frequency illusion" ("Baader-Meinhof"), "recency illusion", confirmation bias, etc... I'd expect a fair bit of compounding*.

Then, add in simple use of statistics, statistical inference, etc. and basic tracking of user navigation around the web, on a given website, etc.

I've had these experiences, perhaps one or two times a year, on average. Experiences where I was VERY surprised by ads presented. Experiences that would easily suggest a microphone must have been on when it shouldn't have been. Sometimes, I realized I'd used someone else's device in a way that could be tied to me. Other times, while some "leaps" would be involved, I could basically deduce myself that someone who had looked for information on some "X", and information on some "Y", might really be thinking about some "Z" that isn't easily arrived at from either X or Y in vacuo.

Spying, in the sense you suggest, can't be ruled out by the above. But, I would ask - why even spy? Is a company like "meta" really going to get much more useful (from their perspective) info by doing so? Particularly given the COST? It's becoming more realistic, arguably, but, really, these companies have had more than enough info on just about anyone for well over a decade to keep their algorithms and such well-occupied.

People gladly hand over tons of data constantly ... with full awareness and intentionality, and otherwise. The vast majority have no idea what statistical inference and other techniques can suggest based on seemingly obliquely connected info. Further, most users are so accustomed to "cookies" and other hidden types of tracking, and ignoring EULAs** ... really, it's hard for me to imagine a good case for doing anything more ... "invasive" and ... legally / otherwise dubious.

Edit: mostly came back to add one of my favorite (ab)uses of (statistical) inference:

https://youtu.be/Oseqh7SMIvo

(also, added the bit below about EULAs)

* Outweighing significantly, I'd suggest, other quirks of human perception, memory, etc. that may diminish awareness and recognition of potentially related events. I write "suggest" mainly because I don't have ready refs to offer this second and don't have time to dig a couple up ... IIRC, the research that exists strongly favors compounding, though, of course, this could be argued to be influenced itself by human psychology (including social and economic factors, e.g., "publish or perish" etc.).

** Jargon buried in legalese, what a genius way to get just about anyone to agree to just about anything! If only John, King of England (in 1215), had been more skilled in the ways of the EULA - perhaps "King Charles III" would be emperor of the world now. Oh utopia denied ... kek.

Re: Temptations of an open-source Chrome extension developer (2021)

#270
post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you can't protect yourself but what are you protecting yourself from? What's the threat model?

You're protecting yourself from targeted psychological manipulation. It's like the difference between someone spraying a cyber-attack over the entire IPv4 space, or spending a while trying to drill into a specific server. The latter is much scarier and harder to resist, but it's basically what targeted advertising is these days. They supposedly want just to help you find what you want to buy, but they do this by tryi…

Of course, someone who has been successfully manipulated would also think they've escaped manipulation. Isn't that the scariest part
Post reply on HN