Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications • Hacker News Board

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#591

Post by Der_Einzige » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 6:57 AM UTC

kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote: post #583

Der_Einzige wrote: post #412

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gosh I am so happy to have like the best senator in the senate next to Bernie Sanders in Oregon. Oregon is an extremely based state. Y'all crap on PDX but the reality is that we have more freedom and less tyranny here than in any other state in the nation, and possibly in the world. PDX is "bad" because it's one of the only places in the world that hated the cops enough to actually muzzle them - and not living in fea…

> Want to shoot guns? (relatively lax gun laws for a blue state) Your DA is determined to destroy this right by spending tax dollars appealing 114 until they find a judge who agrees with them.

Yeah it sucks, but I care the least about it tbh.

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#592

Post by Tutanota » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 7:00 AM UTC

That's why we at Tuta do not send any information with the push on Apple and have built our own push notification for Android (we'd never use Google Push): https://tuta.com/blog/posts/open-source-email-fdroid

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#593

Post by explaininjs » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 7:16 AM UTC

frumper wrote: post #589

explaininjs wrote: post #442

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s part of the ploy. Give people a million menial jobs to elect so they feel exhausted by the process instead of demanding to have control over the real power. See also the California senators, which have at this point been unilaterally appointed by Gavin rather than elected by the people. If that wasn’t bad enough, he appointed this latest one based on a personal promise made to put a Black woman in the seat, in…

You’re saying part of the problem is people overwhelmed by menial job elections yet say people should elect police captains. Should they then also elect deputy police chiefs, police chiefs? Also, anyone that knows their civics would know that what Newsome did is covered in the US Constitution.

I was imprecisely using "captain" in the "person in change" sense, Chief/Commissioner of police would be the more accurate term, and yes they should absolutely be elected.

As for your alleged lesson in civics, the actual matter is covered by the 17th amendment to the constitution, which states:

> When vacancies happen in the representation of any State in the Senate, the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, That the legislature of any State may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.

- U.S. Cons. amend. XVII § 2, emphasis mine

So then the question is how has the CA legislature directed the executive thereof to make temporary appointments? The answer to that lies in the California Code:

> If a vacancy occurs in the representation of this state in the Senate of the United States, the Governor may appoint and commission an elector of this state who possesses the qualifications for the office to temporarily fill the vacancy until a person is elected at a statewide general election...

- Cal. Elec. Code § 10720, emphasis mine

So we're left with a very simple question: Was Laphonza Butler an elector of the state of CA at the time she was appointed to fill the vacancy by Gavin? If not, Gavin was operating outside his authority as granted by the CA Legislature, and accordingly in volition of the 17th amendment to the US Constitution.

And the answer to that is very simple, a resounding "No":

> Butler is a longtime California resident but now lives in Maryland. She owns a home in California also. The governor’s office said she would re-register to vote in California soon.

- https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/laphonza-butler..., emphasis mine

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#594

Post by mrexroad » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 7:33 AM UTC

fidotron wrote: post #39

matthewdgreen wrote: post #8

Some issues could be prevented if push messages added end-to-end encryption by default, something that shouldn’t be particularly hard to use if it was built into the dev tooling. Instead, developer recommendations like this one [0] suggest that you should put content into your push messages and optionally use a separate library to encrypt them. Clearly developers aren’t doing this, hence the opportunity for surveilla…

Encryption wouldn’t help as the whole point would be to look for coincident timings. I.e. after activity from one user to a known service you see a push occur going to another user. If this pattern repeats you can build confidence they are in contact.

Differential privacy, meet notifications: just add random notifications as noise to everyone. If payload decrypts to junk, then drop/ignore as a faux-notification; else, trigger notification.

Eh, what’s a few orders of magnitude increase in notification infrastructure overhead anyway? /s

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#595

Post by maxhille » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 7:42 AM UTC

Izkata wrote: post #406

AshamedCaptain wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This complain is nonsense. Android _still_ allows background applications, the only limitation they added in that release is that such background applications have to show a notification that they are running (actually a feature if you ask me). You are still allowed to listen on a gazillion sockets perfectly fine. It's more problematic that some Android "skins" tend to kill background applications at random https://d…

> Android _still_ allows background applications, the only limitation they added in that release is that such background applications have to show a notification that they are running (actually a feature if you ask me). You are still allowed to listen on a gazillion sockets perfectly fine. ...I'm not even clear on what they're complaining about (the page github links to seems to have been changed, it describes the cu…

Android's behavior WRT to background services over the years changed from "MAY kill" to "WILL kill", so for people who never honored the official docs (unfortunately most of them), this was a problem.

Additionally, Alarms and Broadcast Listeners were seriously crippled which made common workarounds much harder.

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#596

Post by fsflover » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 8:31 AM UTC

Klonoar wrote: post #545

fsflover wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how delays of preorders are relevant today, when the devices are available within 10 working days.

Call me when a glance at the Purism subreddit isn't people still complaining about problems here. ;P

People in charge of that subreddit are Purism haters. They ban supporters and encourage complaining, even if baseless.

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#597

Post by espe » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 8:59 AM UTC

averageRoyalty wrote: post #558

steelframe wrote: post #533

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So what are the alternatives here? You have to be willing to live with something less feature-rich than what you can get on the latest iPhone 27 Max Pro(TM). And you have to be gutsy enough to click an "Install some other OS" button in your web browser with your phone plugged into a USB port. Then to extend to services, a lot of it depends on your ability to deploy your own stuff. This can involve a lot of time rea…

This is an excellent reference. It is worth emphasising though, this does not make the device secure. No matter what OS you put on, there's still a proprietary baseband blob with executuon permissions underneath. All of these devices are built compromised.

yes the baseband blobs are still underappreciated.

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#598

Post by GoblinSlayer » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 10:46 AM UTC

garblegarble wrote: post #130

GoblinSlayer wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If notification is malformed or erroneous it should be invisible, shouldn't it?

I think (reading between the lines on their docs) that you'll get throttled/dropped if you abuse the system by sending a regular push notification but do not notify the user. Apple doesn't like app developers using invisible notifications because it risks wasting device battery without the users being aware that their device is constantly being awakened by your app. However, I was actually wrong more generally becaus…

Technically you can make malformed messages visible: store them in spambox and display their metadata or maybe even as a source of randomness, like random.org

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#599

Post by boffinAudio » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 12:36 PM UTC

gowld wrote: post #578

iwontberude wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good thing there is no penalties for lying under oath anymore. That pesky rule of law was so long in the tooth.

Penalties for whom ? Clapper was bound by conflicting laws requiring both honesty and secrecy. This problem goes all the way to the root of government and legal system.

The corruption of government begins with its secrets. A truly free people keep no secrets.

Re: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications

#600

Post by boffinAudio » Thu, Dec 07, 2023, 12:42 PM UTC

jay-barronville wrote: post #425

Legitimately scary stuff but not surprising. Snowden risked everything to tell us what was going on and where things were headed yet here we are. At this point, it seems the only way to not be subject to this type of treatment by our governments is to completely unplug from the system, but of course, practically speaking, this isn’t feasible for the overwhelming majority of our society. So what are the alternatives h…

> So what are the alternatives here?

Stop being wilfully ruled by war criminals and start prosecuting their crimes.

The civil means for wresting back control over our government exists - we have to have the courage to use it. That means, prosecuting our own war criminals.

After all, it is the criminals with the most blood on their hands which want to use the tools of the state to repress the public, from which they derive their actual power, and who are the only ones with the resources to actually do something effect about the criminals getting away with it.

These rights-violating mechanisms exist to protect the criminal ruling elite only.

Seriously, to clean up our government: prosecute our war criminals. The war crimes are real, the crimes against humanity are real, the human rights violations are real. What isn't, is the general publics' stomach for the embarrassment they must experience in order to confront the fact of their own wilful rule by dyed-in-the-wool war criminals.

This discomfort at the fallacy of our own moral authority over nations considered to be 'worse human rights violators' has to be replaced with outrage at the actual human rights violations we are allowing to be committed in our name, or else we continue the slide into the abyss..