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Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

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Re: Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

#121

Post by robotnikman »

kortilla wrote: post #112
anon7000 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s honestly crazy that we allow companies to sell our data — and even financially incentivize companies to share our data like this.

The problem is that to you it seems like your data but to Walgreens they see it as theirs. They generated it with their point of sale system. The data is about a transaction that you made, but they generated all of it. Until we have agreement as a society about what “my data” means, this kind of stuff is going to run rampant.

>what “my data” means

It makes me wonder, if everyone 'owned' their own data, I wonder if it could be used as a form of UBI. Everyone has data from using services, everyone owns it, everyone can sell it to make a living just doing whatever they are doing everyday.

This is only just a shower thought I had the other day though, there are probably many pitfalls when it comes to such an idea.

Re: Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

#122

Post by JW_00000 »

sureglymop wrote: post #76

A while ago a co worker told me "why would you care about your privacy? all my data is already out there anyway and what can even be done with it anyway". What would be the ideal response to such an absurd comment? At the time I found it hard to answer because she surprised me with that opinion. Edit to note: the explanation should be compatible with a professional context. I don't want to scare my co workers or appe…

See https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/1drrjtu/i_dont_have_....

My examples:

- You get an HIV diagnosis (or other terrible disease). Do you want everyone you meet to know?

- You feel depressed or burnt out. Should your employer know?

- You're financially in a bad place. Do you want your kids to know? Do you want your kids' friends to know?

- Do you share your salary with everyone?

- If someone's gay, should this be public information?

- Should your religion be public? Your political points of view?

Re: Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

#124

Post by bredren »

baxtr wrote: post #108
curiousthought wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is called Level 3 data, and any merchant can choose to provide it for a reduction in the transaction fees they pay. Here's a small comment thread from a few months back: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41213632

So in essence the merchant pays with my data?

Yes, though people also welcome the extra cash back or other card benefits.

Apple Card does not sell this data, IIRC. But offers a lower cash back than many other cards.

Re: Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

#125

Post by xboxnolifes »

robotnikman wrote: post #121
kortilla wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that to you it seems like your data but to Walgreens they see it as theirs. They generated it with their point of sale system. The data is about a transaction that you made, but they generated all of it. Until we have agreement as a society about what “my data” means, this kind of stuff is going to run rampant.

>what “my data” means It makes me wonder, if everyone 'owned' their own data, I wonder if it could be used as a form of UBI. Everyone has data from using services, everyone owns it, everyone can sell it to make a living just doing whatever they are doing everyday. This is only just a shower thought I had the other day though, there are probably many pitfalls when it comes to such an idea.

Unlikely. I'd think the most valuable data is generally the type that can be used to extract money from you. Targeted ads and such. So, your data's value would increase in proportion with your spending power.

Re: Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

#126

Post by daneel_w »

spencerflem wrote: post #78
jiri wrote: post #32

What does happen if I turn off location/gps? I guess that location has to be quite imprecise.

Stores have WiFi hotspots with very short range to track you that way while you're in the isle.

Only if you don't turn WiFi off. To my understanding even the "soft off" option present in iOS stops the phone from beaconing, and just listens in order to collect data for building augmented location services. I don't know what the Androids do. These days both of them also offer randomized MAC address to curtail such tracking.

Re: Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

#127

Post by beders »

I'm surprised people think they have any kind of privacy - especially when using free services. They are not free. You pay with whatever data can be extracted from your devices and behavior.

Also, there's a looong list of companies who know the location of your mobile device, starting from the cell phone tower operator to Apple/Google and many in between.

Re: Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

#128

Post by throw_away32 »

kortilla wrote: post #119
nicbou wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things like that are on my mind when HN rants about GDPR. Something like this would be wildly illegal where I live.

HN rants about it because it’s not a good solution. It identified a problem but caused an idiotic fallout (cookie banners) and failed to actually put in a framework to enforce that companies aren’t just lying.

> failed to actually put in a framework to enforce that companies aren’t just lying.

That's not true. I work in an European company and we were contacted by the agency to give a complete list of partners that we use, reasons for why it is justified, which routines we have for deleting old data etc.

I guess in theory we could have lied and made up data, but only an idiot would risk lying to the government. Everyone at my company took it seriusly and tried to provide as accurate data as possible. There were also several follow up questions that had to be answered.

The mindset of lying to the government to "protect" your employer seems so far fetched. Why should an employee lie to the government? If it turns out that the company was in violation of GDPR the worst case scenario for the company is a fine. If the government finds out you are lying, the employee faces jail time. The trade-off is simply not worth it.

Maybe it's easier to lie to the government in some countries, but not in my country. The government agencies actually checks and verifies your claims.

Re: Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

#129

Post by lesuorac »

jjeaff wrote: post #114
everdrive wrote: post #84

I'm really happy to see this level of detail and research. So many privacy-related articles either wholly lack in technical skill, or hysterically cannot differentiate between different levels of privacy concerns and risks. People commonly point to Mozilla's research regarding vehicle's privacy policies. ( https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/blog/privacy-nightmare-on-... ) But that research only states what the car com…

I'll answer the, "Does disabling it void your warranty?" question. The answer is almost always "no". Unless the modification you make to something actually directly or indirectly caused damage to it, companies in the US cannot "void the warranty".

I'm sure the company will argue the warranty is voided akin to how trucks have "not liable for damage from rocks" or w/e (they are).

IIRC, this is under the Magnuson-Moss act but I didn't find it when skimming wikipedia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnuson%E2%80%93Moss_Warranty...

Re: Everyone knows your location: tracking myself down through in-app ads

#130

Post by spencerflem »

daneel_w wrote: post #126
spencerflem wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stores have WiFi hotspots with very short range to track you that way while you're in the isle.

Only if you don't turn WiFi off. To my understanding even the "soft off" option present in iOS stops the phone from beaconing, and just listens in order to collect data for building augmented location services. I don't know what the Androids do. These days both of them also offer randomized MAC address to curtail such tracking.

right, they were saying it's enough just to turn off location though.

tho tbh if i really cared, no phone/battery out/faraday cage is still the gold standard

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