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India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

reuters.com

141–150 of 783 posts

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#141

I wouldn’t venture in the direction that many here will take. I will point out that India have the highest number of victims of cyber-fraud. I personally know many people who have lost significant sums through social engineering attacks. The money is transferred to multiple mule accounts and physical cash is siphoned off to the fraudsters by the owners of those account. They choose helpless, illiterate, village dwell…

> I will point out that India have the highest number of victims of cyber-fraud Combined with worst enforcement and investigation efforts to tackle this issue. The default resolution on a cyber crime report is : Fraudster's account is blocked and they are given a choice to plead forgiveness from the accuser. They often return the money in lieu of the complaint being rescinded. Then fraudster is free to con others. Fr…

Local police stations often refuse to file even an FIR. The reason we have such good data, is possibly due to the banks reporting them.

If it were up to the police, then we wouldn’t even hear about 25% of the cases.

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#142

ref: "the new tobacco" this last year i'm seeing very concerning behavior in students in the 14-20 range. complete addiction to their phones. very deep interests in things i was completely unaware that they existed. similar to how when i started noticing anime girlfriends/waifus in 2016. about 40% are deep in discord communities where i literally cannot figure out a single sentence of what they're talking about. if s…

Got some example words or phrases? When I hear stuff like this I'm curious how much is just your standard "out of touch adult" stuff and how much is genuinely bizarre niche rabbitholes.

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#143

Indian government is big on pronouncements. It will be a garbage app that most likely will not work, considering the historical incompetence of the Indian government's expertise in all things tech. I am pretty certain Apple and Samsung will pay off someone in the government.

Isn't one of the largest payment processors in the world made by the Indian Government?

Personally I wouldn't risk my personal digital privacy on the incompetence of the government. I'd assume the opposite.

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#144

ref: "the new tobacco" this last year i'm seeing very concerning behavior in students in the 14-20 range. complete addiction to their phones. very deep interests in things i was completely unaware that they existed. similar to how when i started noticing anime girlfriends/waifus in 2016. about 40% are deep in discord communities where i literally cannot figure out a single sentence of what they're talking about. if s…

Is this an "old man yells at cloud" impersonation?

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to think that we all agree that you would be arrested for saying things in person (hate crimes, etc) would be the same things you'd be arrested for saying online... i'd place the line about there. However, there are cases which do cross the line... https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9dj1zlvxglo

> we all agree that you would be arrested for saying things in person (hate crimes, etc) would be the same things you'd be arrested for saying online.. And that’s where you’d be wrong - lots of us belief that speech should not be a cause for arrest except in the most extreme circumstances. Hurting someone’s feelings is not that

> And that’s where you’d be wrong - lots of us belief that speech should not be a cause for arrest except in the most extreme circumstances. Hurting someone’s feelings is not that

what is an extreme circumstance?

At least in the UK, hate speech is a crime and is punishable by law, whether people agree or disagree is irrelevant, I do believe that if it's illegal on the street it should be illegal online, obviously in the relevant jurisdiction.

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#146

I wouldn’t venture in the direction that many here will take. I will point out that India have the highest number of victims of cyber-fraud. I personally know many people who have lost significant sums through social engineering attacks. The money is transferred to multiple mule accounts and physical cash is siphoned off to the fraudsters by the owners of those account. They choose helpless, illiterate, village dwell…

And you trust the government to only use it for good purposes? and not to track people who may be protesting or belong to opposing political/religious/cultural views? We know based on historical pegasus complaints that this trust has to be earned and can't be given. There are lots of ways to solve for this, mandating that these companies own the identification process through their systems, report misuse, govern apps…

I don't trust anyone blindly. The point of my comment was not to support the decision, but to show where it might be coming from.

What's inherent in the comment is- there are simply too many people to educate, "made aware", etc. So, this might be a knee-jerk reaction to fight cyber fraud. Not Big Brother sensorship.

I can say these because I know too much about the ground reality. An example from top of my head- SBI e-Rupee app doesn't launch in your phone if you have Discord installed. Yeah. Just because some scammers communicated through Discord.

Of course, I cannot guarantee that something sinister is not being planned or that this app won't be utilized for something bad.

There is also a small chance of some bureaucrat in management position taking this decision, so he can write in his report- "Made Sanchar Saathi app download soar up to X millions in 3 months through diligent effort..." just like highly placed PMs/SVPs in large tech companies eyeing a promotion.

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#147
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Even in mainland China [..] Apple does not pre-install any apps from anyone. That's because China has no regulation obliging them to do so. China takes the other, more comprehensive, route to privacy invasion. Sucking up every bit of data at the router.

The GFW is certainly looking for traffic to block, but it is not really going to invade much privacy, as it cannot decrypt anything using HTTPS/TLS.

GFW does indeed have man in the middle capabilities per the recent leaks of Geedge tech used in it. Your laptop might throw a warning for the fake signed cert, but devices in China that trust Chinese root CAs would not.

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#148

I'm shocked by people and state using the crutch of cyber crime or scams to push a totalitarian solution to a problem that is better solved by improved education and targeted campaigns against common security pitfalls. I abhor any decision that robs even a grain of my individual freedom.

> improved education and targeted campaigns against common security pitfalls Good one. Do you see how dumb the average consumer is? They don't know or care even if you try to educate them.

Maybe but there’s a fair amount of corruption going on in India. For example, they got caught spraying water near air quality monitors (at them?) to make the data seem better than it is instead of actually tackling the problem.

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#149
I wonder if this will cause a reduction in remote jobs for citizens. Compliance with US laws like HIPAA and FERPA have strict requirements regarding access. Many employees use 2FA on their personal devices, which if passed this law would interfere with.

Re: India orders smartphone makers to preload state-owned cyber safety app

#150

ref: "the new tobacco" this last year i'm seeing very concerning behavior in students in the 14-20 range. complete addiction to their phones. very deep interests in things i was completely unaware that they existed. similar to how when i started noticing anime girlfriends/waifus in 2016. about 40% are deep in discord communities where i literally cannot figure out a single sentence of what they're talking about. if s…

> very deep interests in things i was completely unaware that they existed

as one of said students, I would just call these hobbies!

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