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Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

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Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#151

Post by raverbashing »

DerpDerpDerp wrote: post #138
Tyrannosaurs wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re. proper keyboards - the market says otherwise. There have been plenty of Android phones with hard keyboards but they've not sold in sufficient quantities to make it attractive. If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... Also worth seeing kids who've never used a physical keyboard to any great extent. I've seen them do…

> If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... This is incredibly disingenuous because of the high barrier to entry on cellphone manufacturing.

You can sell a pluggable device, no need to produce the whole phone

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#152

Post by ben1040 »

Nursie wrote: post #43

They still need to split the permissions more. READ_PHONE_STATE is nasty. Apps ask for the permission because they (for instance) need to pause playback on a video because you have an incoming call. But it covers all the phone details (numbers, IMEI etc) and who the call is coming from and a hell of a lot of other stuff. Who the hell thought that was a good idea?

Yep. I have gotten one-star reviews on an app of mine because they think I want to invade users' privacy, when I really just want to pause media when a call comes in.

READ_PHONE_STATE means I have to decide whether I want a handful of one-star reviews for requesting that permission, or a truckload of one-star reviews for the app playing media over their calls.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#153

Post by ben1040 »

freehunter wrote: post #100
signalnow wrote: post #29

I don't understand this from the EFF first they post a piece lauding an unofficial, deeply buried unannounced functionality, then they condemn Google for removing something that they have never officially released or supported in the first place. It’s their mistake for jumping the gun and discussing something that wasn't officially, the followup is just to save face, but that is really an unfair attack.

How would anyone know it was not official until Google said it wasn't meant to be released?

What sort of official feature is hidden and can't be accessed via any user interface provided by the vendor?

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#154

Post by silencio »

nhaehnle wrote: post #44
kmfrk wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It took away users' ability to block other users from viewing their tweets? How is that not privacy?

I think the point is that if Alice hopes to hide her tweets from Eve by blocking Eve, then Eve can always log out of Twitter to see those tweets again. Conclusion: Blocking users cannot ever be a privacy feature. You cannot prevent a specific user from seeing your tweets without preventing every un-logged-in person from seeing your tweets. Edit: Though admittedly, that's a bit of a black-and-white perspective. I supp…

After reading lots of discussion about this yesterday, I think the change being negative hinged on one big thing. Nobody truly believed that the old(current) block on Twitter was actually blocking anyone from reading your posts if they were public, but not being able to follow someone had the (imo) underrated benefit of not letting someone directly interact with your tweets.

That added layer of friction meant it was just a little more difficult for group harassment (e.g. retweet someone you don't like, laugh at them, have a group of your followers send harassing tweets even though they're not individually blocked). The only way to do so would be to open Incognito mode or log into another account and then manually RT or find another way to harass someone (like a forum or chat). The suggested new functionality meant that there was more security through obscurity (well not quite, apparently you couldn't add people that blocked you to lists) but reduced that friction in the harasser's favor.

Personally I'm hoping Twitter keeps the old block forever, but then adds something like the attempted new block functionality under the less-of-a-misnomer-name "mute" - both have their strengths and weaknesses and I don't think one can really replace the other.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#155

Post by contingencies »

ouaibe wrote: post #66
CalRobert wrote: post #24

I'm probably going to turn in to that old guy with tin foil who can't play any games because nobody supports his choice of platform, but I really miss when computers were devices you could buy and then put your choice of OS on. Phones are pretty much just little ARM computers, why the hell don't I just install Ubuntu, Firefox OS, Android, WinPhone, Symbian, whatever? I could format a microSD card to boot from and go…

Because phones inherit from an old business model where they were subsidized by mobile network operators and thus manufactured and sold according to their needs, not to the users need. This meant you'd have many restrictions and the user was constrained to a tightly-controlled environment that forbode anything the operator deemed unnecessary (and could even contain malware/spyware-like pre-loaded software). That mode…

phones inherit from an old business model where they were subsidized by mobile network operators

Only in the US.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#156

Post by zmmmmm »

It seems really dumb of Google not to just go with the flow here and let the AppOps feature exist. Whack a giant disclaimer on it that it will break stuff, disable Play Store comments and ratings, let the users use it, and collect the giant PR dividend for looking like you care about privacy. They can do all that and lose virtually nothing because such a tiny percentage of people will ever use this feature that it will make no difference to them at all.

On the other hand they can go the other way and take a giant PR hit for virtually no benefit. Out of some sense of stubbornness or beligerance Google often seems to desire to shoot itself in the foot like this.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#157

Post by discardorama »

Users of Android should realize that they are the product. If Google gives too much privacy control, advertisers won't pay as much for ads, and Google's core business is ads.

Given a fight between privacy and ad dollars for Google, privacy will lose almost every time (within reason; Google doesn't want to kill the golden goose (i.e., you)).

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#158

Post by dublinben »

jackgavigan wrote: post #18

This is one area where iOS stands head and shoulders above Android. I used to run Cyanogenmod and I remember deciding to not upgrade the Facebook app because doing so would have required giving it a slew of permissions, including the ability to "directly call phone numbers". By contrast, in iOS, I can choose which apps have access to my location, contacts, etc. I know that Apple's track record when it comes to privac…

BlackBerry actually gave completely granular permission controls for every app you install, as far back as five years ago. It's a shame that neither iOS or Android have come anywhere close in that regard.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#159

Post by cpleppert »

zmmmmm wrote: post #156

It seems really dumb of Google not to just go with the flow here and let the AppOps feature exist. Whack a giant disclaimer on it that it will break stuff, disable Play Store comments and ratings, let the users use it, and collect the giant PR dividend for looking like you care about privacy. They can do all that and lose virtually nothing because such a tiny percentage of people will ever use this feature that it wi…

I don't if it will break a lot of applications; probably some. The real problem is the permissions system that doesn't allow users to selectively choose which permissions they want to give to applications thus application developers don't code their applications to not work if they fail to get permission. Users are just shown a screen with the permissions the application requested. For most users, this is worthless. Do any users decide not to install an application based on asking for too much? Users still don't have any control on stock systems over running services and applications in the background.

It is all 100% anti-users and pro-monetization; which is probably google's intention all along.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#160

Post by kllrnohj »

annoyedgoogler wrote: post #145
kllrnohj wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, EFF is simply wrong. The feature was never released, and instead of posting a "we screwed up" retraction EFF is now trying to shift blame.

If you put software into the wild - you have released it. Just because the cycle has sped up, you didn't document it properly, and your QA failed, does not mean you didn't release it. I'm not taking sides here, but you have to call a spade a spade.

> If you put software into the wild - you have released it.

Even by that definition Google never released it. You needed a 3rd party app to access the feature, Google's software alone was not enough. Google didn't fail here, they flat out never released it.

Or perhaps you could argue that they failed by not releasing it (or something similar), but that's different story.

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