Facebook can now read your texts • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#161

Post by e40 » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 2:52 PM UTC

StavrosK wrote: post #119

e40 wrote: post #70

The main reason I rooted my Android phone is to run AppOps 4.3/4.4. I can revoke permissions from apps, just like the one in the linked article. This should be a standard part of Android, in my opinion. The app, for those curious (I have no affiliation with it): https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.colortiger... My favorite permissions to revoke are: Wake lock, Location, Read contacts. As a result, I get…

What does revoking the wake lock do, both to the app and the phone?

The Wakelock allows the app to wake up when your phone is asleep. My twitter client wants one, but I have notifications turned off. It might be that because I have them turned off it doesn't invoke a Wakelock. But it might. Basically, Wakelocks are the #1 cause of unnecessary battery drain.

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#162

Post by StavrosK » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 2:56 PM UTC

e40 wrote: post #161

StavrosK wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does revoking the wake lock do, both to the app and the phone?

The Wakelock allows the app to wake up when your phone is asleep. My twitter client wants one, but I have notifications turned off. It might be that because I have them turned off it doesn't invoke a Wakelock. But it might. Basically, Wakelocks are the #1 cause of unnecessary battery drain.

I see, thanks. That's what I thought, but I thought that apps rely on push to get notifications. I guess that would not be very scalable, so the client wakes up once every X hours and polls.

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#163

Post by dhimes » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 2:56 PM UTC

foxylad wrote: post #86

Access to all your texts is scary, but what about "Add or modify calendar events and send emails to guests without owner's knowledge ...". I feel dirty just reading that - I'm so glad I've broken my Facebook habit. Facebook's value proposition is going downhill fast. All but the dumbest users are now very careful about what they allow FB to know, if they stay at all. I suggest that their hallowed social graph contain…

And record audio and video? Are they insane? Who the fuck would agree to this?

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#164

Post by dlwiest » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 2:58 PM UTC

01Michael10 wrote: post #160

simonsarris wrote: post #3

Is there any recourse short of "don't use the app" that regular users have against this sort of thing? Is there no meaningful way to push back against Facebook for demanding this permission?

I am not a Facebook app user since closed my account years ago so maybe not the best person to comment but... I have never understood why one needs an app to view a website? Facebook has a mobile site that works yes?

The app can push notifications to your phone, which is nice for regular users, and it can merge with contacts to fill in blank pictures and provide more information. It's not essential, but some of the integration is nice.

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#165

Post by ziegeer » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 3:04 PM UTC

I only use Facebook via Firefox on Android (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.mozilla.fi...) and it works great. Not wanting to grant intrusive permissions to the Facebook app is my number one reason.

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#166

Post by bricestacey » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 3:36 PM UTC

chrsstrm wrote: post #33

Not just Facebook. There are many apps that are overstepping in terms of permissions. I turned off auto-update long ago and removed many offenders, but it seems every app these days is now requesting as many privileges as they can get away with. The general population of users aren't reading the list of new permissions on updates and no one is making these co's explain themselves as to why they need listed permission…

Apps do not autoupdate from the Play store if there are new permissions. You have to manually update them. I am not sure if this is a recent change or not as I started using Android with the Nexus 5.

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#167

Post by runjake » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 3:51 PM UTC

beedogs wrote: post #19

zobzu wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

use cyanogenmod + privacy mode, you can disable what the app can do. for example, you can disable that. app still works, it just gets an empty sms list.

Sure would be nice if someone would jailbreak the iPhone, so we could have these sorts of options in our little walled-gardens too.

Welcome to two major iOS versions ago. iOS already has privacy controls. Check out Settings->Privacy.

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#168

Post by mmagin » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 3:58 PM UTC

rodrodrod wrote: post #18

This has been a thing for about a month and a bit now. A Facebook engineer posted the following on Reddit[0], explaining the rationale behind the SMS permission: > As for the READ_SMS permission, we require that so we can automatically intercept login approvals SMS messages for people that have turned 2-factor authentication for their accounts, or for phone confirmation messages when you add a phone number to your Fa…

This reminds me a lot of LinkedIn's clever scheme to MITM your IMAP traffic: http://blog.linkedin.com/2013/10/23/announcing-linkedin-intr...

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#169

Post by kissickas » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 4:04 PM UTC

victorhooi wrote: post #59

JohnTHaller wrote: post #39

Don't forget that Google Hangouts now has access to all your texts, too, now.

Err, yes, but on any modern version of Android, Google Hangouts is the SMS app - so I thing that's a bit of a red herring, and completely unrelated.

I would love this feature if they actually incorporated my SMS history into Hangouts, but unfortunately I can't move or sync messages across phones or view them on my computer.

I suppose they reason that it would be too confusing to the people who would then try to SMS from their computer, as iPhone+Mac users are able to do so... but isn't segmenting my Hangouts history just as confusing?

Re: Facebook can now read your texts

#170

Post by kissickas » Tue, Jan 28, 2014, 4:12 PM UTC

zrgiu_ wrote: post #147

Like others have said, on Android you can use App Ops, and if you're on 4.4.2, App Ops X ( https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.colortiger... disclaimer: I developed it). It still sucks that you're on an "open" platform but you still have to root/jailbreak your phone to keep your privacy.

Cool app, thanks. Is there a place where I can see an explanation for all of these permissions? I have no idea what the difference between "location" and "monitor location" is, for example.