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Density.io

density.io

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161–170 of 189 posts

Re: Density.io

#161

Post by JackC »

jordanmessina wrote: post #109
650REDHAIR wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess I have to start looking towards outlets. I wonder if there is any other way to 'protect' yourself?

We have stickers for stores to put on their doors so you know if they're using Density. We don't want to be sneaky about this.

Stores will have a strong incentive not to advertise that they're using your service, as Nordstrom found out. Will you be doing anything to check whether stores post the stickers properly? Will you terminate service if they don't?

Euclid Analytics keeps their customers secret, so if a store doesn't post notices, there's no way for us to know they're using the service. Will you be keeping your customers secret as well?

Re: Density.io

#162

Post by ajcarpy2005 »

reddit_clone wrote: post #126
shiftpgdn wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's trivial to turn off the wireless on your phone. If you want privacy in this day and age it's not going to be convenient. The difference is I can't turn off my face.

I blame the WiFi protocol. Since the routers are already broadcasting their SSID why are devices themselves broadcasting sensitive information back to them before the user has shown any interest in any particular hotspot? This over sharing should be addressed at protocol level.

Maybe it's needed for ad-hoc networks between peers without a router. But maybe a one-time key would work?

Re: Density.io

#163

Post by matthewmacleod »

Pretty good execution. We recently build something pretty similar for keeping track of who was in our office and where they were (partial write-up here: http://matthewmacleod.co.uk/blog/passive-wifi-tracking.html) - strictly opt-in, but we still had to wrestle with the privacy implications.

Problem is, this is a really effective and totally passive system with great benefits. But privacy-wise, it's scary.

Re: Density.io

#164

Post by fudged71 »

xauronx wrote: post #135
albertsun wrote: post #8

This is a privacy nightmare. Perhaps wifi devices should no longer provide constant MAC addresses....

I'm confused why it's a privacy nightmare. They could just as easily sit someone there and count how many people are in a store and write it down. Your face is an identifier. I don't get why people think that anything technological anymore is instantly privacy nightmare. For an often technological website there is so much technophobia.

The difference is that this is equivalent to having that person follow you to the next business you shop at... and the one after that... and the one after that...

Re: Density.io

#165

Post by dfc »

shiftpgdn wrote: post #156
dfc wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Houston system uses bluetooth, not 802.11.

Bluetooth uses MAC addresses as well FYI.

I realize that. However you brought up the Houston system in response to a comment that only discussed wifi. After bringing up the Houston system in your comment you said people concerned about privacy should "just turn wifi off." Anyone coming along and reading this thread would realistically conclude that the Houston system used WiFi and that they could avoid the Houston system's tracking by "just turning wifi off."

I thought it would be important to let others know that "just turning wifi off" would not be an effective measure against a system that uses bluetooth.

Re: Density.io

#167

Post by mindslight »

joeshaw wrote: post #123
Karunamon wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Devil's advocate mode: What privacy is that? Your device is broadcasting information, in the clear, to anyone who cares to receive that information. You've taken no steps to prevent anyone from receiving that information. Your device is doing the equivalent of standing on the street corner and screaming various things. You can't rightly tell someone not to listen or write down what's being said. I don't see how this…

> Your device is doing the equivalent of standing on the street corner and screaming various things. Except there's one huge difference: anyone with eyes and ears can understand what the person is screaming. I would wager that even fewer than half of HN readers realize what's being broadcasted here. What you're saying is that every human must have complete technological and implementation knowledge of any possible in…

> that every human must have complete technological and implementation knowledge

Or they could use software produced by people with that knowledge and who had users' interests in mind, which would automate the appropriate way to handle these concerns. And if they're unable to judge softwares' merits, they should rely on the opinion of more knowledgeable friends.

In this case, the device could easily generate a new MAC for every connection attempt, and give you an option to make that identifier more persistent per-network.

But instead people listen to the TV (et al) as it tells them to keep buying new closed Androids and iDevices, and then act incredulous (or Stockholm syndromed) when for-profit companies end up betraying them.

Re: Density.io

#168

Post by patmcc »

jordanmessina wrote: post #33
uptown wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"They take privacy incredibly seriously" What does that even mean? They're tracking not only the number of people in a location, but where they go ... then sharing that with their customers. From their own website: Understand your business in the context of others: 1. Who you share customers with. 2. Where else your loyal customers love to go. 3. Where foot traffic in the city is trending. How is that respecting my p…

Definitely understand your concerns. In the system you're an anonymous datapoint. The information can't be used to determine who a specific individual is.

Will you provide real-time stats? Could I see that user A523498BD5352F is currently in my store, and what other stores they frequent? If it's only aggregated data after the fact, that alleviates some of the concerns.

Re: Density.io

#169

Post by chrischen »

chrisfarms wrote: post #5

Risky. MAC address tracking is definitely a legal 'grey area' at the moment. I can imagine mining/fingerprinting in this way could easily become illegal in the not-to-distant future. In the UK, City of London already banned the wifi-enabled bins that were tracking MAC addresses. It would be really easy to tie a name to MAC address (from point of purchase with a credit card), then see exactly where that person went vi…

I built a device similar to this (with a raspberry pi). iOS from 7 and up no longer allows getting mac addresses... so it's much harder to tie a mac addresses to actual purchases. You'd have to do some sort of collaborative filtering over tons of visits to reliably tie purchases to a mac address.

Re: Density.io

#170

Post by chrischen »

plusbryan wrote: post #97

Without wishing to belittle the privacy concerns of my fellow HNers, I wonder how long it will take for people to just be ok with being tracked in this way? This seems like one of those social changes that feels strange and uncomfortable at first, but over time becomes the accepted norm.

Commercial Wifi routers already do retail traffic analysis.

https://meraki.cisco.com/blog/2013/12/get-a-visual-on-your-b...

So people are probably already being tracked... and no one has noticed.

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