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Ask HN: Should it be legal to switch privacy policies after purchase?

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11–20 of 74 posts

Re: Ask HN: Should it be legal to switch privacy policies after purchase?

#11
I don't regret sticking to dumb appliances. I hate Smart TVs with a passion, but they are all you can get nowadays. But I can just throw the TV out the window if it stops working when I unplug it and continue living just fine. Not so much with my washer, dryer, stove, car and fridge/freezer.

I do not look forward to the day you CAN'T buy a non-smart appliance like a fridge or water heater.

Re: Ask HN: Should it be legal to switch privacy policies after purchase?

#12
post #9

1GB of data per day? That's incredible. Have you tried to inspect the data? I'm curious to know what a washer and dryer could possibly send home per day to total that. If what you're saying is true, it smells like you're getting spied on.

It definitely is 1GB per day. Any insight/links on how I can do that? I'll admit I have no idea where to begin when it comes to this.

Re: Ask HN: Should it be legal to switch privacy policies after purchase?

#15
post #14

If you live in California, use the CCPA to figure out what they have on you and then submit a deletion request.

Not in CA. I did ask for the data and for my account to be deactivated. Haven't received an email from them yet.

Re: Ask HN: Should it be legal to switch privacy policies after purchase?

#16
post #3

Wow. I do not believe changes to terms after purchase should be allowed unless required by law. We need a lemon-like law for consumer electronics. Also, I believe it is important to not buy connected devices and appliances that are not entertainment purposes only. I’d rather pay $200 extra for a dumb tv that will last be 10 years and guaranteed to not start showing me ads in the menu screen someday.

I’m in the market for a TV currently, and have found (in the US) that it doesn’t matter how much extra I’d be willing to pay for a dumb TV, there just aren’t any beyond super low-end ones.

Any pointers to some would be much appreciated!

Re: Ask HN: Should it be legal to switch privacy policies after purchase?

#17
post #9

1GB of data per day? That's incredible. Have you tried to inspect the data? I'm curious to know what a washer and dryer could possibly send home per day to total that. If what you're saying is true, it smells like you're getting spied on.

It definitely is 1GB per day. Any insight/links on how I can do that? I'll admit I have no idea where to begin when it comes to this.

You could use Wireshark[1] which is a pretty powerful network packet sniffing application. If you capture using monitor mode, you'll likely see a bunch of 802.11 requests - take a look at [2].

1: https://wireshark.org

2: https://wiki.wireshark.org/HowToDecrypt802.11

Re: Ask HN: Should it be legal to switch privacy policies after purchase?

#18
Not sure about the US but in Europe and UK, GDPR would not permit them to collect anything that is not strictly needed without explicit consent.

The Data Minimisation principle says you should only collect what you need.

They can soft-opt you in to certain things if you have a business relationship (news letter) but this should be opt-outable, I think even at purchase time.

It would also not permit the extension of data collection without consent (or another acceptable basis, but that would be unlikely). In the case of a service online, I guess you could potentially say if you don't like it, don't use the service but with hardware, I don't think this would fly.

Re: Ask HN: Should it be legal to switch privacy policies after purchase?

#19
I think the real issue here is not whether it should be legal to switch privacy policy after purchase. LG shouldn't be allowed to collect more info than it requires. It seems absurd to me that a washer-dryer needs to access bookmark history etc. to function.

I would contact my local data protection authority and alert them of this practice. I guess LG would get in some trouble :). My initial instinct is that this collecting this info from a washer-dryer is wildly illegal.

Re: Ask HN: Should it be legal to switch privacy policies after purchase?

#20
They are not legal in Spain, and probably neither in most of the civilized world (YMMV!). Over here a contract change needs to be approved by both parties at the time and with the specifics of the change, so a blanket "we might change this at any time" prior to it would also not be valid.

I'm pretty sure (again in Spain) you could sue them and win, but you'd have to carry the cost of suing them AND the benefit would probably be small so not many individuals do. Some nice consumer defense groups do sue these companies and win again and again, which is amazing IMHO. Specially with the last ~10 years new data protection laws these shady practices are more and more illegal.

> And I can't use the app unless I accept the new terms and services.

For example Whatsapp keeps asking me to accept the new terms and I keep closing the popup, and still can use the app. We'll see how things end up, but for now they do not "force you" to accept them (though I'd say asking for it N times/day everyday might be considered harassment).

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