101–110 of 172 posts
I definitely never actively opted in, and Google never disabled the tracking to force previous tacit consenters to opt in to account for the cultural shift from opt-out to opt-in, which probably happened in the early 2010s?
Google is pushing location data to devices and purging it on servers. From a citation within my comment I’ve cited below: > This change means that Google will no longer respond to geofence warrants from law enforcement that request information on all devices near a particular incident. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40869536 (edit to fix my mistake, thank you Centigonal!)
The actual accuracy is worse than before but it’s a welcome change. They do still offer a way to keep an encrypted backup of the database on Google servers (so you don’t lose it if you lose your phone) but its disabled by default and it doesn’t even have a modal popup making it easy to enable backups, you have to specifically click the UI button to see the modal with the info sheet and a button to enable backing it u…
Missing from this is the reality that the modern world increasingly requires using these applications. It is meaningless to present an option you are forced to agree to. Additionally there is, to me, a big difference between me enabling an app to use my data for the service I believe it provides and them using it for everything else.
> enabling an app to use my data for the service I believe it provides and them using it for everything else. I completely agree, but I think we need to push society away from requiring for profit products into our life, or at least recognize that they have an association cost to the user. What is the reasonable expectation of a business to profit off a product that we’ve deemed “required”? Who would make or support…
Secondly there's nothing special about these services except their moat. Even when serving video was a novel problem, there was dozens of competitors. Nowadays it's a solved problem. If they leave, they'll be replaced overnight, just like many other social networks, messengers, video platforms, etc. before them. They'll go far not to give up a position they will likely never claw back.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The actual accuracy is worse than before but it’s a welcome change. They do still offer a way to keep an encrypted backup of the database on Google servers (so you don’t lose it if you lose your phone) but its disabled by default and it doesn’t even have a modal popup making it easy to enable backups, you have to specifically click the UI button to see the modal with the info sheet and a button to enable backing it u…
> a welcome change Can someone explain why it's good that your official law infrastructure has no access to Google when in need? Is this some kind of bizzaro-extermist-libertarianism "government is evil" from America again?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The actual accuracy is worse than before but it’s a welcome change. They do still offer a way to keep an encrypted backup of the database on Google servers (so you don’t lose it if you lose your phone) but its disabled by default and it doesn’t even have a modal popup making it easy to enable backups, you have to specifically click the UI button to see the modal with the info sheet and a button to enable backing it u…
> a welcome change Can someone explain why it's good that your official law infrastructure has no access to Google when in need? Is this some kind of bizzaro-extermist-libertarianism "government is evil" from America again?
No, plain old respect of privacy against state surveillance.
The "official law infrastructure" also doesn't have other powers that Gestapo, GPU and Stazi used to have. Perhaps they should get them too?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> a welcome change Can someone explain why it's good that your official law infrastructure has no access to Google when in need? Is this some kind of bizzaro-extermist-libertarianism "government is evil" from America again?
Statistically, you can't rely on having a non-repressive government for your entire lifetime. The US has been fortunate in missing out on it for quite a while, but even then there has been HUAC and J Edgar Hoover, even if they didn't take over the whole government.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Statistically, you can't rely on having a non-repressive government for your entire lifetime. The US has been fortunate in missing out on it for quite a while, but even then there has been HUAC and J Edgar Hoover, even if they didn't take over the whole government.
Not just those, the goverment has been historically repressive of many minorities, using the police to do this, from blacks to native americans, labour advocates, activists, and other categories, that's not confined to the HUAC and Hoover era.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The actual accuracy is worse than before but it’s a welcome change. They do still offer a way to keep an encrypted backup of the database on Google servers (so you don’t lose it if you lose your phone) but its disabled by default and it doesn’t even have a modal popup making it easy to enable backups, you have to specifically click the UI button to see the modal with the info sheet and a button to enable backing it u…
> a welcome change Can someone explain why it's good that your official law infrastructure has no access to Google when in need? Is this some kind of bizzaro-extermist-libertarianism "government is evil" from America again?
Get an iPhone. Android and iOS are equivalent, while Apple’s revenue is overwhelmingly based on hardware and services, unlike Google’s revenue which is overwhelmingly based on advertising and tracking.
I use GrapheneOS with my Pixel 7 with no issues. I won't ever buy an apple device. If the OS isn't opensource, I'm not buying it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The actual accuracy is worse than before but it’s a welcome change. They do still offer a way to keep an encrypted backup of the database on Google servers (so you don’t lose it if you lose your phone) but its disabled by default and it doesn’t even have a modal popup making it easy to enable backups, you have to specifically click the UI button to see the modal with the info sheet and a button to enable backing it u…
> a welcome change Can someone explain why it's good that your official law infrastructure has no access to Google when in need? Is this some kind of bizzaro-extermist-libertarianism "government is evil" from America again?
Are you there yet? OK. Now, the manifesto of the candidacies in the upcoming elections is proposing that the location history data of every citizen in your country should be stored in a database, just in case law enforcement needs to know the exact location of any individual at any time to be able to do their investigations. Suppose that their plan to implement it is technologically feasible and requires no additional effort from the citizens.
Would this make you more or less likely to vote for them?