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The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

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Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#111

Post by dylan604 »

Nasrudith wrote: post #107
dylan604 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should not be looking at this from the user's perspective. Relevance isn't meaning relevant to the user. They are relevant to the ads company.

Yes and no. Technically any given advertising campaign doesn't need to be effective, only convince the buyer that it is effective (without engaging in fraud). But relevance is important to the ad companies because they aren't going to pay for you to advertise towards markets they aren't even operating in or planning to. To go reducto ad absurdum, you wouldn't get any ads contracts if you were to start advertising tow…

Again, you're looking at this from the person with an ad. That's not who I'm saying they are relevant. The relevancy is solely on the ad companies, the Googs, Meta, etc of the world.

Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#112

Post by chaxor »

thfuran wrote: post #32
23B1 wrote: post #21

They're not just storing and using this data for their own private/commercial purposes. They're also licensing it and selling it to third parties, which in turn will sell it to government(s) or other third-parties; the data ramifies and spreads throughout the digital panopticon. There is very little you can do as an individual to escape this. The privacy settings on your phone, in your apps, on your laptop, your rout…

>Heavy top-down regulation won't work, never has. That's utter nonsense. There will never be perfect compliance, but regulations absolutely can curb undesired behavior.

Clearly can't work.

That's totally why the ozone layer is entirely gone now.

Oh wait.

Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#113

Post by javajosh »

quickthrowman wrote: post #106
javajosh wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also expensive to have handicapped parking spots and ramps. You do it because it's right, not because it's convenient or cheap.

Landlords don’t provide parking ‘because it’s right’. A more accurate statement would be ‘because it is required by the Americans with Disabilities Act and you won’t receive a building occupancy permit unless you provide handicap parking’.

That Act was passed by legislators who were elected by the general public to represent what is "right" to them.

Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#114

Post by BurningFrog »

tristor wrote: post #94
BurningFrog wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This argument assumes that insurance companies can't do math and/or don't care that they're losing money on this. I'm 100% convinced they have both the math skills and the greed to know this is profitable for them. I'm less sure it's actually happening. Only proof I've seen is the internet comment a few levels up claiming it.

I never said it wasn't profitable. I said it wasn't accurate. Insurance companies aren't concerned with the accuracy, they are concerned with the profit. It effectively provides some "data" to give them license to increase rates, whether its accurate or not. As long as their rates outpace their claim payouts, they'll be profitable. It's also definitely happening, not only do insurance companies buy telematics data fr…

So you think it's accurate in predicting which customers will generate bigger or smaller claims, but not in who is a bad or good driver?

To me those are functionally the same thing.

Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#115

Post by z_ack »

krono wrote: post #44
IAmNotAFix wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only tracking cookies require consent. Cookies could be about the last time you saw the website's weather content, in which case it's purely functional and need no consent.

Not all places in the world share the same set of laws or jurisprudence. What's allowed or required and what isn't is entirely dependent on the jurisdiction(s) the website operators are beholden to.

Are you sure of that ? I knew that the competent jurisprudence or "forum" is that of the user, or everyone could circumvent the law using "offshore" companies to track people in regulated countries (i.e. EU). I was reading here on HN that , for that reason ( avoid EU Regulation ) sites like New York Times, blocked the availability of their contents in whole EU. I was checking, see here, for example: https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/news/many-eu-visi...

Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#116

Post by marcosdumay »

23B1 wrote: post #43
thfuran wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Heavy top-down regulation won't work, never has. That's utter nonsense. There will never be perfect compliance, but regulations absolutely can curb undesired behavior.

I wish you were right, but unfortunately 'regulations' always have carve-outs for the government itself, and they're one of the largest consumers of this data.

In a democracy, the government is usually the first to adhere to any regulation and is the most compliant. Mostly because it doesn't have to weight it against a profit.

Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#117

Post by anonym29 »

ROTMetro wrote: post #85
anonym29 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd never heard of this and went to go try it. I very disappointed to find it required me to turn off my existing VPN and wanted me to disable DoH :(

It's probably using the VPN mechanism to grab traffic for inspection and can't do what it does without that.

If it can inspect the traffic, why would it demand I turn off DoH? I could understand one or the other, but both?

Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#118

Post by julian_t »

cmilton wrote: post #42
ThaDood wrote: post #10

I mean, I know its not practical for everyone or every application - that being said I have made it my highest priority to go out of my way to not use services or products that require apps to be installed. Obviously I make exceptions for stuff I deem "required" but for coffee chains, fast food restaurants, grocery stores and other services if they need an "app" for me to use it. I just won't use it. Or I will go out…

>That being said, I am now running into what I call the "Non-App Tax". The most prominent example I can think of in my own experience is my towns local parking payment system. You actually don't need to use the app to find parking or pay. You can scan a QR code and pay via text. Then I looked at the prices on the app vs prices via text and the prices were a decent amount higher ($1-2 more) and less flexible than if I…

I've run into several parking places recently where you had to pay using the app, but where there was no mobile signal on any of the networks. Cue a lot of annoyed motorists.

On the other hand we (from London) were visiting Santa Barbara and had to use an app to park, and I was amazed that the app (ISTR it was PayByPhone) let me use the rental car with my UK login and billed me the right amount with no hassle.

Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#119

Post by anonym29 »

voidpepe wrote: post #102
syndicatedjelly wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That type of car in 20 years will become as rare as one without OBD, sadly

And also unusable if you live in a bigger city. Many of those are pushing to ban old cars due to pollution and noise regulations.

Noise regulations?

Yeah, my ancient 4 cylinder hybrid Prius absolutely rips, sounds like a total monster /s

Re: The problem of creeping commercial surveillance (2022)

#120

Post by tristor »

BurningFrog wrote: post #114
tristor wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never said it wasn't profitable. I said it wasn't accurate. Insurance companies aren't concerned with the accuracy, they are concerned with the profit. It effectively provides some "data" to give them license to increase rates, whether its accurate or not. As long as their rates outpace their claim payouts, they'll be profitable. It's also definitely happening, not only do insurance companies buy telematics data fr…

So you think it's accurate in predicting which customers will generate bigger or smaller claims, but not in who is a bad or good driver? To me those are functionally the same thing.

No, I think it gives a veneer of data to the insurance company demanding more money, irrespective of any correlation to claims rates.
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