Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#121

Post by somecodemonkey » Wed, May 25, 2016, 1:42 PM UTC

tdkl wrote: post #58

onewaystreet wrote: post #5

No. This is one of those tech urban legends that keeps popping up. Facebook does have an opt-in feature that can identify what music, tv show or movie you are listening to or watching, but that's it. http://newsroom.fb.com/news/2014/05/a-new-optional-way-to-sh... https://www.facebook.com/help/iphone-app/369513256545845

That's what they say. One of the urban legends was also that USA government agencies don't collect data at bulk and they were lying about it. We know the truth now. Facebook has been caught with the hand in the cookie jar too many times already and got away with it. Fuck Facebook.

Lets leave the tinfoil on reddit please.

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#122

Post by jerf » Wed, May 25, 2016, 1:42 PM UTC

I see two ways to do this, sending audio to Facebook or doing speech-to-text on the phone.

Sending audio to Facebook would be so obvious that presumably somebody would have noticed by now.

So that leaves speech-to-text on the phone. However, if that was on "all the time" or even some significant fraction, wouldn't that take an enormous amount of battery power? I'm not sure exactly how much juice on-handset speech-to-text takes but it seems like it would be nontrivial.

On the flip side, I do have to admit that Facebook probably already shows up on the top of most people's CPU and data listings already, but, still, it seems like this could easily be an order of magnitude beyond even that for many people. Surely someone by now would have noticed that they didn't even open Facebook today but it's the top battery draw and/or data user for the day?

Forget whether Facebook wants to do this. I'll take it as read that, duh, yes they do. The question in my mind is can they actually do this without being noticed somewhere other than a local news channel? I mean this question seriously; as you can see above I've already sort of laid out the parameters, so I'd ask that replies here not just "guess" how much juice speech recognition takes, I already did, please tell me if you know. (I can't enforce this request, of course.)

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#123

Post by TeMPOraL » Wed, May 25, 2016, 1:47 PM UTC

khedoros wrote: post #19

tiplus wrote: post #15

It sounds like a creepier version of google now which listens for many keywords instead of just one, is it not? Question for the experts: How much battery would it actually drain if the mic was constantly activated and the app was scanning for keywords. I mean, you could limit the scanning to times were someone actually speaks and otherwise remain in a sleep mode. The keywords are then synced only when the user opens…

Some devices are always listening for "OK, Google", if you turn that feature on (Nexus 6, Nexus 9, and Samsung Note 4, according to a Google help page [0]). I vaguely remember reading something about a subprocessor in those devices, looking for that phrase, to cut down on battery usage. Most of the speech recognition processing happens remotely on Google's servers, though. [0] https://support.google.com/websearch/ans…

Funny, I'd actually want that feature in my phone (S7). It could easily turn Google Now into single-room Echo alternative. Without it, Google Now's voice features are pretty useless - if I have the phone unlocked and in my hands, I may as well type what I want and get to it faster.

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#124

Post by Herald_MJ » Wed, May 25, 2016, 1:47 PM UTC

hellbanner wrote: post #113

Herald_MJ wrote: post #108

Can't speak for Android, but on iOS it is not possible for an app to "listen" to your microphone unless it is in the foreground, and you have explicitly given the app permission to do this (the first time the app attempts to do so). It can also be revoked at any time without removing the app. The only way around this restriction would be using a private API Apple could have provided. Given that Apple has even integra…

You mean when they removed their warrant canary a few years ago under the guise of "new security policy"? When they were found to be tracking GPS positions even with GPS disabled? (Sorry it's impossible to find a link to this anymore) How about the Bluetooth vulnerabilities their desktop computer suffer -- I've seen keyboard connections trivially hijacked. I'm not suggesting that Apple has made a deal with Facebook (…

I know of the first two examples you gave, but disagree that they're evidence of Apple not being interested in user privacy.

Let's not hijack this thread to talk about Apple's security record.

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#125

Post by NiekvdMaas » Wed, May 25, 2016, 1:48 PM UTC

nutmeg wrote: post #116

Another anecdotal-data-of-sample-size-one, my wife was at a bar and struck up a conversation with another person to whom she had no connections. After she left, Facebook suggested this person as a friend. The other person may have searched for her on Facebook, causing her to be listed as a possible friend. Or perhaps Facebook uses location data to group people that are in the same location for an extended period of t…

This happened multiple times to me in the past as well. Most likely the other person searched for my name on FB causing FB to recommend the searcher as friend to me (LinkedIn uses the same technique). Location data sounds strange, that'd mean FB would constantly recommend other people sitting in the same restaurant etc.

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#126

Post by harryf » Wed, May 25, 2016, 1:51 PM UTC

nstj wrote: post #66

harryf wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Facebook are spying on you and how their apps have all these permissions to use your camera and phone audio. And it's not just the Facebook apps. The Facebook SDK is widely embedded into many other apps Facebook SDK (it's the most popular SDK on iOS for example, according to data published from Cocoapods - https://gist.github.com/ryanolsonk/e33bf9e89677da9fe8ce ). It's so popular because Facebook is basically the m…

You could just build it yourself from the source if you're worried about that. Does the SDK ship with any pre-built binaries?

You're right although most developers are going to get it either pre-built from here https://developers.facebook.com/docs/ios/ and add it manually to their project or via Cocoapods (also pre-built I believe)

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#127

Post by cylinder » Wed, May 25, 2016, 2:01 PM UTC

nutmeg wrote: post #116

Another anecdotal-data-of-sample-size-one, my wife was at a bar and struck up a conversation with another person to whom she had no connections. After she left, Facebook suggested this person as a friend. The other person may have searched for her on Facebook, causing her to be listed as a possible friend. Or perhaps Facebook uses location data to group people that are in the same location for an extended period of t…

Why do people keep the Facebook app installed? I use it in the web browser and it works just fine, while sort of sandboxing it within Chrome.

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#128

Post by anysz » Wed, May 25, 2016, 2:11 PM UTC

nutmeg wrote: post #116

Another anecdotal-data-of-sample-size-one, my wife was at a bar and struck up a conversation with another person to whom she had no connections. After she left, Facebook suggested this person as a friend. The other person may have searched for her on Facebook, causing her to be listed as a possible friend. Or perhaps Facebook uses location data to group people that are in the same location for an extended period of t…

+1 This happened to me at the supermarket.

Super cute cashier girl. No idea what her name is.

As I'm heading out I open up my news feed and what do you know? There she is in recommended friends. WTF

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#129

Post by somecodemonkey » Wed, May 25, 2016, 2:21 PM UTC

Pengwin wrote: post #12

onewaystreet wrote: post #5

No. This is one of those tech urban legends that keeps popping up. Facebook does have an opt-in feature that can identify what music, tv show or movie you are listening to or watching, but that's it. http://newsroom.fb.com/news/2014/05/a-new-optional-way-to-sh... https://www.facebook.com/help/iphone-app/369513256545845

Evey now and again I see a picture or article being shared around saying Facebook are spying on you and how their apps have all these permissions to use your camera and phone audio. If they are on android, I tell them to open their system settings and show them how Google Search has just about every privilege on your phone and has had it since they turned it on. Even if people are concerned they still don't stop usin…

They dont stop using because there is no real reason not to. Nothing is free, every 'free' app takes something. Everyone knows this so they dont really care and why should they?

Re: Is Facebook eavesdropping on phone conversations?

#130

Post by joshstrange » Wed, May 25, 2016, 2:32 PM UTC

Herald_MJ wrote: post #108

Can't speak for Android, but on iOS it is not possible for an app to "listen" to your microphone unless it is in the foreground, and you have explicitly given the app permission to do this (the first time the app attempts to do so). It can also be revoked at any time without removing the app. The only way around this restriction would be using a private API Apple could have provided. Given that Apple has even integra…

Unless Heard has stopped working then this is not 100% true http://www.heardapp.com/ It may put a banner on the top bar but I've used this app and it worked just fine.