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Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

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Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#141

Post by 50656E6973 »

johnnyfaehell wrote: post #124
bendotero wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the "no one is harmed" part I strongly disagree with. Perhaps they signed up for something and have perfect knowledge of how Facebook will use the information they collect (doubtful) but the rest of us will be impacted, manipulated and harmed in some way by what Facebook ultimately ends up doing with the data that their guinea pigs willingly gave up.

> It's the "no one is harmed" part I strongly disagree with. I can't prove a negative. So you would have to prove the positive, what harm came from this app?

>can't prove a negative.

Then why do you assert it as being truthful?

The history of FB's data collection practices is replete with "harm".

Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#142

Post by wicket »

fooker wrote: post #134
wicket wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wireshark won't decrypt encrypted traffic.

But it can easily tell you where the traffic is heading.

Indeed. The parent poster edited his comment which meant that my comment did not make any sense. See my other comment for clarification.

Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#143

Post by 908087 »

CaptainZapp wrote: post #59
11sdmb8m wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you fail to understand is that the average layman doesn't care about data collection and ad tech. If it pisses you off that people don't care about the same things you do, welcome to politics.

Can't Facebook at least pay for effective reputation management? All those new accounts accusing critics of hating Facebook are really rather ineffective.

Sheryl should get the "definers" to cook up some new Soros conspiracy material to use as ammo.

Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#144

Post by bob_theslob646 »

the_snooze wrote: post #132

I've been reading a lot of comments about this, and something that always comes up is the question "why shouldn't people be able to sell their data?" I have two objections to that. First, they're almost certainly not making that deal from an informed position. Security and privacy are very complicated matters, and most people won't even realize to ask questions about data retention, aggregation, sharing, differential…

"First, they're almost certainly not making that deal from an informed position"

After spending an hour reading similar comments to yours, I have to ask this question.

How informed should the user be? What qualifies as an informed user? This is getting into some dangerous territory because it because implies so some sort of contract literacy.

>The second issue is that MITMing all network traffic on a phone will necessary scoop up the user's credentials, as well as private messages and metadata from that user's friends and family.

Do they not already do that with access to Facebook Messenger and Instagram? Why is this not screamed from the top of every hill?

This data collection is also different because they literally say it is for research.( They are protected legally, unfortunately)

>Given all that really hot data, what incentives are there for the data collector to act responsibly and protect that data?

Hmm how about getting fined?(The issue is how much should they be fined and the answer in my opinion should be similar to how the SEC prosecutes for insider trading: fine on top of whatever you made, to strongly discourage you from doing so again or jail them.

Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#145

Post by tasubotadas »

gaius wrote: post #32
tasubotadas wrote: post #18

What a bullsh*t. People got some money for giving up some privacy. Nobody was forced to do this. And now everybody is freaking about a fairly reasonable trade. What's next? People will start harassing students/researchers that do paid studies?

And now everybody is freaking about a fairly reasonable trade OK let’s imagine that you have a close friend or family member with some confidential issue - maybe an illness, maybe debt, maybe they are in the closet. Occasionally they message you, on old -fashioned SMS or email mentioning something about it. How many dollars is a reasonable trade to tell a data collection agency everything you know so they can add it…

Well, I pity the fools that assume that their communications are private when they are using SMS, FB Messenger, or Hangouts. If you want your info to stay private, do not send it to untrustworthy parties via untrustworthy means.

Even if you stick with apps like Telegram or Wire (my choice), you have to have in mind that your phone might have a keylogger on (looking at Xiomi and Huawei).

Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#146

Post by morpheuskafka »

sidcool wrote: post #101
meitham wrote: post #95

I struggle to see how software developers can willingly do work on a project that goes against all values and morales! I have previously worked with developers in start-ups and was amazed to hear some of their backgrounds. One previously worked for a company that bundles spyware with freeware MSI products. Another worked for an airline agency, where they advertise fake a discount on tickets when the price was in fact…

I struggle to realize why we expect Software engineers to be bellwethers of morality and ethics. They are flesh and blood, and like any other profession, if there's money in something, there will be someone to do it

For one, as professionals and engineers, SEs should absolutely be attuned to and deeply reflective of ethics. That said, we can and should expect everyone to consider ethics in their daily lives and work.

Someone likely will do nearly every unethical thing, but that doesn't mean it is right for anyone to do it.

Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#147

Post by morpheuskafka »

spricket wrote: post #135
morpheuskafka wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not even that--they are not stopping the identical Android app, only the iOS one. From the media/public standpoint, the programs are nearly identical, so this is clearly a case of either Apple ordering them to stop and/or they know they are hosed for giving Apple the finger and trying to pull the plug before Apple revokes their entire company's enterprise certificate, which would break any internal apps (the int…

According to articles I saw in the last few hours, their "certificates" have been pulled. So this has likely already happened. Also, Google updated API certificate behavior to only trust built in roots by default. https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2016/07/changes-to... might explain why "project atlas" is only available for Android devices marshmallow and earlier (they can't snoop encrypted app traffic on lat…

Nice! Glad Apple caused them some massive chaos. I'd forgotten about that roots thing, it's actually really nice albeit a little annoying for debugging/reverse engineering.

Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#148

Post by briandear »

mruts wrote: post #117
briandear wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good point. Someone else essentially gets paid to compromise your privacy without your consent.

I mean, if you tell me something, I can legally decide to tell someone else. Unless we signed a contract or something.

Actually, in some states, to record conversations, two-party consent is necessary. 11 states, including California, require two-party consent. It’s a fair assumption that an app that is vacuuming up everything someone does on a phone is potentially gathering data that would fall under two-party consent laws. Also eavesdropping is also a potential crime under common law. It’s a murky legal area in this case, but one that certainly has some merit.

Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#149

Post by johnnyfaehell »

50656E6973 wrote: post #141
johnnyfaehell wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's the "no one is harmed" part I strongly disagree with. I can't prove a negative. So you would have to prove the positive, what harm came from this app?

>can't prove a negative. Then why do you assert it as being truthful? The history of FB's data collection practices is replete with "harm".

I didn't assert that anything was truthful?

And prove the "harm" in its data collection practices. Since you've been very specific in data collection, I will expect your response to be about data collection.

Re: Facebook will shut down its controversial market research app for iOS

#150

Post by richardwhiuk »

FabHK wrote: post #94
maxxxxx wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From a certain size on they need each other. Apple can’t afford to lose Facebook and Facebook can’t afford to lose apple.

God I wish Apple had the balls of suspending the developer account and withdrawing the Facebook app from the app store. It's infuriating that most likely Facebook will again get away with a slap on the wrist. How will they make the next morally relevant decision?

They've taken the sensible step of revoking the Enterprise account, which is usually separate to the AppStore account.
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