Telegram publishes users' locations online

Post by 1f60c » Tue, Jan 05, 2021, 11:36 AM UTC

wilg wrote: post #153

est31 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Map cells are the best solution available for 90% of locations, but they don't help with the 10% that's close to map borders. If an user randomly jumps between two map cells you know they live at the boundary. Generally there is often noise in GPS signals so it's likely that person will jump around. Furthermore, if a person uses multiple services, and each service has its own cell layout, you can check all services a…

Apple's solution to this seems pretty good, here's a snippet of the transcript from a WWDC 2020 talk: > It might be tempting to think that reduced accuracy locations are simply your true location with some noise added in. > But that is not the case. Simply adding some random noise on top of the user's true location is actually not that secure against someone who might wish to disambiguate the true location. Instead i…

Post by jlelse » Tue, Jan 05, 2021, 11:47 AM UTC

tyrion wrote: post #189

arthurcolle wrote: post #7

It's a shame that people still use Telegram when Signal is so much better, and has better credentials all around.

It's a shame that every time that Telegram is mentioned, Signal advocates feels the need to let everybody else know how superior Signal is supposed to be compared to everything else. I don't have anything against Signal itself, but this aggressiveness and arrogance is really putting me off. Has this became some kind of religion? Do you people realize that you are not the exclusive bearer of Truth, and that maybe, jus…

Post by 2Gkashmiri » Tue, Jan 05, 2021, 11:57 AM UTC

gotem wrote: post #13

Hnrobert42 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they are being sarcastic.

Nope. I think they should probably ask for one at signup. Would also reduce their server load if people only used 1 account instead of making 2+

Post by wruza » Tue, Jan 05, 2021, 12:21 PM UTC

koonsolo wrote: post #194

ffpip wrote: post #173

Clickbait. User explicitly shares location to all people nearby, discovers it is accessible to all people. Feature is disabled by default, and user must find this and enable it. They are not even prompted to enable it unless they seek it.

Most users will not conclude from "sharing how nearby" people are, that someone could pinpoint exactly where they live by triangulating. Unless Telegram does some extra steps to prevent exact locations (see other threads here), they should name it "share my location" instead of "show nearby users".

  People nearby.
  Quickly add people nearby who are also viewing this section and discover local group chats.
  Please allow on location access to enable this feature. 
  "Allow in settings" (a button)

Post by budafish » Tue, Jan 05, 2021, 12:57 PM UTC

dafoex wrote: post #192

ffpip wrote: post #173

Clickbait. User explicitly shares location to all people nearby, discovers it is accessible to all people. Feature is disabled by default, and user must find this and enable it. They are not even prompted to enable it unless they seek it.

They also say you need root to software spoof your location, but I thought you could do this without root using Mock Locations in developer options. I'm not sure if that's just an oversight, but it makes me think they aren't exactly familiar with Android as a whole.