Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team • Hacker News Board

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#191

Post by chaostheory » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:11 AM UTC

seba_dos1 wrote: post #25

minimaxir wrote: post #8

It's worth noting that the app received $1M in preseed funding: https://techcrunch.com/2022/09/27/og-app-promises-you-an-ad-... It's also worth noting that the Instagram API is extremely locked down for typical users (which is the reason why there hasn't been a clone like this) as it is limited to Businesses and Creators, but the app demonstrates features not available by the official API: https://developers.facebook…

> They tweeted that they reverse-engineered the Android API, which would likely get personally you banned anywhere The question is - how do we even allow it do be legal? Not being able to reverse engineer applications running on your own devices is some kind of bullshit dystopia, tolerated only because average citizen is not technical enough to realize how dystopian it is.

If you want to be able to reverse engineer everything on your phone, then I would say that Android and iOS are not for you.

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#192

Post by josephcsible » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:11 AM UTC

Matheus28 wrote: post #182

josephcsible wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a third party can build a box to decrypt your encryption without you providing a key, then instead of suing the third party out of existence, you should pick a new encryption algorithm that's actually secure. Consider this analogy: should Master Lock be able to sue companies that make padlock shims, since several of their locks are vulnerable to shimming attacks?

If people use weak locks on their house I should be able to pick them and let myself in, right?

No. My point is if you do that, only you should get in trouble, not the company that made the lockpicks you used.

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#193

Post by amatecha » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:12 AM UTC

ummonk wrote: post #163

amatecha wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, I'm asking _the person in the thread above_ who made these claims that the app is stealing user data to provide any supporting evidence, perhaps via the methods I described in my last comment. I'm not talking about Meta.

THat's not the what you were asking. You asked 'What evidence do you have that this application was acting as a "proxy" where the developers can "intercept and see all data"?' The app is by definition acting as a proxy, and therefore the developers can intercept and see the data, though they might not be doing so currently.

Is the Facebook Messenger app a proxy? Is the Instagram client a proxy? Is the mail app on my phone a proxy? I'm trying to grasp what definition of "proxy" you're using here, because every usage of the word "proxy" I've ever see relating to internet services is: "a program which redirects network traffic to another destination". The subject is explored in detail at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_server . Yet again, I'm seeking to see any shred of evidence that even _suggests_ that the application has acted as a "proxy" or sent more user data to the app developer than absolutely necessary to function.

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#194

Post by cortesoft » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:12 AM UTC

jjulius wrote: post #189

cortesoft wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is Meta supposed to verify this? And verify that they don't start behaving badly in the future? This is what got Facebook in trouble with the FTC... they allowed developers access to all the users data without oversight. They are required by their settlement to not just trust app devs that they won't abuse the data.

That's not what I am asking. GP said that this third-party app is violating user privacy, and I am asking for evidence of that . As of now, there's nothing to suggest that the app is doing more than we're led to believe they are. CA went beyond what they claimed they were doing. That said, while I don't disagree with the point you're making, I disagree with the approach. There's a difference between recognizing that…

Is Meta obligated to work with anyone who wants to? Are they required to dedicate resources to every company that approaches them wanting to partner?

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#195

Post by Matheus28 » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:12 AM UTC

userbinator wrote: post #190

tptacek wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because your access to their API is conditioned on an agreement not to use unauthorized clients. You are free to use the software of your choosing in conjunction with your own computers, but not necessarily with everybody else's.

Quoted post unavailable.

So I should be able to steal from my neighbor because that's true freedom? Because you're using their resources and servers in a way they didn't authorize.

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#196

Post by chaostheory » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:13 AM UTC

josephcsible wrote: post #165

voidwtf wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a pretty hot take, can you elaborate? I’m not sure I understand.

Your argument is basically "what Meta did is okay since you agreed to it in the terms of service that you accepted", right? I'm saying that like selling yourself into indentured servitude, accepting Meta's TOS is not always a completely free choice.

If you don't like Meta's terms, don't use Meta products and services. It's that simple.

There's no indentured servitude because you're not giving Meta free work. In this case, people don't want to pay for Meta services by viewing ads. If you don't want to pay, don't use the service.

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#197

Post by Matheus28 » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:15 AM UTC

josephcsible wrote: post #192

Matheus28 wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people use weak locks on their house I should be able to pick them and let myself in, right?

No. My point is if you do that, only you should get in trouble, not the company that made the lockpicks you used.

The companies that made the lockpicks have the argument that they're only to be used by professional locksmiths in the process of opening a lock that the owner has authorized them to, which is legal. Selling a tool that only has illegal uses would quickly lead to trouble.

The third party clients can only be used in a way that violates the ToS.

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#198

Post by nextaccountic » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:15 AM UTC

Matheus28 wrote: post #83

amatecha wrote: post #45

Oh wow, this app got pulled from everything because it's an unofficial 3rd party client for Instagram? I'll say it again, companies should be legally forbidden from blocking 3rd party clients. They don't have to explicitly support them, but taking action to explicitly thwart them (and writing ToS that forbids them) should be outlawed. There's no reason I should have to be subjected to untold tracking, snooping and ad…

Why should 3rd parties be allowed to make unauthorized api requests? Additionally, some apps are only monetized through advertisement, and 3rd party apps don't display them. How do you expect the 1st party to stay in business? I don't align with Meta on a lot of issues, but they should be able to control what apps interact with their platform. Don't like it, don't use it.

> Additionally, some apps are only monetized through advertisement, and 3rd party apps don't display them. How do you expect the 1st party to stay in business?

Ad blockers are already a thing. Should they be forbidden?

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#199

Post by jjulius » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:15 AM UTC

cortesoft wrote: post #194

jjulius wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what I am asking. GP said that this third-party app is violating user privacy, and I am asking for evidence of that . As of now, there's nothing to suggest that the app is doing more than we're led to believe they are. CA went beyond what they claimed they were doing. That said, while I don't disagree with the point you're making, I disagree with the approach. There's a difference between recognizing that…

Is Meta obligated to work with anyone who wants to? Are they required to dedicate resources to every company that approaches them wanting to partner?

Nope, they sure aren't! Just as they're not obligated to nuke all of the personal accounts for everyone who works for the third-party app.

Not being obligated to do something doesn't mean that one is excluded from looking like an asshole if they don't do that thing.

Re: Meta has banned the personal Facebook accounts for everyone on our team

#200

Post by abigail95 » Thu, Sep 29, 2022, 5:15 AM UTC

dleslie wrote: post #138

Many folks on here might be too young to remember, but there was an era where cable companies served premium channels with a scrambled signal to all customers, and sold access by way of attaching the appropriate filter. In fact, all channels were protected in this way, with your cable box holding the necessary filters. Albeit, some were merely hidden by a band pass filter and not scrambled. Anyhow, those arguing that…

They aren't making the api private, they are making it tricky.

They have no intention (that I know of) of banning new browser technology. They don't say you must use Firefox/Chrome. Which means I can make my own browser and render it however I like.

If the data was meant to be secret, it would be encrypted. At the moment, if I do

> curl -L instagram.com

I get a mix of HTML, JS and CSS. In plain old text.

What am I allowed to do with this data?

Do I have to render it according to what WHATWG says? Obviously not.

If they were trying to limit access to their data, they would, like cable companies do, provide a secret to me so that I could decrypt the response.

Why don't they do that?

Because they want the data *public*.

They could make instagram available only via its own app with its own transport layer.

If they did that you would be violating anti-circumvention in the DMCA by reversing and publishing the protocol.

They want the data open and available to everyone to lower the barrier to entry to make more money. The tradeoff is that they don't control how that data gets presented.

Entirely their choice.