Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS • Hacker News Board

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#241

Post by slg » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:39 PM UTC

kuratkull wrote: post #184

slg wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You are saying that you want to collect my personal information so you can fix your bugs. How do you define personal information? Let's use Chrome as an example. Recording what website I visit is clearly personal information. What about recording how many tabs I have open, how much RAM each tab is using, and when each tab was last viewed? Is that personal information to you? I personally don't value keeping that pri…

It's pretty easy to understand what information is technically static and could be used to track you. Number of tabs: low possible range and pretty variable, even for tab hoarders, so it's low entropy information. Amount of RAM used in each open tab: that should be statistically significant and I'm pretty sure could be used to identify people if there are enough tabs open for a long enough period. When each tab was v…

You are going beyond my example by saying this information can be used to track you. This is the only information collected in my example. It is not associate with any other information so there is no value in trying to deanonymize it.

Perhaps it is better if I approach the question from a different angle. What is the downside of someone having this specific information about you? Can you think of a single negative repercussion from someone knowing how many tabs you have open? That is the fundamental point here.

The idea that all information related to a user should inherently be private just seems like a needless draconian standard and one that didn't exist in the pre-digital age. The privacy value of each piece of information can vary wildly. Some of it deserves protecting. Some of it doesn't.

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#242

Post by kllrnohj » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:40 PM UTC

avianlyric wrote: post #199

mankyd wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is exactly what the article is talking about.

I’m not sure which article your looking at, but neither the OP article, or the Kerbs article suggests that Apple is collecting location data derived from location services on a phone and sending it back to the mothership. The OP article suggests that IP data from the uploads could be used to estimate location, and their table has a “location” column. But that column seems to be referencing the fact that iOS reports w…

> but neither the OP article, or the Kerbs article suggests that Apple is collecting location data derived from location services on a phone and sending it back to the mothership

That is literally what the OP article is saying. Apple phones home your gps location even if you don't sign in. That's the claim of the OP article (really the claim of the paper the article is quoting)

From the paper: "iOS sends the MAC addresses of nearby devices, e.g. other handsets and the home gateway, to Apple together with their GPS location. Currently there are few, if any, realistic options for preventing this data sharing."

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#243

Post by userbinator » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:42 PM UTC

dralley wrote: post #92

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #4

" Modern cars regularly send basic data about vehicle components, their safety status and service schedules to car manufacturers, and mobile phones work in very similar ways." -Google This is a beautiful quote because it is an example of one industry's bad behavior leading to another industry's bad behavior, upon which the first industry then users the second's similarity to justify themselves. Cars only started doin…

>Cars only started doing this because phones made it normal. It's wrong in both cases. I don't know that this is true, planes have been doing it for quite some time now, although obviously they existing in a totally different bracket of price and complexity.

although obviously they existing in a totally different bracket of price and complexity.

There's a whole world of difference between a plane operating commercial service in a highly-regulated industry and one's own car. At least there is an expectation of personal privacy - and some semblance of freedom - with the latter.

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#244

Post by userbinator » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:44 PM UTC

charcircuit wrote: post #151

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #4

" Modern cars regularly send basic data about vehicle components, their safety status and service schedules to car manufacturers, and mobile phones work in very similar ways." -Google This is a beautiful quote because it is an example of one industry's bad behavior leading to another industry's bad behavior, upon which the first industry then users the second's similarity to justify themselves. Cars only started doin…

Telemetry allows people to make better decisions. It's not a bad practice. Information deserves to be free.

Let's not forget that "better" is from the viewpoint of a giant corporation whose primary reason for existence is to suck as much profit out of you as it can...

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#245

Post by userbinator » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:48 PM UTC

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #4

" Modern cars regularly send basic data about vehicle components, their safety status and service schedules to car manufacturers, and mobile phones work in very similar ways." -Google This is a beautiful quote because it is an example of one industry's bad behavior leading to another industry's bad behavior, upon which the first industry then users the second's similarity to justify themselves. Cars only started doin…

I suspect that statement was to placate people with "your car does it too", but mine certainly doesn't --- it doesn't even require a computer to run --- and the statement had the exact opposite effect, namely to revalidate the reason I don't drive a "modern car".

That said, I do have an Android, but it is rooted and spends most of its time off. As I type this message, it is on the other side of the room.

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#246

Post by mcphage » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:50 PM UTC

fbelzile wrote: post #140

mason55 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can still do all those things on a computer. And now it’s so easy to put up a web app that I’d argue barriers are much, much lower than when you had to figure out how to get your physical software distributed. The goals of “keep grandpa from getting his life savings stolen by malicious software” and “allow a power user to do whatever they want” can literally never be solved by the same device. If there’s any way…

> You can still do all those things on a computer. Have you tried to distribute software on macOS out of the App Store recently?

Did you try to distribute software out of the App Store 25 years ago?

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#247

Post by totaldex » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:52 PM UTC

kuratkull wrote: post #152

totaldex wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1 to this. As long as proper privacy concerns are addressed and the data gathering is imperceptible to the product experience, telemetry signals are immensely valuable for improving the product in a variety of ways.

Many users care more about their privacy than your product.

Certainly true, but it doesn't counter the original claim: Anonymized telemetry collection with proper privacy considerations can have a net positive impact on the product.

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#248

Post by zamadatix » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:53 PM UTC

tchalla wrote: post #160

heavyset_go wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's no conversation had upon the charges on a digital distribution store. I'd say - let's have that conversation and come up with a number. Currently, the number is decided in a "free market". There is no competition in the mobile app distribution market. Apple and Google have a duopoly on mobile app distribution, and they behave like a cartel when it comes to price fixing. For over a decade now, consumers and…

I agree - there's no competition. What's your solution to change in the law that will create competition?

At minimum if you operate an app store on your own platform that takes a cut the platform should allow alternative 3rd party stores to be used. Android/Windows/web/MacOS are already there on that software front. iOS/Consoles/SmartTVs and many others are not. It's probably why you hear about the Apple App Store 30% but not the Play/Microsoft Store 30% - those aren't the only options to distribute an app on those platforms. Users are definitely steered and incentivized to use them but not forced.

That in itself isn't a fix all, for example the Amazon app store for Android based devices still takes a 30% cut at the moment, but it opens the floodgates to stores like this that could start to create natural competition. And even if not at least you have the choice to try not to do that, look at Fortnite. Not for the court case but because they took a 0% cut on Android by distributing the app via their own store when they got kicked off due to that battle. Obviously not an option for everyone but you can still load the app on Android devices and Epic Games Store actually only takes a 12% cut as it's trying to compete. Even if none of this ends up mattering - at least one can load what they want on their devices.

.

At the more extreme end there is always antitrust action like the oft cited idea of splitting the likes of Apple or so on into "Apple Hardware" and "Apple Software" which would definitely blow away some anti-competition tendencies (How many use ios+safari+apple-hardware because that's what they would pick vs that's the only option to get any of the above? Probably less than 100%...) but at the same time are probably a bit extreme when we have tried tamer things like the above before.

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#249

Post by rrrrrrrrrrrryan » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:53 PM UTC

simonh wrote: post #193

harry8 wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is such a nonsense justification. You want to sell software you wrote to run on an iphone. You have zero choice. Apple tax your revenue. You want to sell software you wrote to run on a pc. Steam is not your only choice. I am not defending steam or valve here, I've never sold anything using their stuff, nor am I suggesting anything other than that their market power over pc compared to apple's store over the ipho…

The situation on Android shows us that consumers like consolidation and they like walled gardens and simple choices. These things benefit them. Plenty of Android phones come with 2 or 3 app stores. One for the carrier, one for the vendor and Google Play Store. There plenty are others as well, but the market has spoken. Even Epic had to fold and move to Play Store. Maybe Google played dirty, but I think it's perfectly…

Are people buying software through steam because they like the consolidated experience? Or because they trust it more than an exe from a random website? Or because steam already has their credit card info stored? Or because it's the only place to obtain certain games?

It's some combination of these things (and some others I haven't considered), and the value all of this added up, minus steam's downsides, is apparently worth an extra 30% if this cost is sufficiently hidden from the consumer.

Would people still pay a 30% fee if the store were forced to actually show the fee, and there were alternatives? I'm not so sure.

You're right that there's some value there, but it's probably closer to 3% than 30%.

Re: Google collects 20 times more telemetry from Android devices than Apple from iOS

#250

Post by danielrhodes » Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 11:53 PM UTC

ConceptJunkie wrote: post #167

danielrhodes wrote: post #46

Data collection is what companies do when they have no empathy. It's like an ivory tower effect where you don't interact with customers day to day or don't know what they want, so you try to use data to fill in the (large) gap. I could come up with countless examples of amazing products where nobody was using data to justify their decisions.

That's because the user of the service or device is not the customer.

If you're saying they are the product, that's a very old trope and easily falsified. For example, advertisers come to Facebook because, and only because, users are there. If users stopped liking Facebook, they wouldn't be there anymore. If they aren't there anymore, advertisers don't want to be there either. Thus, Facebook is incentivized to keep users happy - they are the most important people to Facebook. From what I've heard, Facebook struggles to get engineers to work on ads. If advertisers were the true customers, I imagine most engineers would be more gung-ho to work on ads because that would align more closely with career success at the company.

The above doesn't justify unrestrained tracking of user activity - but let's not pretend companies get to where they are because they create a first-class space for advertisers. They get to where they are because they, at least at one point, created a great product for their customers.