Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated” • Hacker News Board

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#251

Post by zo1 » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:44 PM UTC

miohtama wrote: post #231

kmeisthax wrote: post #59

Everyone here is commenting about overautomation, but this isn't an overautomation problem. It's a secondary sanctions problem. The developer isn't being banned for breaking Google's rules, he's being banned for having hired someone else who later broke those rules; and then that ban was transitively applied to their personal account as well. This is beyond the pale. Google should not have the power to decide who you…

GDPR Article 22 > The data subject shall have the right not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing, including profiling, which produces legal effects concerning him or her or similarly significantly affects him or her. > In the cases referred to in points (a) and (c) of paragraph 2, the data controller shall implement suitable measures to safeguard the data subject’s rights and freedoms and…

Cool sounds like this guy can open a police case, a detective or police person looks into it, finds "yeah, sure enough, we audited Google's code and they broke rule 2c, so we'll give you X-million in compensation for this." And then the detective (because it's an open-shut case mind you) goes further with: Getting an extract of 12,393,333 other people affected by this "problem" so they issue a court order to charge Google 12,393,333 * X-million in damages. And then further also issuing a court order for Google to stop all operations immediately until they deactivate this automated process.

As if that will ever happen. We don't live in a world of rules and logic until things play out as simply as above.

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#252

Post by dandare » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:44 PM UTC

whymauri wrote: post #208

Once again, the resolution of this problem will come down to either the OP knowing a Google employee or a Google employee happening to see this and feeling pity. For the vast majority of people who deal with Google support and don't have access to Google employees how many of us on HN do, when the hammer strikes: they are completely out of options. I have such little trust in Google's automation for banning accounts…

I don't understand why the fear of being sued is not preventing Google (and other big players) from misusing their position like this. Is it impossible to sue Google?

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#253

Post by TuringNYC » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:44 PM UTC

tempnow987 wrote: post #224

kmeisthax wrote: post #59

Everyone here is commenting about overautomation, but this isn't an overautomation problem. It's a secondary sanctions problem. The developer isn't being banned for breaking Google's rules, he's being banned for having hired someone else who later broke those rules; and then that ban was transitively applied to their personal account as well. This is beyond the pale. Google should not have the power to decide who you…

Google is dealing with a very real problem. There are bad actors, particularly internationally, who systematically and at scale try to subvert / cheat. This includes multiple accounts, and businesses that hire folks who try to cheat the system. Google almost certainly has statistics supporting the increased risk of working with developers / businesses that hire folks who break various rules. Certainly there are false…

>> Google is dealing with a very real problem. There are bad actors, particularly internationally, who systematically and at scale try to subvert / cheat.

I really dislike this explanation because there are so many obvious things they can do. Example:

1. Force uploads of Passport/ID for identity confirmation. If you have 100 accounts with the same passport...ok...issue, but if not, is it worth human review at least?

2. Force credit card payment with address verification, ideally match to passport. Same credit card used across 1000 accounts...ok...issue, but if not, perhaps worth a review at least?

3. Still an issue? Force user to pay $100 for verification and run credit check routine.

The idea that blanket account terminations are the only way to handle issues seem lazy.

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#254

Post by Beltiras » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:46 PM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #4

In the discussion of the last article, there was a discussion about weaponizing "associated accounts" when Google shuts things down. Looks like it's 100% a valid tactic. Looks like you need to make sure your employees all leave on good terms, and stay on good terms in the coming years. Otherwise, you too might find your Google accounts terminated with no recourse.

And also that they never violate Google's TOS.

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#255

Post by unabridged » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:47 PM UTC

qalmakka wrote: post #22

I will say this once again: App Stores are too important in the current world to be left to the mercy of some big Internet company. I agree they should get a cut due to them being both the creators and maintainers of their platforms, but their ability to regulate what's in them should be left to a third party or government agency, just like trade is not left to its own devices and has regulators. Apple and Google are…

I don't think regulation is the answer. The US government should just create app.gov with a 1% fee or something and out compete them.

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#256

Post by zo1 » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:47 PM UTC

bogwog wrote: post #87

qalmakka wrote: post #22

I will say this once again: App Stores are too important in the current world to be left to the mercy of some big Internet company. I agree they should get a cut due to them being both the creators and maintainers of their platforms, but their ability to regulate what's in them should be left to a third party or government agency, just like trade is not left to its own devices and has regulators. Apple and Google are…

Figuring out a fair and effective set of laws/regulations to control how these companies run their app stores seems way too hard and unrealistic. The easier and more effective solution is to simply force them to allow alternative app stores (without suppressing competition, like Google currently does). A free market tends to correct itself in the long term, so that should solve the majority of problems plaguing the m…

As much as being a full 100% free-market person, I'd still say there are plenty of fair and (probably) effective ways to regulate this market.

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#257

Post by RexM » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:47 PM UTC

tempnow987 wrote: post #224

kmeisthax wrote: post #59

Everyone here is commenting about overautomation, but this isn't an overautomation problem. It's a secondary sanctions problem. The developer isn't being banned for breaking Google's rules, he's being banned for having hired someone else who later broke those rules; and then that ban was transitively applied to their personal account as well. This is beyond the pale. Google should not have the power to decide who you…

Google is dealing with a very real problem. There are bad actors, particularly internationally, who systematically and at scale try to subvert / cheat. This includes multiple accounts, and businesses that hire folks who try to cheat the system. Google almost certainly has statistics supporting the increased risk of working with developers / businesses that hire folks who break various rules. Certainly there are false…

> there should be a pathway to a $5,000 fee where you get a higher level of human interaction

That sounds like extortion...

"We're going to ban your account because we want to, unless of course you pay us $5,000 so you can talk to a human to resolve this issue."

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#258

Post by skrtskrt » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:48 PM UTC

throwuxiytayq wrote: post #234

TuringNYC wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a scare last year where Google supposedly gave me 30 days before they would shut off my Google account of 20yrs. Family photos, youtube videos, 20yrs of email, not to mention the treasure trove of personal documents on GDrive. It took two weeks to duplicate the content and back it up elsewhere. This is a paid tier Google account and I've yet to get an explanation on why this happened. It appears to be because o…

After reading so many posts like this, I decided to bite the bullet and start moving off-Google. Funny thing is, ProtonMail and Obsidian are much better than Gmail and Keep anyway. I'm still forced to use Google stuff here and there but I'm no longer dependant on them, and coincidentally I've been sleeping much better recently.

the editor for Google Docs is the one really good thing I can't get elsewhere, but I don't do that much important stuff in it - just like planning vacations, etc. Once I'm done editing something, if I want to back it up I can just export it elsewhere

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#259

Post by Pooge » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:49 PM UTC

qalmakka wrote: post #22

I will say this once again: App Stores are too important in the current world to be left to the mercy of some big Internet company. I agree they should get a cut due to them being both the creators and maintainers of their platforms, but their ability to regulate what's in them should be left to a third party or government agency, just like trade is not left to its own devices and has regulators. Apple and Google are…

I would much rather have a repository system like F-Droid (or you could compare it to Debian/AUR/openSUSE) where the publisher has to create a repository that respects some kind of standard so that they can distribute their software.

NewPipe does this for F-Droid in order to deploy the updates faster. Otherwise, F-Droid needs to very, compile and deploy themselves and it usually takes a few days.

Re: Google terminated our Developer Account, says it is “associated”

#260

Post by ocdtrekkie » Wed, Mar 30, 2022, 3:49 PM UTC

throwuxiytayq wrote: post #234

TuringNYC wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a scare last year where Google supposedly gave me 30 days before they would shut off my Google account of 20yrs. Family photos, youtube videos, 20yrs of email, not to mention the treasure trove of personal documents on GDrive. It took two weeks to duplicate the content and back it up elsewhere. This is a paid tier Google account and I've yet to get an explanation on why this happened. It appears to be because o…

After reading so many posts like this, I decided to bite the bullet and start moving off-Google. Funny thing is, ProtonMail and Obsidian are much better than Gmail and Keep anyway. I'm still forced to use Google stuff here and there but I'm no longer dependant on them, and coincidentally I've been sleeping much better recently.

In my case, I moved to Fastmail... and yeah, the hilarious thing is people remember moving from AOL to Gmail over a decade ago, and think Gmail is still so much better than everything else.

Gmail is worst-in-class at this point. It's slow, it's bloated, it's bad at spam filtering compared to the alternatives. They've been riding on people remembering email before Gmail, but not really actually stayed competitive with any modern alternative offering.