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Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

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Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#321

Post by mindslight »

wat10000 wrote: post #317
mindslight wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it doesn't. You're assuming that markets have a computational efficiency and smoothness that simply isn't there. P != NP. Markets are a heuristic based around mediating between the interests of different parties precisely because the overall problem is computationally hard. If markets achieved the kind of optimality you're thinking, then top-down central planning would also be workable.

Even if markets were perfect, they’re not involved when a company decides to dump toxins into the air or water to save a buck.

Sure, but the usual counterargument is that the air and water need to be made legible to the market (through private ownership or the correct externality taxes), and then everything will be perfect. While in reality that's demanding a level of computation from markets that they simply do not possess.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#322

Post by hungryhobbit »

sertsa wrote: post #144
someNameIG wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Apple wanted more web devs to support Safari they should port it to Linux and Windows. The web is supposed to be an open standard, you shouldn't need a devices and software from a specific manufacturer to develop for it (I say that posting from a Mac).

At some point there was a Safari for Windows.

But there isn't anymore, so there's no way for a web developer to ensure Safari compatibility (unless you expect every dev shop in the world to buy a Mac just for that purpose).

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#323

Post by 8note »

bigyabai wrote: post #312
defrost wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we're not decrying the enthusiastic early database workers. Well, you're not. However: Black reports that every Nazi concentration camp maintained its own Hollerith-Abteilung (Hollerith Department), assigned with keeping tabs on inmates through use of IBM's punchcard technology. from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust suggest that a good number of these "early database workers" were working direct…

With different executives, that might not have happened. With different tabulators I don't think anything would have changed. You're not really disproving my point by emphasizing that the end operators of these machines were typically Nazis.

with different tabulators, it wouldnt have happened, because they would have refused, and protested to make sure no scabs went in to do that work.

workers, especially professionals, have a duty to not do that bad work, and to make sure that that bad work doesnt happen

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#324

Post by aucisson_masque »

MrDresden wrote: post #315
aucisson_masque wrote: post #124

What about the other app ? Now that this trick is known, either it’s completely fixed, including in system webview, or all the other usual spyware ,that the play store is full of, are going to use it to track their user. Google still hasn’t fixed the issue of app being able to list all other installed app on your phone without requiring permission despite having been reported months ago. They didn’t even provide an a…

> Google still hasn’t fixed the issue of app being able to list all other installed app on your phone without requiring permission despite having been reported months ago. They didn’t even provide an answer. Since the first release of Android it has been possible to query for installed applications on the device, and since Android 11 those results have started to be filtered[0] (with some exceptions[1]). So which iss…

https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/thre...

Basically no answer but an a.i generated one and someone promising to get back in touch since 24 of march.

Who are they kidding ?

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#325

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 »

alkonaut wrote: post #214
1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many HN commenters work for "adtech funded outlets". Do they have any credibility on the issue of privacy.

Depends on their stance on the issue but individuals don’t necessarily share the views of their employers. WaPo is by no means worst here. But their omission of Adblock in this article means they can’t be credible.

"But their omission of Adblock in this article means they can't be credible."

But adblockers do not fully solve the problem that the article is focused on. Namely, the use, e.g., by Meta and Yandex, of websockets in closed source mobile apps to listen on a loopback address for requests by mobile browsers, e.g., for tracking pixels.

There are approaches to prevent such tracking that do not necessarily require adblockers running in browsers. If the article mentioned Adblock but omitted other approaches, then does that mean the publisher is not credible.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#326

Post by sershe »

What I wonder is (from someone who has been in a room like that, not speculation), how do these decisions go down?

My other favorite example is un-disabling telemetry, resetting default browser, etc. Some PM or VP is in a meeting saying we are going to do this shady user hostile thing and everyone just nods? What is the amount and type of euphemisation?

I'd love to be a fly on the wall in one of these..

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#328

Post by account42 »

prox wrote: post #212
whstl wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a 90s teen growing up with Grunge and in a DYI punk scene, I remember my youth being a lot about authenticity, and it felt weird reading about how the 80s were all about money and fame and how selling out was ok. To me that sounded absolutely absurd and a freaking caricature, something out of "American Psycho". Today I was just discussing with a friend how we're perhaps even more materialistic and cut-throat...

A fear of mine is that we are speedrunning Cyberpunk 2077. And that’s not something to expire to. It’s a bleak no-hope hell. Hope is about finding and using that moral compass. To change worse outcomes to better outcomes for everyone . The “I’ll take mine” or “My group needs to win” attitude is poison to yourself and to the world, and if you don’t see that your conscience is blind or broken. This is nothing new, in n…

> And that’s not something to expire to.

Corporations disagree, as long as your death will be profitable.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#329

Post by account42 »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #245
michaelteter wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is basically it. There are a dozen ways to become huge, and they all are essnetially anti-humanity. There's an expression: normalization of deviance. This is where we are now. People idolize others because of their wealth, and that wealth is always gained by means which are ultimately harmful to the greater population. Even the wealthy philanthropistMS which will remain unnamed acquired their greatness by cheati…

> There are a dozen ways to become huge, and they all are essnetially anti-humanity. Offering customers lower prices is a way to gain more customers. Software allows for automation and efficiencies of scale. The end result will be a few big organizations that win, without cheating or stealing. (Although, there most likely is cheating or stealing due to other factors). But I would not classify the success of most larg…

The problem is that there aren't ethical ways to build a sustainable business, it's that unethical businesses have all those options and then also all the unethical ones so they will always come out ahead.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#330

Post by account42 »

ninth_ant wrote: post #9
xnx wrote: post #6

Without the suggestion to install an adblocker, this is not credible advice.

A media outlet which depends on ad revenue as a primary income source is unlikely to suggest this. Ditching these deeply invasive products remains a good idea, independent on any decision to use ad blockers or not. The Meta/Yandex incident in particular is straight-up malware and everyone should remove their apps.

> A media outlet which depends on ad revenue as a primary income source is unlikely to suggest this.

That's a problem for the media outlet to solve. Ad-supported tech "news" can never be trustworthy.

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