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Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

nytimes.com

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Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#341

Post by npongratz »

eric_the_read wrote: post #276
FullMtlAlcoholc wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you can't stop using Facebook. On a lot of carrier provided phones, it cannot be uninstalled. And if you've signed in once, it will continue to run, auto update, and collect your information.

On every Android phone I've used, you can always disable the carrier-provided apps, so they won't show up in your app tray, or run any processes. iOS doesn't pre-install it, and I've no idea what Windows Phone does.

I had an HTC Droid Incredible. Facebook was included in the factory build, was always running per the process list even after force quitting, and with the exception of rooting the phone [0], was impossible to remove from the device.

http://forums.androidcentral.com/verizon-droid-incredible/10...

[0] Corporate-provided and payed-for phone, so I was prevented from rooting because of "security reasons." Even after (or, especially because) the phone developed the surprising habit of snapping pictures at random times -- as evidenced by the distinct sound made by my DInc's shutter -- after the corporate-required malware was installed. I'm sure someone, somewhere really enjoyed the view of the inside of my pocket.

Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#342

Post by [deleted] »

Kenji wrote: post #108
Dayshine wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the free market is very slow, and it's a greater total harm. Would you rather your child learned which items are hot by scarring themselves each time?

So, we the people are essentially children and the state is the parent? Nice metaphor, you just proved my point that the state should not interfere.

[deleted]

Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#343

Post by wsy »

patrickaljord wrote: post #25

Facebook asked WhatsApp users to give consent before collecting data, which some did. Why should the government intervine between consenting adults agreeing on a contract willfully? Isn't this the definition of tyranny and why we oppose things such as the war on drugs?

Funny definition of tyranny. Going back to the case itself: a) the German government is elected; b) most Germans are glad to have strong privacy protection rules in place. So it is simply democracy, and agreement on a different set of social rules than the set you would prefer.

Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#344

Post by kuschku »

Jerry2 wrote: post #323
achou wrote: post #251

A former colleague of mine who was a distinguished academic and successful tech executive grew up in East Germany. After the Berlin wall fell, he was able to enter the building where they kept the dossiers. He found his own file and was astounded by the information they had on him. His friends, his work, his habits. Photos of himself going about his business. His social circles. His friends were equally shocked by th…

> He found his own file and was astounded by the information they had on him. His friends, his work, his habits. Photos of himself going about his business. His social circles. His friends were equally shocked by the collection of the most trivial details. Facebook has all of that and way more. They even know which sites you visit when you're not on Facebook (think Like buttons and logins and various JS libraries tha…

I’ve been collecting all chats’ contents I’m in, all webpages I browse, where I am, and when, etc in a database.

Basically, I started with building bad, hacky clones of Google’s services for myself.

But the resulting set of data is so huge and powerful.

Not only can I find out just from my data where my friends were, and when, also with whom they talked, and when, with whom they’re interacting, etc.

And that’s just for my own data, if I had that set of data about every human... I don’t even want to imagine what’d be possible.

Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#345

Post by kuschku »

ryandrake wrote: post #218
logn wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Using the messaging service is a voluntary decision Once a critical mass uses a messaging service, it's not a completely voluntary decision, especially when there is no open standard with interoperable competing apps.

What did we all do in the past without those CRITICAL messaging services? Did people simply not communicate before IM apps were invented?

Things just took a few hours longer, making planning a party a thing of days or weeks.

With whatsapp, I can plan a birthday party in 20 minutes, on the same day as the birthday, while also ensuring everyone who couldn’t answer a call got the message.

Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#346

Post by wsy »

bduerst wrote: post #301
Gracana wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I give someone money, it is their money and they can do what they want with it, it does not matter to me. If I give someone information about myself, it's still connected to me, but now it's under their control. They can use it to exploit or harm me, and so can anyone they sell it to, or anyone who steals it. It's that indeterminate potential for future abuse that makes it important. That's why we consider it diff…

That's a moot argument because every human transaction, whether money or messaging, has meta data tied to it that can be exploited by bad actors.

True, but no reason to let companies collect even more data than they need to perform the transaction. Your argument goes a bit like "every lock can be picked, so why are you opposed to just keeping your door open?"

Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#347

Post by kuschku »

germanier wrote: post #250
rmc wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Extreme non-techies will say "WhatsApp is broken, use this app instead". People who read the news will know it's about the US companies wanting to spy on your data (remember Germans don't have US 4th Amendment rights), and will switch apps.

I'm not convinced German constitutional protections are weaker than the 4th Amendment. The constitution even includes a right to the guarantee of confidentiality and integrity of information technology systems as ruled by the constitutional court. https://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/Entscheid...

I think the argument is more that Facebook is a US company, Facebook isn’t bound by German law (unless they operate in Germany, which they do), and the 4th Amendment only applies to Americans.

Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#348

Post by harry8 »

sasvari wrote: post #308
glasz wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

telegram was sort of a bad choice: https://www.eff.org/node/82654 signal desktop (granted, stupid chrome plugin but official): signal.org/desktop

compared to signal, telegram can be used by android users without gapps (the telegram client can be installed via f-droid). as much as I would like to use signal, I can't.

compared to signal, telegram stores all your messages on a server you don't control in plaintext. It's not the answer.

Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#349

Post by bduerst »

wsy wrote: post #346
bduerst wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a moot argument because every human transaction, whether money or messaging, has meta data tied to it that can be exploited by bad actors.

True, but no reason to let companies collect even more data than they need to perform the transaction. Your argument goes a bit like "every lock can be picked, so why are you opposed to just keeping your door open?"

That's a terrible straw man. My counterargument to the "indeterminate potential for future abuse that makes it important" is that the same logic applies to all human transactions, so it's a moot premise.

Increased security standards on metadata for human transactions is actually the right response to the existence of bad actors, but increased security != forcing bans on the use of metadata.

Re: Facebook Ordered to Stop Collecting Data on WhatsApp Users in Germany

#350

Post by harry8 »

mhurron wrote: post #320
CaptSpify wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If people really cared about mass surveillance would they actively participate in Facebook et al? The problem is: These people weren't using Facebook. They were using WhatsApp which promised to not send their data to Facebook. I don't use either because I personally think it's silly to assume they won't sell your data to someone, but they did make the promise that they wouldn't.

> They were using WhatsApp which promised to not send their data to Facebook. I've seen that mentioned before, but where does it say that? On WhatsApp's ToS it says they won't share WhatsApp data for others to see on Facebook, not that Facebook itself wouldn't use that data.

So now facebook has your data, has a shadow profile of you (already had that from your friends) and adds your whatssapp metadata to. You have to trust all current and future facebook employees who ever have access to that data. You have to trust facebook can now and will always in the future be able to secure that data. Then you have to trust anyone they sell that data to in all these dimensions. Moreover if data exists it can be retrieved by government through legal or other means so you have to trust all current and future public servants in countries in which you may not even have or want citizenship rights.

If you knowingly made that bargain and said, "Yes, I trust all these classes of people." Ok, fair enouhg. I imagine a number approaching 0% of facebook users, let alone whatsapp users actually thought through that bargain and knowingly agreed to it.

But yeah, you're mom might not see who you talk to on whatsapp via her facebook account. So there's that.

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