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App suddenly crashing on startup due to FBSDKRestrictiveDataFilterManager.m

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Re: App suddenly crashing on startup due to FBSDKRestrictiveDataFilterManager.m

#361

Post by ceejayoz »

notacoward wrote: post #168
lathiat wrote: post #3

That’s twice in as many months. They may need some better QA here although to be fair it does seem mostly people with an older SDK version based on the comments. But still. I guess they need to cotton onto whatever server side change happened and roll it back. At least this time you can disable the SDK (at least one app developer has a kill switch for the SDK) unlike the last issue that happened during code initialis…

> They may need some better QA There's no such thing as QA at Facebook. Really. Developers are supposedly responsible for all testing of their own code, but all of the pressure is to "move fast" so that goes about as well as you'd expect.

I’ve had the same basic bug crop up 3x in the last two years while using the API - posts to Groups with dollar amounts just… fail. “An unknown error occurred.”

The first two times it took months to fix. It’s happening again currently, too.

Clear there are GAPING holes in their test suites.

Re: App suddenly crashing on startup due to FBSDKRestrictiveDataFilterManager.m

#362

Post by DoofusOfDeath »

doersino wrote: post #245
heavenlyblue wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can still download the history as a text file though - I did that.

Not in Germany: https://faq.whatsapp.com/android/chats/how-to-save-your-chat... Don't ask me what's leading WhatsApp's legal department to believe that this feature doesn't comply with German privacy laws. It's quite puzzling. (I would've rather expected a feature like this to be mandated by EU laws.) As of now, there's no non-hacky way of exporting chats for German users. (Hacky ways include: dubious third-party sof…

Can you obtain that same information via a GPDR request for all of the information they have about you?

Re: App suddenly crashing on startup due to FBSDKRestrictiveDataFilterManager.m

#363

Post by [deleted] »

beagle3 wrote: post #64

Waze, a google owned app for the past 4 years, crashes because of the FB app. WhatsApp, a Facebook owned app, will not give you read access to your own chat database - it’s encrypted. But they have an arrangement with Google where it’s will back up unencrypted to your Google account (though, Google won’t let you retrieve it ... only the WhatsApp app can) Everything about this duopoly, their cooperation and lack of co…

[deleted]

Re: App suddenly crashing on startup due to FBSDKRestrictiveDataFilterManager.m

#365

Post by IAmEveryone »

sfifs wrote: post #179
beagle3 wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm pretty sure that's the same agreement that every developer has with Google just by writing an android app and using Google APIs. But why would WhatsApp store it unencrypted on Google Drive, and encrypted (without giving you any access to the key) on your own SD card or local backup? It makes no sense. Except ... Google and Facebook have agreed that WhatsApp stores the database unencrypted, and in return Google…

The unencrypted backup system is almost certainly implemented mainly to give government authorities easy access to chat history when presented with a warrant whenever possible. Since this is offered as a helpful feature, very few think twice about the part in asterisk. This way they can comply with warrants without backdooring their app while continuing to sticker label "end to end encryption" and giving people comfo…

That doesn't make much sense. There is no such legal requirement (hence the discussion). The Google backup option isn't universally used. And WhatsApp controls the key generation and management and could easily integrate any other sort of more robust backdoor. Such as their previous system, as described somewhere in this subthread, of storing the key on the server to allow recovery.

Re: App suddenly crashing on startup due to FBSDKRestrictiveDataFilterManager.m

#366

Post by tdrp »

zedpm wrote: post #336
swagonomixxx wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ban it from where? Using their API?

Yes, Facebook requires that any mobile app using Facebook login do so via their SDK. Presumably they will disable your Facebook app (breaking login) if you don’t comply.

They told us that explicitly. We had been using the URL-based login on the app (i.e. open a browser with the URL and use the redirect to continue logging in), for almost two years. Then about a year ago, they e-mailed us just before a holiday and told us we had less than a week to move all of our apps to SDK otherwise they'd just disable us. Their argument was that "it's not providing the best possible experience to our users". There hadn't been a single complaint about it though.

We had nearly 100,000 users logged into our app via Facebook login so we were basically strongarmed into complying. We somehow pulled it off before the deadline for both Android and iOS but felt really dirty afterwards.

Re: App suddenly crashing on startup due to FBSDKRestrictiveDataFilterManager.m

#367

Post by slipheen »

saagarjha wrote: post #308
Nextgrid wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't include libraries which contain such code?

No abort here, the crash is coming from the runtime, which you’re not opting out of if you want your app to work.

Then we can agree the FB sdk should have been better written to avoid this, right?

Re: App suddenly crashing on startup due to FBSDKRestrictiveDataFilterManager.m

#368

Post by tdrp »

mattgreenrocks wrote: post #286
blantonl wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of the very brightest software engineers in the world work at Facebook. As much as I would love to rip on Facebook, I also understand that integrated software development is hard, and I guarantee you that Facebook is "doing it better" than most. Don't sit in an ivory tower and throw stones in glass houses. Can you guarantee that your own SDLC house is in order? Because it might be, right up until a sneaky edge c…

Let's avoid lionizing/denigrating here. They're using static initialization and it bit them in the ass again . They should stop using it because it is prone to things like this which result in apps not launching at all. I'd like to see them commit to stop using this method to initialize themselves, and take responsibility for the crashes. Then, IMO, we'd be good. In a scenario like this, I'd hope they'd want to make…

It was horrifying to see how many config changes you have to do to basically beg facebook not to send back data to their server. Most of these were hidden in various corners of the documentation and I still suspect there's crap being sent back without permission. I would love nothing more than to disable the SDK entirely but we have a few hundred thousand users logged into our app via Facebook.

Here is our Android config in case anyone's interested:

Re: App suddenly crashing on startup due to FBSDKRestrictiveDataFilterManager.m

#369

Post by hexaz »

doersino wrote: post #245
heavenlyblue wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can still download the history as a text file though - I did that.

Not in Germany: https://faq.whatsapp.com/android/chats/how-to-save-your-chat... Don't ask me what's leading WhatsApp's legal department to believe that this feature doesn't comply with German privacy laws. It's quite puzzling. (I would've rather expected a feature like this to be mandated by EU laws.) As of now, there's no non-hacky way of exporting chats for German users. (Hacky ways include: dubious third-party sof…

Most probably not privacy related, but the result of Blackberry suing Facebook over some patent stuff in Germany. (German source: https://t3n.de/news/whatsapp-kein-chat-export-mehr-1238327/)
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