Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data • Hacker News Board

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#361

Post by dahfizz » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 1:49 AM UTC

samatman wrote: post #351

falcolas wrote: post #109

This statement - "None of these requests appear to be used for customer features like last read location." - bugs me, because it's fairly obviously false, and detracts from the real concerns. To sync a "last read page" across devices, you need to send a location back to Amazon. It's also appropriate to tie a location to a device, so you can pick the appropriate device to sync your position from. And, when you highlig…

In isolation, "last read page" could surely be E2E encrypted. Amazon would know that I'm using a Kindle app or device, but everything else could be opaque. There's no motive on Amazon's part to do it this way, it would be a hassle to implement, possibly not great for battery life, and I expect that users don't care much. Frankly, I don't care much, in practice. In principle, yes; everything which can be kept private,…

The pro-privacy crowd needs to choose it's battles.

The most common response about online privacy is "what does is matter if X knows Y? I've got nothing to hide".

People already don't care, and I guarantee they also don't care that Amazon knows what page they are on in the book the are reading. There are much bigger issues to focus on

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#362

Post by pseudalopex » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 1:57 AM UTC

gnusty_gnurc wrote: post #278

pseudalopex wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's strange to you people care more about their autonomy than your convenience? Telemetry can tell you what users are doing. It doesn't tell you why.

I'm saying as someone who works in software I empathize with the idea of spending lots of time implementing a feature, tearing hair out over some technical issue, etc. only to realize no one uses that feature. I'd rather people be able to opt-in, but conceptually I'm not really upset that people can see my usage patterns, etc.

I think most of us work in software. Asking for consent isn't hard.

Telemetry won't tell you nobody wants a feature you haven't implemented yet. User research might.

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#363

Post by dahfizz » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 1:58 AM UTC

gambler wrote: post #190

falcolas wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd have to figure out some kind of secure key sharing mechanism between phones, tablets, web browsers, and e-readers. Or, you can trust that a position in a book (bookmarks, notes, etc.) is not sensitive information that really needs to be encrypted. This is my - perhaps overly pragmatic - position.

>You'd have to figure out some kind of secure key sharing mechanism between phones, tablets, web browsers, and e-readers. Yeah, it's not like Amazon can afford security experts to work on this or anything. >Or, you can trust that a position in a book (bookmarks, notes, etc.) is not sensitive information that really needs to be encrypted. This is an ignorant position that has been proven wrong over, and over, and over…

Amazon could also afford to fill the Panama canal with dirt and reunite the American continents, but why would they? A dozen angry (potential) customers on HN is hardly motivation.

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#364

Post by II2II » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 3:58 AM UTC

notatoad wrote: post #330

freeone3000 wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The screen refresh rate on these devices is measured in seconds , so a few hundred millis of network latency is impossible to display.

have you actually used a kindle? it certainly doens't take seconds for the definitions to pop up. a full-page refresh might take a second, but most page turns or UI interactions are partial draws and are much faster.

I suspect that they were overstating a limitation of these devices rather than speaking from inexperience. While it has been years since I've used a Kindle, I do use Kobo devices and the delays are perceptible. While changing a page may be quite quick, user interface elements (such as a box containing a definition) seem to take longer. I suspect that they have to be more agressive when refreshing the screen before and after these user interface elements are displayed in order to make the ghosting less perceptible.

If you want to see what I mean by the ghosting of user interface elements being more perceptible, try using KOReader. The ghosting after using a menu can be quite noticable (at least on Kobo devices, which are based on the same technology).

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#365

Post by taneq » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 4:27 AM UTC

zxcb1 wrote: post #138

Despoisj wrote: post #38

As a former Kindle developer, I can say that most of what's mentioned in this article are metrics used to understand how the features are used (bookmarks, highlights, dictionnary, etc.), how much they are used, and in which country. This allows the teams to focus on features that are actively used, and sometimes lead to discontinuing features that see little to no use. Hope that helps.

A Kindle comes with Kindlings, a lesser form of the book, where you are being read by Amazon while reading; you are working for Amazon in ways you might never understand. The Kindling never leaves Amazon properties; it is not yours even though you paid almost the full price of a book. If there is rule of law in the US and EU, these will eventually become free e-books, that is, separated from Amazon; they will regain…

This is why you keep your e-books stashed on media you control, and put copies onto your Kindle when you you want to read them.

Same with any data you store on an iOS device. You never let a device you don't control have the only copy of any data important to you.

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#366

Post by taneq » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 4:35 AM UTC

gnusty_gnurc wrote: post #203

moksha256 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I came here to say the same. I'm about as tin-foil-paranoid-privacy-all-the-things as they come, but the "invasive" data mentioned in the post don't seem particularly invasive to me, and collecting that data seems perfectly appropriate for the purposes you mentioned. With all that said, I do dream of a PINE64 E Ink device (or something that's open and hackable).

Yea analytics like this are really what I find to be so important, as a developer. How much time and frustration do I potentially waste on something that no one ends up using? Things like this are very useful and it's strange to me that people aren't sympathetic to that perspective.

I think a lot of people are sympathetic to that perspective while still wanting control over their privacy.

It's the difference between someone inviting you to come into their home for a visit, and you breaking in whenever you feel like to take notes on what they're doing.

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#367

Post by taneq » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 4:37 AM UTC

piokoch wrote: post #100

belorn wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this practice ever get wide spread I would guess that the developers will limit airplane mode in someway in order to ensure that the device will call home at some point. But it is a pretty clever hack to get a hostile machine to not connect to the internet as airplane mode is (I assume) regulated behavior.

I don't think they can - if they do this, Kindle would not be allowed in airplane cabin.

You're allowed to use WiFi on planes (other than take-off and landing, currently) and Aeroplane Mode often allows WiFi and Bluetooth these days. The rules are changing pretty fast.

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#368

Post by taneq » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 4:40 AM UTC

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #21

I have quite often seen people here and on other tech forums assume that purchasing a Kindle means being locked into Amazon's ecosystem, giving up personal details, and having the risk that your books might be deleted. But you don't have to use the Kindle's internet connectivity: I have owned three generations of Kindle, and with each one I activated airplane mode the second I unboxed the device and I never turned ai…

Same, although I just have the one old Kindle that I revived with a new battery. It's never had a network connection since I factory reset it. I just dump ebooks onto it via USB. It might be recording all sorts of analytics but I don't care because it'll never be connected to the outside world.

Plus, for all the people saying basically "it's for your own good", the battery lasts much longer on aeroplane mode. For this device, for me, WiFi is an anti-feature.

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#369

Post by edanm » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 5:44 AM UTC

naikrovek wrote: post #284

benmller313 wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can we stop pretending that analytics don't explicitly benefit the user? Product Engineering organizations rely on analytics to improve user experiences.

Analytics can be done less granularly and still benefit the user. Also, surely not every data point collected is used to benefit the user. For example, Amazon doesn't need to know where I am when I request a definition or translation. If they're concerned about usage, they only need to know how many times I actually used one or both of those features per day, per week, or month. They don't need to know instantly ever…

> Analytics can be done less granularly and still benefit the user. Also, surely not every data point collected is used to benefit the user.

How? For all we know, it isn't granular - it might be aggregated at the server level to hide specific user's actions. But they'd still need to be sending in the data from the device to the server.

Re: Kindle collects a surprisingly large amount of data

#370

Post by rumanator » Wed, Aug 26, 2020, 5:44 AM UTC

neiman wrote: post #353

rumanator wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you believe syncing means? This discussion talks about whispersync reporting last page read and most recent page read events. What do you think that's supposed to do?

Syncing and analytics are not identical, sorry.

You're the only one fabricating accusations about "analysing" in a discussion about how Kindles send data with whispersync, a system widely known to be used to sync data across devices.

More importantly, the only usecase mentioned in the discussion that resembles anything like analysis is synching page reads across devices, and tracking reading progress to compensate authors who make their books available through subscription services.

Either you know stuff about "analysing" that for some reason you're keeping a secret, or you're talking nonsense about stuff you have no grasp over.