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Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

reuters.com

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Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#391

Post by [deleted] »

devin wrote: post #381
m12k wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the notion of trusting any company over a certain size is crazy - I wish people would stop anthropomorphizing companies that way. Basically, I can trust specific people if I feel that I know their character, and by proxy I might trust a company that these people have significant control over. Once a company reaches a certain size, any power that individual employees wield will have been diluted to microscopic…

What??? I cannot make any sense out of your comment. No disrespect, but you're jumping around a lot and I do not follow. ETA: Allow me to explain for the downvoters: The size of the company is irrelevant. There are plenty of large companies that have honest leadership. I can trust a fraction of the size of the company, because I trust those people to not work for horrible companies. Trusting a human being and trustin…

[deleted]

Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#392

Post by a1369209993 »

hogFeast wrote: post #234
andrepd wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Palantir is involved Holy shit, and I didn't think that this whole contact tracing bullshit could look even worse.

Contact tracing isn't bullshit. It is how they dealt with sexually transmitted diseases four decades ago...it works. The issue is that the UK govt is composed of a combination of incompetent and corrupt people (one of the companies involved in this is owned by a minister). And they are trying to go with the low-cost option (whilst the govt is subsidising 1/4 of salaries paid in the whole country) rather than the old-…

> It is how they dealt with sexually transmitted diseases four decades ago

That's not untrue, but that's clearly not contact tracing, much less was-in-the-same-room tracing.

Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#393

Post by cl3m »

adatavizguy wrote: post #327
azinman2 wrote: post #239

I have to say, working at Apple and knowing all the hard work that goes into this and making sure your data stays private while also being able to combat this disease, it's very frustrating to read a lot of the comments here. I can understand why the public is skeptical, but I feel like as a society we've swung so far away from institutional trust that now nothing good can actually emerge. The anti-vax movement is a…

We are culturally obsessed with "Luke, trust your feelings." There is something extremely wrong and dangerous with Star Wars and that idea to put away reason and just trust our feelings. Joseph Campbell what did you do?

Maybe not everything can be explained with reason, the unconscious mind can play its part.

Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#394

Post by eitland »

the_gipsy wrote: post #378
tastroder wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google and Apple are the ones pushing for isolating where this data lives and how it can be used/abused here. They are doing this in an effort to curb far more dangerous data collection on the very same devices in architectures that infer location or send off all data that is gathered on central servers. Your comment boils down to "Gapple is evil because Snowden" and seems to be disconnected from the specific issue a…

> They are doing this in an effort to curb far more dangerous data collection Don't be naïve. This is not an NGO or an institution. They are doing this so that they and noone else owns the data.

Or maybe so that ordinary people will continue to to trust them and people like me will start trusting them.

They have a long way to go in my case but every journey starts with a single step, and this seems like the twelfth or so step from Googles side towards becoming trustworthy (but they still have a long way to go!)

I think one shouldn't underestimate the business value of actually being a trustworthy vendor/business partner/SaaS company and while there are a few contenders that niche isn't too crowded for now :-)

Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#395

Post by [deleted] »

azinman2 wrote: post #239

I have to say, working at Apple and knowing all the hard work that goes into this and making sure your data stays private while also being able to combat this disease, it's very frustrating to read a lot of the comments here. I can understand why the public is skeptical, but I feel like as a society we've swung so far away from institutional trust that now nothing good can actually emerge. The anti-vax movement is a…

[deleted]

Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#396

Post by randomchars »

killjoywashere wrote: post #360
azinman2 wrote: post #239

I have to say, working at Apple and knowing all the hard work that goes into this and making sure your data stays private while also being able to combat this disease, it's very frustrating to read a lot of the comments here. I can understand why the public is skeptical, but I feel like as a society we've swung so far away from institutional trust that now nothing good can actually emerge. The anti-vax movement is a…

As a lifelong public servant, welcome to the ungrateful side of life. If you're providing a service to the public with the hopes of their gratitude, you will be sad. Do it for the same reason you change your baby's diaper: you love them and it needs doing. They might take pleasure in pissing on you while you're doing it, but this thing you love will be better off afterward.

It's nice to have some people like you, but a significant amount of public servants I encountered visibly took pressure in making the life of other's miserable, and the processes as convoluted as possible.

Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#397

Post by riffraff »

chopin wrote: post #387
riffraff wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But in this case the mechanics at play are the same: people can read the documentation and arrive at the idea that this protocol is actually good and much better than some alternatives. Instead, they form an opinion based on generic distrust for apple and Google, just like no-vax people do it out of generic mistrust for institutions and big pharma.

While the protocol may be good, the app implementing it may be not. Google and Apple have gone to great length that you cannot control what's running on your device. The next update can be nefarious and you can do only little about it. Just have a look at the Australian assistance laws. The distrust is well earned.

but the next OS update can do whatever it wants too, how is this a change? We will always need independent verification and observation of the platform behaviour from the outside.

The distrust _is_ justified, and we should be wary. What is not justified is dismissing the CTF based only on that, imo.

Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#398

Post by thelittleone »

nindalf wrote: post #344
coliveira wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having Google/Apple develop a tracking technology is the same as the US government having it. If you don't believe, read again what Snowden revealed several years ago.

I read Snowden's biography - Permanent Record . Your claims are untrue. The sibling comment has it right - the US govt could steal data from the tech giants but they gradually got better at plugging such leaks. For example, in response to the Snowden revelations, all data in transit between datacenters is now encrypted. On the other hand, the govt would also request the data of a few people, which was generally grant…

Do you recall the news that NSA (US Intel Agency) paid RSA (US security vendor) $10m go backdoor encryptions libraries?

If this was exposed once it’s happening elsewhere.

There was also the case of the NIST elliptic curve encryption best practices being subverted for NSA backdoors standard.

They’ve got a job to do. They’re doing it. But worth noting that a vendor could claim be pro privacy while also cooperating with their government.

Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#399

Post by rexarex »

uluyol wrote: post #336
coliveira wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having Google/Apple develop a tracking technology is the same as the US government having it. If you don't believe, read again what Snowden revealed several years ago.

What? I don't think this is accurate. From what I recall, the US was/is spying on the major tech companies and would regularly demand data and place gag orders on those companies. Neither actions are willful forms of data transfer. The first is actually an eternal game of cat and mouse. NSA finds a leak for some data, Google fixes it, new leak, etc. The second is targeted handover of data, and only affects a few indi…

Exactly why they aren’t collecting GPS data and the system is built using anonymous Bluetooth keys, similar to the find my iPhone anonymous network. Can’t hand over what you don’t have.

Re: Apple, Google ban location tracking in apps using their contact-tracing system

#400

Post by fsflover »

tastroder wrote: post #382
probably_wrong wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A PDF document with a specification is not even close to "open source code". There is no way to know whether the specification actually matches the implementation.

> There is no way to know whether the specification actually matches the implementation. That would be true even if Apple suddenly decided "oh these folks on HN want to see the code for that tracing component, better open source our complete OS". I've seen assurances that parts of this will be open sourced as far as they can but I honestly don't see how that matters. You have, as is a general tradition, a description…

> but I honestly don't see how that matters

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

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