Seems as though crash reporting is now deemed harmful. Strange take by the community.
You don't need a reverse shell to do crash reporting.
Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
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Re: Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
#42Seems as though crash reporting is now deemed harmful. Strange take by the community.
Why does crash reporting need my IP address?
One possible reason would be to "group" reports: if 95% (or even 100%) of a certain error come from a single computer then there's either a very obscure bug or something wrong with that computer. If all reports come from different computers then it's a much more serious issue.
IP addresses aren't really super-reliable for this (corporate networks, ISP NAT), but many people still are under the misapprehension that they are, and it's probably reliable enough for this purpose.
I don't know if that's the reason; but it could be.
Re: Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
#43Is it like, Audacity is widely used by whistleblowers, so by tracking down its users, authorities could prevent human rights violation from being uncovered? What else are these features useful in context of “law enforcement”?
I guess it could be used to cut and crop recordings to sound like a legit thing? Reaching here ...
Re: Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
#44While there is room for arguments whether these changes to Audacity actually constitutes spying, I believe it's rather their vague wording (and potential reach) that worries people. Rightfully so, I would say. More often than not, developments like these don't end up well. Also the relative little info there is known about this new owner (or backers) appears worrisome.
Anyone knows if there is more known about this new owner, their history and or financial backers?
When this news initially broke, I remember there was a lot of mystery (with some few red flags) surrounding this new owner. I got an uncomfortable feeling that this could even be a front or proxy for a commercial entity that sees Audacity as competition. Not sure how much was payed, but this could be a relatively cheap way of knocking out an open source alternative. On the other hand, abusing an existing install base for any kind of intelligence harvesting also is a popular business model these days (actually criminal in many countries, but sadly hardly ever enforced as such).
Either way, after reading several pages of back and forth on this issue a while ago, I'm convinced that these new owners either don't quite get what they bought (or what it means) or that they do but simply can't really care (and therefore can't be trusted).
Until there's a fork, I'm not toughing this with a ten feet pole.
Re: Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
#45Which version is the last one we're 100% sure isn't doing this?
Re: Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
Who would aquire a piece of pretty niche software to use strategically as a spying platform? Is the information that can be gained really worth that much?
Why would anyone acquire it except to turn it into malware? I can't recall a project that wasn't built for commercial success from the start being bought for any other reason. I guess sourceforge stopping malware bundling could count.
I don’t doubt that’s what’s happening but I’m curious if/how it can be a good business decision
Re: Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
#47Seems as though crash reporting is now deemed harmful. Strange take by the community.
Crash reporting is an obvious vector for leaking of private and personal information.
Re: Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
What the GP was saying was that there was no essential technical reason for Firefox to send telemetry data to Mozilla (unless you're connecting to Mozilla). And yet, Firefox does this: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/telemetry-clientid
Yes, and I agreed with that in my comment. My point is that the software already hands out some data by its core function, so users are generally accepting of losing a little more data as long as it seems reasonable. It's the psychology of "well, it's already sharing some data. what's the harm in a little more?" There will always be people that want minimal data sharing, and I'm one of them, but the vocal minority ar…
> "The majority of users don't actually care" …
They don't care until it directly affects them personally somehow, and then suddenly they instantly forget that it happened because they allowed it to happen, and they make a huge noise about it as if it's the first time they heard about it.
Re: Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
#49Which version is the last one we're 100% sure isn't doing this?
So far as I know it's 2.4
Re: Audacity 3.0 called spyware over data collection changes by new owner
#50Fork incoming.
Shouldn’t DARPA or the National Security Agency fund 3-4 developers full-time to fork it and start improvements that will be so sexy that the russian version fades away? If they are so concerned about national security… that seens like a low hanging fruit.
DARPA funding open source projects seems like a pretty decent idea to avoid them being influenced by foreign interests. They already provide a lot of funding to Tor so it's not completely out of the realm of possibility.