411–420 of 422 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is a way to delete your data from Google or ms. Not Apple. BTW, there is no way to delete apple Id. Seriously try doing it. You cannot.
This must be one of those "alternative facts" I keep hearing about. I literally just now created, and then deleted, an Apple Id. It's trivial. Why do you think it isn't?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Only if you're not bothered by the fact that you'll be giving up on the vast majority of apps that most people use.
Like what? You can have a FLOSS Browser (Firefox) and eMail (K9), that takes care of almost all use cases for smartphone usage.
It's fine that your use cases are extremely limited, but not everyone is you.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If Apple claims to care about protecting privacy, the onus is on them to prove that they actually do, e.g. by publishing the source code to show everyone that it doesn't collect anything. Otherwise, the assumption is that they do.
While I appreciate the sentiment that we should be distrustful of every large company that has our data, including apple, I take issue with the assertion that unless that publish their source code, they are selling our data. Logically, apple has no reason to be selling our data in even close to the same way that google does. These arguments have been thoroughly outlined in the threads above. Furthermore, showing us t…
Companies exist (only) to make money. The only reason Apple has to not sell users' data is because they think the reputational and other costs are more than the profit from selling it.
If at some point in the future, the expected costs and profits change to make it profitable, they will do it without a second thought.
If the code is closed source, the users are less likely to be able to tell whether their data is being sold. This reduces the expected costs of selling the data (in PR expenses, customers who take their business elsewhere on principle and so on).
If the code is open source, it's more likely to be more costly to sell users' data, so it's more likely that it won't be worth it even in the future.
It's amazing to me how many comments here excuse Google's behavior by offering the impractical "solution" of just not using a smartphone (a false dilemma) when the obvious answer is to get an iPhone. That's the advice of pretty much everyone in the infosec field and I'm sure some of them will attest to that in this thread.
Apple provides a black box with iOS, they have full control. Maybe the next iOS update comes with privacy intrusion because it's more lucrative. A more sensible way of dealing wirh the issue would be to use an open source Android version like AOSP or LineageOS, not run proprietary gapps, and replace its functionality with F-Droid, MicroG and Yalp-store. Your location will stay out of Apple's/Google's hands and you ca…
If only HW and chip manufacturers released Linux sources (or ideally had support in the mainline Linux branch) soon with proper drivers (ideally open)...
Manyfacurers keep releasing lots of closed junk smartphones every year :/ but as long as people will continue buying it, nothing will change.
It's amazing to me how many comments here excuse Google's behavior by offering the impractical "solution" of just not using a smartphone (a false dilemma) when the obvious answer is to get an iPhone. That's the advice of pretty much everyone in the infosec field and I'm sure some of them will attest to that in this thread.
The only way to regain control over SW and to prevent spying and data leakage is by using free software, where you can read and modify the source code, build the firmware yourself. Because as long as there is source released and some company decides to add a tracking functionality, people will notice and make a fork without it.
This is how it works on GNU/Linux for a decade and I am happy I can use it. Now I only wish people stopped buying these smartphones with proprietary blobs tracking them and demanded free software.
Most people are easy (I don't want to say stupid) and don't see the problem unfortunatelly. :(
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's smoke and mirrors. What guarantees you that Apple isn't collecting your location right now ? It's proprietary software, so you wouldn't know, and it's perfectly within the terms of their EULA. You're just gonna trust that they don't (even though they are a business and that can potentially make them more money)? Or are you gonna know your phone isn't spying in you by installing free software on your device?
OpenSSL proved to me that being open source doesn’t mean anyone actually checks what it’s doing. It could be checked, but it would be trivial to sneak in things.
If you paid someone (even multiple people/companies) to do professional audit over OpenSSL, it would be prevented.
Now, with closed software you are lost and the only thing you have is a TRUST the SW developer. Because inspecting blbs is much more difficult. And I don't trust them.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chrome does not allow you even to turn off auto-updates. Why? Because then they can't use their new tracking and advertising techniques on you.
Or rather, because people can't be trusted to update their browsers and turn their machines into a danger to themselves and others. No need for assuming malice.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's pretty ridiculous, we're talking about credit card purchases here, which can be trivially charged back, not bitcoin private keys... if you've worked with sensitive info on a Windows box though, that's probably a much worse off environment.
The comment above didn't mention what type of card they are using nor in what country they live. Regarding Windows, in the times of Windows XP there were no "telemetry". Using a smartphone for banking is really dangerous because banks often use a phone as a second factor and compromising the phone gives full access to your bank account. And many phones do not get security updates.
Even with a regular bank account in most of the world at least, it's tightly regulated and you're only liable for a small portion of the loss - on a credit card, generally nothing at all.
Even without OS security updates, generally browsers and other internet connected software gets security updates regularly, I'd trust a new user on Android far more than Windows because clicking an ad would not have a risk of getting them infected system wide without jumping through some serious hoops and involving a few exploits. On Windows that's one Run button press away.
It's amazing to me how many comments here excuse Google's behavior by offering the impractical "solution" of just not using a smartphone (a false dilemma) when the obvious answer is to get an iPhone. That's the advice of pretty much everyone in the infosec field and I'm sure some of them will attest to that in this thread.
Apple provides a black box with iOS, they have full control. Maybe the next iOS update comes with privacy intrusion because it's more lucrative. A more sensible way of dealing wirh the issue would be to use an open source Android version like AOSP or LineageOS, not run proprietary gapps, and replace its functionality with F-Droid, MicroG and Yalp-store. Your location will stay out of Apple's/Google's hands and you ca…
And this would be swiftly called out by someone soon after release, putting a very ugly stain on Apple's reputation. There is absolutely no advantage they would gain from this which could outweigh the PR nightmare.