Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

arxiv.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 155 posts

Re: Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

#61

Post by rrix2 »

aomobile wrote: post #45
Jeaye wrote: post #29

It's tough to diff the privacy between Android and iOS, as an OS. However, as an app ecosystem, it's not tough at all. For example, there is not a single open source email app on iOS which supports GPG email. In the iOS app ecosystem, privacy and FLOSS is an afterthought, since iOS users are more likely to pay for proprietary software. On Android, there are a lot more options, including things like F-Droid which are…

Feels safer though to pay than to get something for free.

But as this linked study points out: that's "just a feeling"...

Re: Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

#62

Post by chmsky00 »

teddyh wrote: post #60
aomobile wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feels safer though to pay than to get something for free.

I prefer free friends to those that charge me money to be my friend.

Android phones are free like speech, not free like beer.

Re: Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

#63

Post by drcongo »

jondwillis wrote: post #57
WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

O & 0 are adjacent on US keyboards because they're interchangeable.

that logic holds the same with p and o, right?

I6's 6he reason I 6end 6o use 6he numeral six ins6ead of "t" 6oo.

Re: Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

#64

Post by molsio »

zsmi wrote: post #28

I think this study is quite good but it does come with one important caveat: From page 5, "This is before the introduction of Apple's new opt-in mechanism for tracking in 2021. Our dataset therefore reflects privacy in the app ecosystem shortly before this policy change." Personally, I would prefer to see the difference between apps monetized by customers paying directly and apps monetized by advertising. I take for…

https://www.imore.com/apples-anti-tracking-iphone-feature-fu...

Re: Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

#65

Post by joconde »

croes wrote: post #55
joconde wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes definitely. There are a lot of nuances in privacy. As an example, take the approach to ML and assistants, where Google collects most of everything to train models on their servers, while Apple tries to anonymize things a bit (e.g. their “differential privacy” techniques).

Anonymize things a bit sounds like a bit dead and a bit pregnant.

That's my attempt to characterize it fairly, since I'm not a cryptographer and don't know how solid it is. Last I checked there were debates about that.

Re: Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

#66

Post by amelius »

wtallis wrote: post #41
spansoa wrote: post #21

One thing you have to consider when debating i0S versus Android in the context of privacy is: you can have the best of both worlds and own an Android phone and an i0S device (if you can afford that, and I'm aware many citizens in third world countries don't have the luxury of owning two phones). It's like the old Chrome versus Firefox debates that happen every other month now on Hackernews & Reddit. I own a Chromeboo…

> i0S Slightly OT, but: is there a reason why you're spelling that with a numeral zero?

By the way, what does "i" in "iOS" stand for?

EDIT: I looked it up, it stands for "internet". From now on we should be referring to it as "internet OS" where space is not an issue.

Re: Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

#67

Post by concinds »

I'm not going to debate the conclusion of this paper, but keep in mind if you pick Android, it's still very important to pick the brand correctly. When you open the Clock app on Xiaomi phones, the first thing you see is a privacy policy you need to accept (!). Samsung might be better on this. I saw quite a few people on other websites (not HN) who said they switched to Android after Apple's CSAM thing, but put little thought into brand choice beyond price and features, just assuming all Androids are the same.

You might say that people who really care about privacy would just get GrapheneOS, but the mainstream info available to help make these decisions is really poor as of now. Just seems like a Wild West.

Re: Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

#68

Post by teddyh »

chmsky00 wrote: post #62
teddyh wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I prefer free friends to those that charge me money to be my friend.

Android phones are free like speech, not free like beer.

We were not discussing the actual phones, nor even Android itself, but the application software running on phones.

Re: Are iPhones Better for Privacy? Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps

#70

Post by jiminymcmoogley »

chmsky00 wrote: post #62
teddyh wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I prefer free friends to those that charge me money to be my friend.

Android phones are free like speech, not free like beer.

more accurately AOSP phones, since Google Location Services is far from free as in freedom
Post reply on HN