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iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

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Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#91
post #75

I've been using the iOS 13 developer beta for a couple months, and I can confirm that within the first week, several apps from the big 4 requested permissions for things that should be absolutely unnecessary. iOS 13 has several great privacy-focused changes: - WiFi SSID is protected behind location permissions (ie, an app must request and be granted location permissions to be able to access the current SSID) - Blueto…

Great! Now, one more thing I’d like to have added: get rid of photo library access and separate this into several permissions: - write access - read access (all photos) - read access (through a special iOS picker that acts as a middle man) The longer people have their phones, the more photos they have. And with them a whole lot of meta data such as location etc. I simply don’t trust most apps these days that they rea…

> The longer people have their phones, the more photos they have. And with them a whole lot of meta data such as location etc.

Stripping location metadata before handing photos off to apps would be nice too.

Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry but by your logic everything is a eugenics programme. My train being late causing me to not meet my future partner in another timeline fits your definition of technology and policy and algorithms, but that's sure as hell not a eugenics programme. Pretty much anything that causes me to meet or not to meet somebody is also not a eugenics programme. And using Facebook does not mean you're submissive to a higher au…

No need to apologize. Given this tech is precisely intended as a tool for people to meet each other, and the service value add is the filtering of options based on data they have collected by surveillance, that would distinguish it from say, a train.

If that's the line you're drawing, then I can understand where you're coming from more, but anything opt-in still doesn't seem to qualify as eugenics.

There was dating services in meatspace long before OKC, Tinder and now FB. Much of the same data given to them was similar to what Facebook has. Do those services class as eugenics?

Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#93
post #82
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great! Now, one more thing I’d like to have added: get rid of photo library access and separate this into several permissions: - write access - read access (all photos) - read access (through a special iOS picker that acts as a middle man) The longer people have their phones, the more photos they have. And with them a whole lot of meta data such as location etc. I simply don’t trust most apps these days that they rea…

Yes, this is actually one of my biggest peeves. iOS 13 takes a good step in the right direction by creating 'only once' permissions, but I'd also like it to be 'only this photo' (or perhaps iOS already does this if an app uses the standard photo picker?)

No, full photo access is required for an app to pick photos using the standard picker (as of iOS 12 anyway). I also wish they would separate these. I think it’s a legacy thing, since the photo picker pre-dates the remote-view-controller stuff used to isolate apps from system views (first seen when they introduced the in-app “safari view controller” thing)

Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#94
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It looks like this was released either in 8.x[0] or 9.x[1] series. Unclear to me which one. That means that only up to about 1/3 of Android devices[2] have the feature. Version distribution is one of the things that seems to tip stuff like this in favor in iOS[3]. Admittedly, the distribution of Android devices on 8.x+ is higher than I even expected before looking at this. [0] https://developer.android.com/guide/topi…

Location access started being required for WiFi scans in Android 6.0 Marshmallow (2015). https://developer.android.com/about/versions/marshmallow/and... By eye, that covers nearly 75% of current devices.

Thank you. I figured I was probably missing something on that point.

Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#95

> “We’ll continue to make it easier for you to control how and when you share your location.” Technically, that's true. The choice between “yes, always” and “yes, always” is as easy as it gets, while of course also being totally misleading in arrogating that users actually do have a choice.

If the _app_ gives you the choice > between “yes, always” and “yes, always” because they deliberately left out a viable option of “yes, only when in use in the foreground” then I’d say the app developers are hostile and you should consider uninstalling the app. But this isn’t really on Apple. It’s the developers, managers, stakeholders who deserve your ire.

The quote at the start of my comment was the article quoting Facebook, not Apple. I neglected to make that unmistakable for commenters who haven't actually read the article.

Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No need to apologize. Given this tech is precisely intended as a tool for people to meet each other, and the service value add is the filtering of options based on data they have collected by surveillance, that would distinguish it from say, a train.

If that's the line you're drawing, then I can understand where you're coming from more, but anything opt-in still doesn't seem to qualify as eugenics. There was dating services in meatspace long before OKC, Tinder and now FB. Much of the same data given to them was similar to what Facebook has. Do those services class as eugenics?

A more concrete analogy would be if you donated to an egg or sperm bank, and found out later that the hospital had destroyed samples after checking the donors linkedin profiles for employment gaps.

If you would really like to turn my innocent quip into an something more inflamatory, I'd say a lack of informed consent by users about the use of their data, obtained by surveillance, used to impose opportunity costs on their reproductive prospects, structured around the commercial and political agenda of a company who makes addictive products - would be a pretty awful thing to countenance indeed.

I'm sure the lawyers and bioethicists have got it all sorted out.

Matching people based on their survieled unintentional preferences instead of their stated intentional ones seems helpful, except I'd propose that the combination of opacity and power difference ethically deprives the subjects of their intent.

They may have volunteered for the opportunity, but they have not volunteered to be chosen for. The selection bias inherent in secret data is the expression of the intent of the administrator, not the intent of the subjects.

Taking this beyond a quip wades much deeper into thorny ethical issues than is really useful on HN, but I hope this has emphasized the value of letting sleeping dogs lie.

Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#97
PSA for People here who are privacy conscious - don't forget to completely turn off Background App Refresh in iOS. For all the talk about privacy, this is my biggest gripe at the moment with iOS that this setting is hidden so well in the Settings app. So many apps send needless information when you don't even use them!

I have a pet paranoia that when apps have both Background App Refresh feature as well as Photos access - well when the phone's connected to WiFi and charging (both of which can be detected by the app) - what's to stop apps from happily uploading everything? I'd be really happy to hear from someone that this isn't actually possible tbh.

Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#98
post #81

How can facebook be in the business of Dating without a bias? If their outcome variable is time on the site, then real lifelong connections actually put that in jeopardy.

Couldn’t that argument apply to all dating sites? Tinder was doing good enough that they got bought.

Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#99
post #29

One thing I found find suspect in iOS 13 is Apple automatically enables collection of data of your usage of 3rd party apps. Any idea what this is for?

Doesn't it ask you during the setup process whether you'd like to share analytics and usage data?

There is a per app sharing option. So perhaps they added granularity to what usage data sharing to exclude sensitive applications.

Re: iOS 13’s privacy pop-ups of Facebook data grabs

#100
post #33
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just switched two months ago. Been an Android users since 3.x days. I switched mostly for privacy reasons as as well. The original idea of why I liked Android: open source / Linux based, I developed apps for it, are not as important as giving too much control and my data to Google at this point. Been pretty happy with it as a new user. At first it was hard getting used to not having a back button where I expected i…

> The interface is slick and nice, however, I'd have have to say in recent years Android mostly caught up in that regard. How would you say are the apps in this regard? Are ios apps more standardized than android's?

Definitely. I used Android for almost 5 years and I use iOS for 2 now.

iOS apps on average are definitely faster, smoother and well-made in terms of visual beauty.

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