Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
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Re: Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
#2Seems like there's a (difficulty/physical file size)/(profit or effort)*(likelihood of success) score that matters in these things: a terabyte of credit card numbers (alone) would be 62.5 billion card numbers, but a terabyte of facebook chat messages/private pictures is some small fraction of data. It'd be much easier for O(20 mb) to move off the network than O(500 GB). The former can be profitably resold, while the latter requires a careful search to find high value data (e.g. pictures like the fappening, I guess?) and no foolproof profit mechanism. And the sheer size brings other problems like how to store it and how to exfiltrate it and deal with it without being noticed. And of course, if you ARE good at all of the above, why not give in to a chill life in SF instead of a "life of crime" and all the volatility/violence/cloak-and-dagger that goes with it?
Not saying a Facebook/Google data breach isn't terrifying -- it certainly is, and the privacy implications are indeed upsetting -- but the profitability path is just not as clear.
The "Russian propagandists" angle from the article is interesting, but seems a bit separate from the "FB has a shitload of data on people" problem. It's basically using the ad/social aspects of the service as designed: changing people's perspectives on something you want them to feel differently about. (Albeit aimed at a different target!) Not sure how to solve that problem.
Re: Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
#3No, both are bad and we should not forget none of them.
Re: Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
#4I think that the US gov has not yet realized the full potential danger of data exposure. The best thing is to plan for these disaster scenarios like you would pandemics, wars, and natural disasters. There should be strong regulations, a set of protocols, a way to mitigate these situations.
Understandably, the government is way behind on this issue, still seeing the digital information (especially on social media) as secondary or less important.
I think its the type of thing with banks that slowly evolved, where security got higher and higher, FDIC was established, bank vaults improved, alarming improved, money tracing was implemented. We aren't there yet for cyber crimes.
Re: Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
#5Seems like there's a (difficulty/physical file size)/(profit or effort)*(likelihood of success) score that matters in these things: a terabyte of credit card numbers (alone) would be 62.5 billion card numbers, but a terabyte of facebook chat messages/private pictures is some small fraction of data. It'd be much easier for O(20 mb) to move off the network than O(500 GB). The former can be profitably resold, while the…
What's the value of a credit card number? It can quickly be changed and you would be hard pressed to exploit a billion of them at the same time.
What's the value of a psychological profile built from FB data? People say Trump won the election because Cambridge Analytica built a psychological profile of most Americans and targeted them with customized propaganda. Probably an exaggeration, but it's early days. This will only get better. Can you make your psychological profile invalid the same way you can change your credit card number?
Re: Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
#6Yes they have immense amounts of personal data and that is worrying. It is worrying they share this data with government agencies, marketing agencies etc.
BUT, unlike Equifax they haven't been completely compromised by hackers. Equifax is unique it's level of incompetence. I'm surprised the equity is holding up as well as it is. The company is grossly negligent.
Re: Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
#7Yes they have immense amounts of personal data and that is worrying. It is worrying they share this data with government agencies, marketing agencies etc. BUT, unlike Equifax they haven't been completely compromised by hackers. Equifax is unique it's level of incompetence. I'm surprised the equity is holding up as well as it is. The company is grossly negligent.
30 mil US accounts on FB were scraped using Mechanical Turk in an ingenious way. No hacking was required.
I don't think that for many it matters if their data was obtained through hacking or through legal means.
https://theintercept.com/2017/03/30/facebook-failed-to-prote...
Re: Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
#8I'm not particularly worried, Google and Facebook have two of the best security teams in the world and spend an amazing amount of money to protect customer data.
The amount of convenience I get from Facebook and Google outweigh the risk I'm exposed to in my opinion.
If Governments want to create data protection regulations I'll save my opinion until I see whatever regulation is proposed but I think it'll be difficult to create data protection regulation that is effective at protecting people without imposing a large expensive burden on companies.
Re: Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
#9Seems like there's a (difficulty/physical file size)/(profit or effort)*(likelihood of success) score that matters in these things: a terabyte of credit card numbers (alone) would be 62.5 billion card numbers, but a terabyte of facebook chat messages/private pictures is some small fraction of data. It'd be much easier for O(20 mb) to move off the network than O(500 GB). The former can be profitably resold, while the…
What's the value of a credit card number? It can quickly be changed and you would be hard pressed to exploit a billion of them at the same time. What's the value of a psychological profile built from FB data? People say Trump won the election because Cambridge Analytica built a psychological profile of most Americans and targeted them with customized propaganda. Probably an exaggeration, but it's early days. This wil…
> you would be hard pressed to exploit a billion of them at the same time.
Really? A billion automated orders for something, followed by the banking system having a metaphorical heart attack and either cancelling lots of/all cards (breaking normal usage until the card printers can catch up), or few/no cards (and risking further, directly exploitable, fraud)?
Sounds like a potent way to successful fight a nation-state from a coffee shop.
Re: Forget Equifax. Facebook and Google Have the Data That Should Worry You
#10I'm not particularly worried, Google and Facebook have two of the best security teams in the world and spend an amazing amount of money to protect customer data. The amount of convenience I get from Facebook and Google outweigh the risk I'm exposed to in my opinion. If Governments want to create data protection regulations I'll save my opinion until I see whatever regulation is proposed but I think it'll be difficult…
You're a little foolish to believe that some sensitive data within Google/Facebook/XYZ does not get shared outside with FVEY countries and intelligence agencies.