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Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'
- speps 10y agoThe irony: "This website (villagevoice.com) wants to know your location"...
- smacktoward 10y agoIt would only be comparable if they didn't bother asking.
- curiouscats 10y agoI don't think this has anything to do with the website asking instead of just collecting. The "wants to know" is based on browser settings to not just share your location without approval.
- mavrc 10y ago...uses Google Analytics, and has a variety of social networking and ad trackers...
- spdustin 10y agoThis sounds eerily like the plot of Watch Dogs https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watch_Dogs https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watch_Dogs
- ocdtrekkie 10y agoGoogle has repetitively made their interest in running cities public, Larry Page talks about it often. While this article is primarily focused on the Wi-Fi efforts in New York City, Google has been working with other cities to replace management of public transit and parking enforcement.
- jessaustin 10y agoThen they've chosen city services that definitely could stand for some drastic improvement.
- jswny 10y agoI really do hope that by now, everyone knows not to do anything they wouldn't want the public to know about on public WiFi, especially these systems. Using a VPN when you are on public WiFi such as this helps solve a lot of the privacy problems that you face using said service.
- fluxquanta 10y ago>I really do hope that by now, everyone knows not to do anything they wouldn't want the public to know about on public WiFi What's your definition of "everyone"? Those of us in the tech bubble? Sure. Your everyday smartphone user? The internet's just the internet to them, and where it comes from is not a concern.
- walterbell 10y agoAlphabet's NYC kiosks also have two cameras which are recording passers-by, https://cryptome.org/2016/06/linknyc-spy-kiosks-installation-videos.htm https://cryptome.org/2016/06/linknyc-spy-kiosks-installation... A dystopian "smart city" vision can be seen in the "Hyper Reality" video, http://hyper-reality.co http://hyper-reality.co that is inspired by Magic Leap's AR, in which Google is an investor.
- ucaetano 10y agoOr the Syndicate Wars intro sequence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGvIrf86g4Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGvIrf86g4Y
- sevensor 10y agoOr the Self-Aware Colony Secret Project video from SMAC.
- advertising 10y agoGod I love that game
- ChuckMcM 10y agoWith persistent facial recognition it gives Google a very marketable database. The key being that they can store all faces and only need to go back and search them when a customer wants to know all the dates and locations where they have seen that face.
- smoyer 10y agoIf the displayed advertisements are based on who's passing the kiosk, some very uncomfortable situations could be created - let's say a high-profile clergyman walks by and an Ashley-Madison advertisement is shown.
- chockZ 10y agoThe ads are all anonymous and based on an aggregate on who is around the unit. It will never be a "Minority Report" type experience, more of a "55% of the users around this location are males, therefore a Draft Kings ad will play". One-to-many, not one-to-one.
- ucaetano 10y agoI counted 21 cases of mostly targeted ads in that single article.
- jolux 10y agoAnd what makes you think the author of that article has any control over the business model of the publication they're writing for? Are we not allowed to criticize ad tech online in ad supported venues? Because all of the most popular venues are ad supported. If you want a voice, you have to make compromises.
- ucaetano 10y ago"If you want a voice, you have to make compromises." "If you want free wifi, you have to make compromises."
- jolux 10y agoYes and who wanted free WiFi exactly? Bill DeBlasio?
- ucaetano 10y agoApparently everyone who's using it.
- jolux 10y agoYes and if you gave everyone a free sandwich they'd probably eat it too, but if you do that you can't then say "but you asked for a free sandwich" when you reveal that you actually captured everyone's personal details for advertising purposes.
- ucaetano 10y agoMost people would give up their personal details for a free sandwich.
- heheocoenev 10y agoI was walking down 3rd ave at 2am a week ago. I saw a homeless man with headphones listening to music on YouTube on a link. He had a little chair and was rocking out. It was beautiful. We might give up a lot, but maybe those with nothing to give have plenty to gain.
- dblock 10y agoI tend to agree. The preventers of making progress that waste millions of tax payer money in the name of civil liberties have many valid points, but don't offer any implementable alternatives.
- krschultz 10y agoI came here to say something similar. I've seen many people using them all hours of the day & night. People are watching music videos, charging their phone, getting directions, and surfing the internet. The people using them are often those that don't have the luxury (necessity?) of walking around with a nice smart phone and a big data plan. Do they have ads on them? Of course. So do the bus shelters which are funded using a similar public/private partnership. If you are worried about the data collection, don't use them or the wifi provided by them. But you are basically saying you trust Verizon/AT&T/T-Mobile/Sprint with your data more than you trust Sidewalk Labs/Google. Is that an informed tradeoff?
- smpetrey 10y agoOn the streets and subways? Hell yeah it would be worth it. If I had to choose who gets my data I think I take Google over an A Mobile ISP like At&t or Verizon
- Vexs 10y agoThis is my little deal with the devil, I know that google has loads of my data, but I know they'll do something to keep it in house, instead of selling it off to whoever. It's more profitable for google not to sell your data because they already have the largest ad provider out there.
- paulgb 10y ago> They're telling you that they can use your IP address, which is essentially you, and all of the pages you've viewed or searched for, including how long you visited them, to serve ads. You don't bring your own IP when you use public WiFi, so this feels like a very confused argument.
- tekacs 10y agoYou do however bring (and broadcast) your MAC address, which was mentioned as permissible to collect.
- avn2109 10y agoWhich is pretty spoofable.
- tekacs 10y agoTrue, although that's hardly common and completely impossible on many embedded devices - devices which are only becoming more common.
- lorenzhs 10y agoEmbedded devices and public WiFi seem like an odd combination. Do you have any examples in mind which embedded devices you'd like to connect to something like that?
- detaro 10y agodon't iPhones do that by default? Not sure if it is common in Android-land by now, my old-ish phone required a custom ROM for that.
- __david__ 10y agoSort of [1]. It also sounds like it's just for scanning networks. If you ever actually connect it still uses your real MAC. [1] An older article about the feature that may be out of date: http://9to5mac.com/2014/09/26/more-details-on-how-ios-8s-mac-address-randomization-feature-works-and-when-it-doesnt/ http://9to5mac.com/2014/09/26/more-details-on-how-ios-8s-mac...
- Vexs 10y agoIf they're serving ads based on personal information, some people might have a little embarrassment heading their way. Jokes aside, we all knew this was coming, right? It's not like your telecom isn't serving you up to the NSA already, and with this you know you're being watched. It's just driving VPN sales.
- andrewtlove 10y agoWhile I certainly understand the paranoia here (hell, I uninstalled PokemonGO due to the invasive permissions), I see the positive here far outweighing the negative. The Internet is becoming akin to fresh air or clean water—a right for all citizens, not just those with means. I don't know the percentage, but there are a huge number of New Yorkers who can't afford Internet and are missing out on the digital world we're all engaged in on a daily basis. As a New Yorker, I heartily welcome a city blanketed in free wifi. For the 300Mbs I get off of one of those things, I'll use a VPN just like I do with all public wifi networks.
- darkstar999 10y ago> I uninstalled PokemonGO due to the invasive permissions They are fixing that. https://support.pokemongo.nianticlabs.com/hc/en-us/articles/222648408-Permissions-update https://support.pokemongo.nianticlabs.com/hc/en-us/articles/...
- BHSPitMonkey 10y agoI think that went out yesterday.
- danjc 10y agoI'd really like to hear from a domain expert whether tor or something like it could a) drastically mitigate the impact of this type of surveillance and b) how likely it is that it (tor) could become mainstream (sort of like WhatsApp made end to end encryption mainstream)?
- typeiierror 10y agoWhen you take into account the full range of tracking methods cited in the article, I think the impact of Tor would be limited. For example: you probably already have an app on your phone that has an SDK from Gimbal (beacon company in the article) or a similar firm that reads beacons and tracks your location passively. So while Tor would disguise the source of your web requests, the SDK still has free reign to send your location and your Ad ID back to the mothership.
- schoen 10y agoWe have at least five different kinds of problems with mobile device privacy here: - Apps that intentionally identify you and your location to somebody (like apps that have permission to use location services, supposedly for some user benefit, and tell the app developer that location) - Apps that intentionally reveal your presence in a physical location to other devices nearby - Apps that unintentionally identify you to a network operator or wiretapper (because of unencrypted unique identifiers like cookies) - Aggregate device profiling because of a unique combination of observable behaviors (e.g., this person has this OS version and this combination of apps) - Observability of hardware and subscriber identifiers in the RF protocols All of these are bad for privacy, but the way of fixing them is different. Tor helps a lot with the third one. To deal with the others, apart from somehow getting that software not to exist or not to be installed on people's devices, it could be sufficient to make some of the software not communicate on the network at certain times or in certain ways, like if the OS could say "maintain radio silence, except for Tor-aware apps". For the device RF identifiers, we need the ability to change those identifiers, which is kind of sort of there for wifi on some devices (except there was just a paper showing it often doesn't succeed in protecting you), and not there at all for mobile network interfaces.
- morgante 10y agoFunny, I don't see the Village Voice writing screeds about how terrible it is that NYC has a subway system or busses, even though advertising (ie. "propoganda") helps to underwrite their costs as well.
- spot 10y agoeven more funny: the village voice is ad supported.
- kbenson 10y agoAs he spoke, the screens shifted and a new message appeared: "If You See Something, Say Something. Be Suspicious of Anything Unattended." Okay, that's kind of creepy. [Google] actually went so far last year as to shit-can its own "Don't be evil" admonition to its employees in favor of "Obey the law" No, they didn't[1]. Alphabet has a slightly more formal code of conduct[2], and it's not simply "Obey the law", it's "follow the law, act honorably, and treat each other with respect." Sloppy. Reporting using another news article as a source rather than just looking it up. 1: https://abc.xyz/investor/other/google-code-of-conduct.html https://abc.xyz/investor/other/google-code-of-conduct.html 2: https://abc.xyz/investor/other/code-of-conduct.html https://abc.xyz/investor/other/code-of-conduct.html
- aub3bhat 10y ago"If You See Something, Say Something. Be Suspicious of Anything Unattended." How is it creepy? Have you ever visited New York, its announced every 15 minutes or so on subways. This might even be something that city officials explicitly required.
- throwanem 10y agoThe slogan and program are a Department of Homeland Security thing, so you see it in a lot more places than just NYC. My guess is it's a string attached to some sort of DHS funding.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 10y agoMy understanding is the slogan was originally from NYC, and they didn't want DHS to use it.
- kbenson 10y ago> Have you ever visited New York, its announced every 15 minutes or so on subways. My point is more that it's creepy in general, not specifically because of these devices (but the relation to 1984's telescreens is obvious), and that if it's prevalent in NYC (which I assumed), then I definitely don't want to live there. To me that feels like living with a sensationalist newscast about past terrorism always playing in the background, and I don't think that's a good state of mind to keep your citizens in for a decade and a half without good, and recent cause. > How is it creepy? I think there's a trade-off to be made between security and how you prime your population with fear. Having frequent messages about being suspicious of any random items in the city in general, not a specific high value target such as an airport, falls too far on one side of the spectrum for me. That it's on a large screen capable of recording video and audio, well that doesn't help[1]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telescreen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telescreen
- michaelbuddy 10y agoThe village voice talking about another company being a propaganda engine is laughable. Also VV requires logging into Facebook to leave a comment on that story too.
- feralmoan 10y agoWelcome To City 17
- op00to 10y agoI'd love to see a thoughtful article on what it took to get these kiosks installed, or what awesome tech is inside, or what the traffic looks like, or what lessons we can learn. How is tin foil hat-ism making the world better for those who are most benefiting from being able to access these kiosks?
- yk 10y agoI don't know if I should be impressed or scared. Everything google^1 does in the last few years feels like they really know what they are doing, autonomous cars, everything they do about machine learning, now they are integrating that with fiber. It feels like Microsoft, if they would have nailed the browser and activeX in 95. ^1 I will use alphabet and google interchangeably, since I am not trying to do math here. If you are looking for a mathematical theory of world domination, just ask google's famously responsive customer service.
- busterarm 10y agoThis is very hit-piece and I'm someone generally wary of Google. Titan has owned and operated all of the city's remaining phonebooths for near 20 years. And I believe the MTA bus stop and subway advertising too. This is something they've already been doing. Control Group developed those info kiosks you may have seen on subway platforms. They're good people that have got some cool tech. They even post in Who's Hiring here frequently (Hi, Ben!). If this is something that the city wants, I don't see that there's another way that they would get it. The real problem that I have with LinkNYC though, especially in midtown where I live, is that all the terminals have become 24/7 campgrounds for the city's homeless. They charge their phones and browse the web there. There is no way that I would use one of these things now.
- ComodoHacker 10y ago>They charge their phones and browse the web there. What exactly is the problem with that?
- busterarm 10y agoWith charging phones? Nothing. But the reality is that one person is sat camped out with a chair in front of the thing for the entire day. Nobody else can use it. I've seen folks get in fights over these things already. I spent part of my life homeless. I still see a major problem with how these things are being used right now. We shouldn't be encouraging people to be out on the street all day -- it doesn't solve anything.
- rmxt 10y agoWhat do you propose as an alternative? Charge them 25c for an hour of use? I find it hard to blame the homeless (as you are) for taking advantage of a free perk, when it should be the cities and companies being held accountable for returning some portion of the profit back to those whom they are profiting from. Alphabet wants the information -- do you think they would have turned down a request to say that some nominal percentage of the revenue goes back to city social service programs?
- noneya 10y agoMy new startup is building a system like this out for retailers. It has the added benefit of helping customer service personalize a shoppers experience as well as connecting digital ad spend (ads and landing page vidits) with foot traffic in both real-time and aggreated. Prototype is built and we are currently seeking investors and developers that would like to help us flesh this out. Pm me for details or questions.
- noneya 10y agoFYI. Our system can also do "minority report" based ad retargeting. Also, we have a few large retail/auto dealers ready to deploy sooner then later. We are getting there but things could be moving much quicker with a little capital for additional developers, etc.
- ISL 10y agoFor the alternate perspective: https://www.link.nyc https://www.link.nyc
- bahjoite 10y agoA ++good piece. I particularly liked this astute observation by one of the article's sources:- > "They are working hard to get you to behave true to your statistical profile," Rushkoff says, "and in doing so they reduce your spontaneity, your anomalous behavior, your human agency, as they try to get you to conform to the most marketable probable outcome. When we're doing that en masse, to an entire city - that kind of long-term manipulation is just astounding."
- bogomipz 10y ago'That LinkNYC is, ultimately, underwritten by Google should tell you a lot about why New York got so very lucky as to receive an unprecedentedly fast network of citywide public Wi-Fi — for "free."' Except that none of this is free. Google gets all of the data collected by these kiosks and the ad revenue. Why was this allowed without any public say in the matter? The very public whose data was bought will also be sold by Google. What's the ad revenue worth on these? There are ads on each sides of these kiosks. These are effectively billboards on some of the most trafficked street on the planet. Does our society really need more advertising? So did New York get lucky or did Google get lucky?
- bogomipz 10y agoThere is a really disturbing trend on HN whereby expressing anything negative about Google, gets down voted. I've actually spent a fair amount of time around these kiosks as theres one a few blocks from me. I've actually observed it its environment, as part of the urban scenery and I've interacted with it a bunch. I think my comment has merit.
- davidf18 10y ago400 mbs/200 mbs data rates in Manhattan on the Mac laptop where I've tried it. The iPhone 6s+ with the security cert. is about 185 mbs/195 mbs. Not bad for free.