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I realized the futility of trying to keep my data private. I used to never upload my contacts to any site, because I valued my privacy and my contacts' privacy.

I realized the futility of trying to keep my data private. I used to never upload my contacts to any site, because I valued my privacy and my contacts' privacy. Then I found things like my phone number being detected by Facebook, and I realized that it didn't matter what I did. Any one of the hundreds of people who had my phone number could upload my information without my consent, and thus nothing I did mattered. I was infuriated but now I just give up, because there's no way to control your own information. Even something as private as DNA is no longer under my own control. A sibling signed himself up for 23andme, and I realized that once he did that, I'm as good as being up there too. My entire family tree can now be identified because of that single person, which is scary as hell.

rootusrootus 8y ago
This is a good observation, but I don't think the conclusion is that you should give up. It means that successfully controlling the data through good personal hygiene is infeasible and we need to use legislative power to curb abuse. We cannot rely on private companies to just do the right thing. It is possible to maintain our privacy if we are willing to use force of law.
- dmix 8y ago
  If you think you can legislate the world away from big data and data mining through legislation you are terribly naive. At most it will punish a few surface level players like FB while the massive industry continues to flourish at every single major consumer company with a modern marketing dept. Not to mention the many billion dollar companies you've never heard of who trade in this data, all the consumer financial companies, the government itself (IRS and security agencies), etc etc. This rabbit is not going back in the hat. We need better tools which respect users, behaviour change via a new common sense, and decentralization. Not flashy legal theatrics that is out of date well before its written in law.
  - modzu 8y ago
    you think its naive to change the law but "behavior change" is a viable alternative?? the reason the op is claiming we need legislation is precisely because there is no incentive to change behavior. im not even an EU citizen and already ive benefited from GDPR
  - Joeri 8y ago
    If you think you can legislate the world away from big data and data mining through legislation you are terribly naive. At most it will punish a few surface level players If you think you can legislate the world of crime away through criminal law you are terribly naive. At most it will punish a few criminals here or there while the massive crime industry continues to flourish. Just because something bad is hard to regulate doesn’t mean you just give up. Besides, saying decentralization is the solution is even more naive, because centralized systems are more convenient and people prefer convenience to privacy.
    - binomialxenon 8y ago
      Sure, centralized services are popular, but there's nothing unrealistic about decentralized/federated ones, it's not a pipe dream like the blockchain craze. The main difference in end-user convenience is the difference between "@username" and "@username:server.net".
  - rootusrootus 8y ago
    That's like trying to solve global warming by telling everyone to be more efficient. Good luck with that.
    - dmix 8y ago
      That's not at all an adequate comparison to what I said.
- BurningFrog 8y ago
  Maybe you can rely on the government to protect you from private companies. But no one will protect you from the government(s).
  - rootusrootus 8y ago
    The gov't already has monopolies on force and law. And we can use law to limit the gov't's collection of data as well. The power to vote may not feel like much, but it's quite a lot more power than most people have over private companies.
gaius 8y ago
A sibling signed himself up for 23andme, and I realized that once he did that, I'm as good as being up there too Should it ever become legal they’ll sell that info to insurance companies in a heartbeat. That’s the real risk.
- __jks__ 8y ago
  They already sell it to Big Pharma. https://amp.businessinsider.com/dna-testing-delete-your-data-23andme-ancestry-2018-7 https://amp.businessinsider.com/dna-testing-delete-your-data...
colechristensen 8y ago
Everybody used to be in the phone book, a few people were unlisted and it seemed a bit strange but otherwise you could just look anybody up in a directory and call them. I don't really understand the motivation trying to keep one's phone number or address secret.
- drharby 8y ago
  Look beyond the face value and see the implication
- function_seven 8y ago
  It's not the digits of the phone number or the name of your street that are sensitive. It's the way they connect with all other aspects of your life. The white pages never told me who was friends with whom. Or what everybody's sexual preferences were. Or any other data except their name and phone number. One FB notices that you exist, they build a profile on you that includes much more than these two pieces of info. OP was trying to avoid being "noticed" by FB in the first place, to prevent the profile being assembled.
  - digi_owl 8y ago
    Similarly it took effort to look up random numbers in phone books. Few if any were ever printed in a way that made it easy to to from number to name, only name to number.
    - snark42 8y ago
      > Few if any were ever printed in a way that made it easy to to from number to name Law enforcement, most libraries and other phone companies always had access to public printed reverse number phone books in the late 1980-1990's.
      - digi_owl 8y ago
        Point taken, not familiar any libraries that was large enough to have such items shelved.
jorvi 8y ago
This completely depends on where you live. I'm glad the EU introduce the GDPR, and as privacy becomes more and more of a hot button issue I trust in them to keep bringing out the big guns.
- smallbigfish 8y ago
  For the time being GDPR is quite a joke. The guys that actually did planet-scale tracking never stopped and the little guys that did nothing wrong posted obnoxious notices on their sites. If I had to guess, it will take at least a decade to get things moving.
nkrisc 8y ago
Your DNA is hardly private. You leave it everywhere you go. If someone wanted it they'd only have to follow you around for a short while.
- digi_owl 8y ago
  And that kind of following around was what certain secret police forces did back in the day. And it was inefficient unless they already had a reason to spend manhours on you. Now however the computer will do it, virtually for free, and then the hoard of data can be dug through for incriminating (or socially awkward) information.
- LinuxBender 8y ago
  I hold a copyright on my DNA.
  - notyourwork 8y ago
    Which means what in context of this conversation?
    - tomcam 8y ago
      That LinuxBender has a sense of humor
  - moftz 8y ago
    No you don't, you are not the creator of it therefore have no claim to copyright. It is not an original work of authorship. You can have a patent on DNA but not on naturally occurring DNA according to the supreme court.
    - LinuxBender 8y ago
      Overruled. I will charge 42M per minute to unauthorized copies of my DNA. My shadow ninjas will sneak into their vaults and take back every single strand of my DNA.
    - 8y ago
digi_owl 8y ago
One big thing to keep in mind about Facebook et al, is that every page with a like/share/whatever button from a third party effectively allows said third party to build up a profile of who the person operating the computer is. Even if you do not have a Facebook account, Facebook likely has a shadow profile on you based on browser fingerprint etc showing up on various sites. Also, your typical adblocker is not configured to block these buttons by default.
forapurpose 8y ago
> I was infuriated but now I just give up, because there's no way to control your own information. Many feel this way (about many issues these days). Let me suggest that it's not at all hopeless: 1. Security is never about 100% protection; it's about making attacks more difficult. You can't protect your data perfectly, but you can make attacks more difficult. A simple solution for phones: Use a VOIP number and forward it to or connect to it via a pre-paid phone (without giving your name). You can't stop people from sharing your number, but you can disassociate your number with your location and other data on your phone. 2. Better yet, use Signal, Tor, etc. Use cash when you can. 3. The problem can be fixed via legal action. It's happened to a great degree in Europe. If everyone walking around saying 'it's hopeless' actually did something about it, it would change quickly. And people on HN are generally the ones who understand these issues and need to take the lead for friends, neighbors, and coworkers.

rootusrootus 8y ago

This is a good observation, but I don't think the conclusion is that you should give up. It means that successfully controlling the data through good personal hygiene is infeasible and we need to use legislative power to curb abuse. We cannot rely on private companies to just do the right thing. It is possible to maintain our privacy if we are willing to use force of law.

dmix 8y ago
If you think you can legislate the world away from big data and data mining through legislation you are terribly naive. At most it will punish a few surface level players like FB while the massive industry continues to flourish at every single major consumer company with a modern marketing dept. Not to mention the many billion dollar companies you've never heard of who trade in this data, all the consumer financial companies, the government itself (IRS and security agencies), etc etc. This rabbit is not going back in the hat. We need better tools which respect users, behaviour change via a new common sense, and decentralization. Not flashy legal theatrics that is out of date well before its written in law.
- modzu 8y ago
  you think its naive to change the law but "behavior change" is a viable alternative?? the reason the op is claiming we need legislation is precisely because there is no incentive to change behavior. im not even an EU citizen and already ive benefited from GDPR
- Joeri 8y ago
  If you think you can legislate the world away from big data and data mining through legislation you are terribly naive. At most it will punish a few surface level players If you think you can legislate the world of crime away through criminal law you are terribly naive. At most it will punish a few criminals here or there while the massive crime industry continues to flourish. Just because something bad is hard to regulate doesn’t mean you just give up. Besides, saying decentralization is the solution is even more naive, because centralized systems are more convenient and people prefer convenience to privacy.
  - binomialxenon 8y ago
    Sure, centralized services are popular, but there's nothing unrealistic about decentralized/federated ones, it's not a pipe dream like the blockchain craze. The main difference in end-user convenience is the difference between "@username" and "@username:server.net".
- rootusrootus 8y ago
  That's like trying to solve global warming by telling everyone to be more efficient. Good luck with that.
  - dmix 8y ago
    That's not at all an adequate comparison to what I said.
BurningFrog 8y ago
Maybe you can rely on the government to protect you from private companies. But no one will protect you from the government(s).
- rootusrootus 8y ago
  The gov't already has monopolies on force and law. And we can use law to limit the gov't's collection of data as well. The power to vote may not feel like much, but it's quite a lot more power than most people have over private companies.

gaius 8y ago

A sibling signed himself up for 23andme, and I realized that once he did that, I'm as good as being up there too Should it ever become legal they’ll sell that info to insurance companies in a heartbeat. That’s the real risk.

__jks__ 8y ago
They already sell it to Big Pharma. https://amp.businessinsider.com/dna-testing-delete-your-data-23andme-ancestry-2018-7 https://amp.businessinsider.com/dna-testing-delete-your-data...

colechristensen 8y ago

Everybody used to be in the phone book, a few people were unlisted and it seemed a bit strange but otherwise you could just look anybody up in a directory and call them. I don't really understand the motivation trying to keep one's phone number or address secret.

drharby 8y ago
Look beyond the face value and see the implication
function_seven 8y ago
It's not the digits of the phone number or the name of your street that are sensitive. It's the way they connect with all other aspects of your life. The white pages never told me who was friends with whom. Or what everybody's sexual preferences were. Or any other data except their name and phone number. One FB notices that you exist, they build a profile on you that includes much more than these two pieces of info. OP was trying to avoid being "noticed" by FB in the first place, to prevent the profile being assembled.
- digi_owl 8y ago
  Similarly it took effort to look up random numbers in phone books. Few if any were ever printed in a way that made it easy to to from number to name, only name to number.
  - snark42 8y ago
    > Few if any were ever printed in a way that made it easy to to from number to name Law enforcement, most libraries and other phone companies always had access to public printed reverse number phone books in the late 1980-1990's.
    - digi_owl 8y ago
      Point taken, not familiar any libraries that was large enough to have such items shelved.

jorvi 8y ago

This completely depends on where you live. I'm glad the EU introduce the GDPR, and as privacy becomes more and more of a hot button issue I trust in them to keep bringing out the big guns.

smallbigfish 8y ago
For the time being GDPR is quite a joke. The guys that actually did planet-scale tracking never stopped and the little guys that did nothing wrong posted obnoxious notices on their sites. If I had to guess, it will take at least a decade to get things moving.

nkrisc 8y ago

Your DNA is hardly private. You leave it everywhere you go. If someone wanted it they'd only have to follow you around for a short while.

digi_owl 8y ago
And that kind of following around was what certain secret police forces did back in the day. And it was inefficient unless they already had a reason to spend manhours on you. Now however the computer will do it, virtually for free, and then the hoard of data can be dug through for incriminating (or socially awkward) information.
LinuxBender 8y ago
I hold a copyright on my DNA.
- notyourwork 8y ago
  Which means what in context of this conversation?
  - tomcam 8y ago
    That LinuxBender has a sense of humor
- moftz 8y ago
  No you don't, you are not the creator of it therefore have no claim to copyright. It is not an original work of authorship. You can have a patent on DNA but not on naturally occurring DNA according to the supreme court.
  - LinuxBender 8y ago
    Overruled. I will charge 42M per minute to unauthorized copies of my DNA. My shadow ninjas will sneak into their vaults and take back every single strand of my DNA.
  - 8y ago

digi_owl 8y ago

One big thing to keep in mind about Facebook et al, is that every page with a like/share/whatever button from a third party effectively allows said third party to build up a profile of who the person operating the computer is. Even if you do not have a Facebook account, Facebook likely has a shadow profile on you based on browser fingerprint etc showing up on various sites. Also, your typical adblocker is not configured to block these buttons by default.

forapurpose 8y ago

> I was infuriated but now I just give up, because there's no way to control your own information. Many feel this way (about many issues these days). Let me suggest that it's not at all hopeless: 1. Security is never about 100% protection; it's about making attacks more difficult. You can't protect your data perfectly, but you can make attacks more difficult. A simple solution for phones: Use a VOIP number and forward it to or connect to it via a pre-paid phone (without giving your name). You can't stop people from sharing your number, but you can disassociate your number with your location and other data on your phone. 2. Better yet, use Signal, Tor, etc. Use cash when you can. 3. The problem can be fixed via legal action. It's happened to a great degree in Europe. If everyone walking around saying 'it's hopeless' actually did something about it, it would change quickly. And people on HN are generally the ones who understand these issues and need to take the lead for friends, neighbors, and coworkers.