4 ms·

Sounds like some trolling to me, especially since he can't produce the email. If Google was actually doing this they would have emailed other NewPipe users, not

by sigmar 7y ago

Sounds like some trolling to me, especially since he can't produce the email. If Google was actually doing this they would have emailed other NewPipe users, not just this one guy.

ceejayoz 7y ago
Does Gmail give access to your emails when your Google Account is suspended?
- danesparza 7y ago
  Pretty sure the answer is no.
- dannyw 7y ago
  Under GDPR, they legally have to if you request it.
  - drusepth 7y ago
    Not to be that guy, but do you have anything to back that claim up? I'd love to know if it's actually true or not; it seems like GDPR is often used as a catch-all magic wand for "I want my data therefore the company has to give it to me", but I'd love to know if it actually applies in the case of a terminated/suspended account and/or an account found to be in violation of the service's terms & conditions.
  - londons_explore 7y ago
    Ctrl+F for my comment above to see how they won't give you anything in response to a GDPR request.
    - RandomBacon 7y ago
      You could just link to your comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21248111 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21248111 (I assume that's the one you meant. "Ctrl-F" is very vague when you have a bunch of comments in this thread.)
      - londons_explore 7y ago
        Apologies - on mobile, it was tricky to get the link without losing context - and I thought that the info was relevant.
  - COGlory 7y ago
    No, they'll delete the data and say they have none.
mantap 7y ago
I find it perfectly plausible that Google would suspend someone's account arbitrarily. Even if it's not true, it is a reminder that Google can and will suspend your account and fuck up your life because of some algorithm, and you should probably do something about it.
- jerf 7y ago
  The most likely scenario to me is that Google did suspend the account, but either this is not the reason, or it was only a minor aspect of the algorithm's decision. People are often bad at figuring out what they did wrong when you send a message explaining exactly what it was, people are hopeless when they get no message at all, which is how these suspensions work. The assurance that they've used no other apps I put little faith in; I've too often both delivered and received the incorrect "but I'm sure I did nothing else, it had to be this!" claim. We do a lot of things without forming strong memories of them all the time. No offense intended to the original reporter, it's just my experience says that's rarely a highly trustworthy claim, even when trustworthy people make it.
  - Kalium 7y ago
    You're exactly right. It's been my experience from community moderation that you can give people an itemized list of things they did that led to a response, and often all they'll take away from reading it is the one item they have a strong emotional reaction to.
ishitatsuyuki 7y ago
I took a look at this user's GitHub activity, and it seems they have been using NewPipe daily. It's not trolling probably.
shadowgovt 7y ago
Their system isn't even likely detecting NewPipe. It is probably detecting signals indicating the ads it serves are being blocked and the user's account isn't a Premium account. Any client that failed to vend the ads (or failed to spoof the ads-vended signals) could trigger this. (Obvious solution: use the approved clients.)
- sigmar 7y ago
  You can't log in with an account to newpipe though. It is pulling videos off youtube as if it was a browser on the phone.
  - shadowgovt 7y ago
    Has anyone wiresharked its transactions to Google? If it's literally doing it like it's a browser, what cookies or storage API (or other) state is it leaking?
    - sigmar 7y ago
      It's all open source. Not sure what info it is leaking tho. https://github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe#Description https://github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe#Description
      - shadowgovt 7y ago
        NewPipe itself is open-source. It's using the OS infrastructure to make requests (https://github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe/blob/ce17ccad27af0aba72b25913ffc6e6dba9d770d0/app/src/main/java/us/shandian/giga/service/DownloadManagerService.java#L136 https://github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe/blob/ce17ccad27af0aba...). One would have to do a deep-read of the implementation of those APIs to know what they might leak (or toss a packet sniffer in the network stack).
        gruez 7y ago
        This seems like an argument from ignorance. eg. "Well, there's no evidence to support this hypothesis, but it could be x (no proof given), so unless we look into x, we won't know for sure". Using the system browser or webview doesn't send any user identifying information (other than device type and version) in http requests. There's no plausible reason why using the download manager API would do it either.

by sigmar 7y ago

Sounds like some trolling to me, especially since he can't produce the email. If Google was actually doing this they would have emailed other NewPipe users, not just this one guy.

ceejayoz 7y ago

Does Gmail give access to your emails when your Google Account is suspended?

danesparza 7y ago
Pretty sure the answer is no.
dannyw 7y ago
Under GDPR, they legally have to if you request it.
- drusepth 7y ago
  Not to be that guy, but do you have anything to back that claim up? I'd love to know if it's actually true or not; it seems like GDPR is often used as a catch-all magic wand for "I want my data therefore the company has to give it to me", but I'd love to know if it actually applies in the case of a terminated/suspended account and/or an account found to be in violation of the service's terms & conditions.
- londons_explore 7y ago
  Ctrl+F for my comment above to see how they won't give you anything in response to a GDPR request.
  - RandomBacon 7y ago
    You could just link to your comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21248111 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21248111 (I assume that's the one you meant. "Ctrl-F" is very vague when you have a bunch of comments in this thread.)
    - londons_explore 7y ago
      Apologies - on mobile, it was tricky to get the link without losing context - and I thought that the info was relevant.
- COGlory 7y ago
  No, they'll delete the data and say they have none.

mantap 7y ago

I find it perfectly plausible that Google would suspend someone's account arbitrarily. Even if it's not true, it is a reminder that Google can and will suspend your account and fuck up your life because of some algorithm, and you should probably do something about it.

jerf 7y ago
The most likely scenario to me is that Google did suspend the account, but either this is not the reason, or it was only a minor aspect of the algorithm's decision. People are often bad at figuring out what they did wrong when you send a message explaining exactly what it was, people are hopeless when they get no message at all, which is how these suspensions work. The assurance that they've used no other apps I put little faith in; I've too often both delivered and received the incorrect "but I'm sure I did nothing else, it had to be this!" claim. We do a lot of things without forming strong memories of them all the time. No offense intended to the original reporter, it's just my experience says that's rarely a highly trustworthy claim, even when trustworthy people make it.
- Kalium 7y ago
  You're exactly right. It's been my experience from community moderation that you can give people an itemized list of things they did that led to a response, and often all they'll take away from reading it is the one item they have a strong emotional reaction to.

ishitatsuyuki 7y ago

I took a look at this user's GitHub activity, and it seems they have been using NewPipe daily. It's not trolling probably.

shadowgovt 7y ago

Their system isn't even likely detecting NewPipe. It is probably detecting signals indicating the ads it serves are being blocked and the user's account isn't a Premium account. Any client that failed to vend the ads (or failed to spoof the ads-vended signals) could trigger this. (Obvious solution: use the approved clients.)

sigmar 7y ago
You can't log in with an account to newpipe though. It is pulling videos off youtube as if it was a browser on the phone.
- shadowgovt 7y ago
  Has anyone wiresharked its transactions to Google? If it's literally doing it like it's a browser, what cookies or storage API (or other) state is it leaking?
  - sigmar 7y ago
    It's all open source. Not sure what info it is leaking tho. https://github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe#Description https://github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe#Description
    - shadowgovt 7y ago
      NewPipe itself is open-source. It's using the OS infrastructure to make requests (https://github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe/blob/ce17ccad27af0aba72b25913ffc6e6dba9d770d0/app/src/main/java/us/shandian/giga/service/DownloadManagerService.java#L136 https://github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe/blob/ce17ccad27af0aba...). One would have to do a deep-read of the implementation of those APIs to know what they might leak (or toss a packet sniffer in the network stack).
      - gruez 7y ago
        This seems like an argument from ignorance. eg. "Well, there's no evidence to support this hypothesis, but it could be x (no proof given), so unless we look into x, we won't know for sure". Using the system browser or webview doesn't send any user identifying information (other than device type and version) in http requests. There's no plausible reason why using the download manager API would do it either.