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Along with sign-in-to-sync, AMP, URL hiding, upcoming manifest v3, Google is doing their best to benefit advertising and data collection. As the market leader i
by vehemenz 6y ago
Along with sign-in-to-sync, AMP, URL hiding, upcoming manifest v3, Google is doing their best to benefit advertising and data collection. As the market leader in ads, it is textbook anti-competitive behavior, but the courts will have to decide if it is legally.
- superasn 6y agoI'm kinda happy they are doing it more and more. Just waiting for the last straw that breaks the camel's back.
- ignoramous 6y agoI'm afraid the lobby money will keep buying them extra straws.
- tupputuppu 6y agoThis isn't the highly visible anticompetitive behavior which might cause a backlash. Regular people, or even journalists or judges won't even understand what cookie clearing on exit means. If there's antitrust sentiments towards Google, it needs to come from some where else.
- nojito 6y agoChrome is one thing the DOJ is using to push its case against Google. https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/10/feds-may-target-googles-chrome-browser-for-breakup-428468 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/10/feds-may-target-goo...
- feanaro 6y agoOn the other hand, a corporation cannot be allowed to continue its anti-competitive practice just because the subject is too complex for an average person to comprehend. Techology isn't going away and is becoming ever more important. It seems obvious to me that we will need cross-domain specialists to handle cases such as this in the future -- someone with both a legal and computer science background.
- walterbell 6y agoFrom https://scienceandsociety.duke.edu/learn/ma/ https://scienceandsociety.duke.edu/learn/ma/ & https://scienceandsociety.duke.edu/learn/ma/jdma-program/ https://scienceandsociety.duke.edu/learn/ma/jdma-program/ > Many of the most important challenges confronting the legal profession lie at the intersection of science, technology, law, and policy. Emerging science and technologies, such as AI, big data, social media, genomics, and neuroscience, demand an interdisciplinary approach and visionary leadership. Students in the JD/MA in Bioethics and Science Policy program spend their three years at Duke focusing on these intersectional problems and preparing themselves for a seat at the table in these discussions for decades to come and earn an additional degree while doing so.
- bofenbref 6y agoThis is something I've often called a retreat into complexity. Classic example: food corpo gets flak for putting something nasty into their products. They then switch to using an alternative that's just as harmful, just with harder to spot effects.
- feanaro 6y ago> This is something I've often called a retreat into complexity. Thanks, I'm using this from now on.
- fauigerzigerk 6y agoI disagree. This sort of double standard is a very clear-cut and easy to understand case of abusing a dominant market position. I wager that Google will be very quick to declare this a bug and fix it ASAP.
- Retric 6y agoYep, though specifically because it’s harming Google’s competition rather than users.
- cpeterso 6y agoHere's what Google said when this same "Clear all Cookies except Google Cookies" issue happened back in 2018: https://www.blog.google/products/chrome/product-updates-based-your-feedback/ https://www.blog.google/products/chrome/product-updates-base... This 2018 CNET article has more details: https://www.cnet.com/news/google-promises-chrome-changes-after-privacy-complaints/ https://www.cnet.com/news/google-promises-chrome-changes-aft...
- ezoe 6y agoAlthough politicians and the court does not understand the cookie, That doesn't mean we won't have a backlash. It just doesn't guarantee the backlash is technologically sound. EU's cookie law, for example, is just stupid from the pure technical standpoint. It's your computer that store a cookie to local storage. It's your computer that decide to send back previously stored cookie. And they're crying like they don't have a consent.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- lima 6y ago> It's your computer that store a cookie to local storage. It's your computer that decide to send back previously stored cookie. And they're crying like they don't have a consent. Fortunately, EU regulators understand that non-technical users exist and need protection from abuse.
- QasimK 6y agoExcept your computer doesn’t know what the purpose of a cookie is, in order to decide what to do with any particular cookie. Neither does the user, not by themselves anyway. Only the website knows really.
- jacquesm 6y agoAntitrust action against Google is much more likely to come from the EU than from the US.
- Zak 6y agoPeople understand perfectly well when you abstract it by one level: Google's web browser ignore's some of the user's privacy settings on sites Google owns.
- walterbell 6y ago> Regular people, or even journalists or judges won't even understand what cookie clearing on exit means. It's been almost 30 years since the Cypherpunks. When billions of dollars or existential business threats are at stake, regular people are motivated to find a technically-knowledgeable peer for advice. There have now been several generations of financially successful tech entrepreneurs, some of whom move in non-tech circles.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- a_imho 6y agoThere were plenty of last straws. The missing piece is a powerful enough entity that has interest in regulating them. No, despite the GDPR the EU is not that.
- DarkmSparks 6y agoThis actually seems to me like a fairly blatant breach of multiple important aspects of GDPR on the part of google.com and youtube.com Are there not serious fines for companies saying they opted you out of this kind of data collection and then not actually abiding by your requests? France Sweden and the UK is already in on that action, Im sure others will follow.
- a_imho 6y agoExactly, compared to what could be the maximum fine, there are no high profile cases. This is the point, GDPR is as useful as much as it is enforced, which is lackluster at best. We are not talking about a one off, for example Google has been continuously violating GDPR for years at this point.
- xxpor 6y agoGDPR entrenches big tech. Costly regulation always benefits the incumbents.
- swalsh 6y agoCombined with the latest twitter bout of censorship, the hammer is going to hit tech soon... very hard. They are running out of friends on both the left and right.
- peteretep 6y agoWhat are some ways in which Twitter is anti-competitive or acting like a monopoly?
- stevehawk 6y agotwitter isn't doing those, they're losing friends through censorship. which they legally have every right to, but the powers that be are now campaigning to change that legal protection (exemption? sinve no one understands the second amendment)
- trident1000 6y agoThey have every right to do it legally and you're right that the rules will probably change. People say "just go and make another platform" but Google literally tried and failed to make their own (Google+). If they cant do it who really can? Its not happening or it will take centuries/enormous resources to gain traction and compete. So we are left with an oligopoly that is censoring in lockstep and that's an issue for all sides because eventually its not them, its you, with time (amongst other issues). I think the platforms are a huge threat to democracy personally and I hope the new rules are meaningful and not just a knee jerk makeshift reaction.
- johannes1234321 6y agoThat argument of "just go and make another platform" is misled anyways: Even if I build another platform: Twitter is still the primary communication channel of the US President. Which means that all secondary users (interested citizens, journalists, ...) hang out there as well. Thus whoever they block there or not has an impact, even if my competitor has a few hundred million users.
- WilTimSon 6y agoI'm, sadly, not so sure that straw will come any time soon. Major tech companies have been under fire for years now and nothing managed to break them. Not saying it'll never happen but monumental shifts like that can take decades to pass.
- whydoineedone 6y agoI think that’s the reason they’re doing it; they realize it’s just a matter of time before regulation comes so they’re throwing caution to the winds until then to maximize profit
- wdn 6y agoAs long as the political "contributions" still flowing into the right politicians, you can bet if there is any change, it will be adding more regulation that is too expensive for small players comply.
- sildur 6y agoNot being able to set a "home" in maps unless I consent to be spied is another shitty behavior from Google.
- jannes 6y agoWhy would you want to tell Google where you live anyway? Can you not just save your home as a regular starred place?
- codegladiator 6y agoGoogle already knows anyways, using the map to set home is just for user convenience.
- bt1a 6y agoYes. Imagine thinking you can hide your place of residence along with using google location services.
- CameronNemo 6y agoUnifiedNlp for the win :) https://github.com/microg/UnifiedNlp https://github.com/microg/UnifiedNlp
- amelius 6y agoDo you think that solves the problem? What if 4G operators sell your information to data brokers, which then sell that information to Google?
- CameronNemo 6y agoAre 4G operators allowed to give away (or more likely sell) your data like that?
- usrusr 6y agoI doubt that there can be much of a legal angle: the defense would be to think of Chrome as a client software for Google services. That client software can additionally interact with many third party services if they follow open web standards, but why should that have legal implications on how it interacts with their own services? It's a very dissatisfying situation.
- anuila 6y agoWould you like your car to follow some laws or anything goes? What if it’s nearly the only car you can buy in the US? We’re talking about access to the internet, something that people are increasingly acknowledging as a primary need. Regulations will follow.
- usrusr 6y agoWeb standards are not laws. Would I be outraged if a car's design language would follow some aesthetic conventions (another set of "rules" that are not laws) but not others? I'm certainly not happy with how Google is using their position, but is it illegal? Should it be? Even a Pixel phone can install and use Firefox. You might perhaps make a case out of how all SDK WebViews end up being Chrome (-ish), but as long as a third party app embedding their own web view would not be rejected by Play, that's still more open than significant other parts of the smartphone market. Sure, Google is using a position of power and everybody who isn't a major shareholder shouldn't exactly be happy about it, but itvit abusing? In a way assailable on legal grounds?
- Closi 6y agoRather than ask “is it illegal” you can ask “is it anti-competitive” and it almost certainly is.
- lern_too_spel 6y agoIf that's the case, why is Safari already worse than manifest v3, already hiding URLs, already promoting Apple News (more anticompetitive than AMP), and not even offering the ability to clear storage on exit?
- jacquesm 6y agoBecause Safari is a niche player. Anti competitive behavior matters a lot more when you have a stranglehold on a market than when you are just a bit player.
- lern_too_spel 6y agoThe question is why would Safari do those things if they help advertising giants?
- jacquesm 6y agoThat's not for me to answer, but for Apple I guess. Maybe someone who works there can shine a light on this. Speculation about the URL bit would probably center on Apple tending to put form over function. Promoting Apple News -> because it cost them a lot of money to get it in the first place and they are trying to recoup that money. Not that I would ever even look at it, I don't think a hardware manufacturer is the best place to get my news fix.
- saagarjha 6y agoThe URL hiding thing is probably because it looks pretty and they think it reduces phishing.
- cageface 6y agoSafari is far from a niche player on mobile. The last few US projects I’ve done were over 50% iOS safari.
- SquareWheel 6y agoAs far as I can see, Manifest v3 addressed all the major concerns. It was a developmental spec and they adapted it based on feedback. What problems still remain that you take issue with?
- AaronFriel 6y agoWhere have you seen any source that isn't Google or Microsoft say that it "addressed all the major concerns"? And what exactly has changed in the past year to do so? My understanding is that webRequest blocking is deprecated and a limited size static list will replace it. No? Edit: spec still shows ~35,000 total block entries, far too few. A medium sized marketing firm could, on their own, set up 70,000 distinct s3 bucket URLs, or a large one could easily justify that many distinct domains. Many existing block lists and uBlock's dynamic (uncountable) behavior far outstrip these limitations. This spec will break the back of ad blocking for good, and Chrome engineers and PMs know it. Spec: https://developer.chrome.com/extensions/declarativeNetRequest https://developer.chrome.com/extensions/declarativeNetReques...
- SquareWheel 6y agoGoogle is the one that made the changes in response to feedback. If you're rejecting them as a source of those changes, then you're setting impossible goal posts. The changes included greatly increasing the rule list size, allowing dynamic rules, not requiring the list be included in the manifest (for independent updates), and the ability to adjust some network headers. As I said, they addressed all the major concerns that I saw raised.
- saagarjha 6y agoHow about the (fairly critical) ones raised by the authors of uBlock?
- AaronFriel 6y agouBlock currently has ~75,000 rules. That list isn't getting smaller, so which 50% of the rules would you cut? In a few years, which 2/3 of the rules would you cut? How is this a win for consumers? How have they addressed those major concerns? Edit: That was stock, I just added a few lists and passed 100,000 network filter rules. Please explain to me slowly, as if I were a child, how a static limit of 30,000 rules is a bigger number than 100,000, and why my computer with 128GB of RAM memory can't possibly support more than 30,000 rules?
- lima 6y agoI like declarativeNetRequest and think that the tradeoffs are reasonable, especially after the last revision[2]. Ad blocker extensions are a major security risk, and this fully eliminates the risk without breaking most of the functionality. Adblocker extensions need full access to all network traffic and all it takes is a single person's account or machine to be compromised to get access to millions of browsers. Chrome extension compromises are a somewhat common occurrence - see [1] for a recent example. I want ad blocking without giving the extension access to my cloud accounts, bank statements or company intranet. My current solution is to use the ExtensionSettings[3] Chrome policy to blacklist extensions from particularly sensitive domains like accounts.google.com, my bank and the company intranet, but it's a clunky solution - I still want tracking and ad scripts blocked on those! [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24803740 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24803740 [2]: https://blog.chromium.org/2019/06/web-request-and-declarative-net-request.html https://blog.chromium.org/2019/06/web-request-and-declarativ... [3]: https://support.google.com/chrome/a/answer/9867568?hl=en https://support.google.com/chrome/a/answer/9867568?hl=en
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- kudu 6y ago> Ad blocker extensions are a major security risk This is only true in the sense that an all-purpose browser is "a major security risk". That is to say, it's not true in any coherent sense. Yes, the ad blocker needs to be trustworthy, and there are a variety of approaches for furthering that goal. > Adblocker extensions need full access to all network traffic and all it takes is a single person's account or machine to be compromised to get access to millions of browsers. Again, you could say the same about the browser itself. Even if it were infeasible for extension developers to implement more security safeguards, that would be a flaw in the Chrome Web Store, not in the concept of web extensions.
- stefan_ 6y agoA trivial "backspace to go back" extension needs access to all sites. Fraudsters buy semi-popular extensions and load them up with tracking and link rewriting malware, unhindered by Google. Their continued "refinement" of the core ad blocker APIs while all these abuses and deficiencies go unaddressed is extremely suspicious.