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Surveilling the Gamers: Privacy Impacts of the Video Game Industry
- api 5y agoIs anything not spying on you?
- PenguinCoder 5y agoBoard games and card games.
- Dig1t 5y agoI don't think my Debian desktop computer is spying on me.. but that may be the only computer that isn't.
- teawrecks 5y agoMight be.
- shadilay 5y agoAre you sure the computer inside the computer (Intel ME) isn't spying on you?
- neatze 5y agoall apps can run with network disabled by default via firejail and/or apparmor or simply by using iptables/nftables :)
- fsflover 5y agoIntel ME is disabled and neutralized on my Librem laptop.
- gentleman11 5y agoAny hiccups with that? How are their laptops? I might look for a replacement for my dell soon
- fsflover 5y agoWorks flawlessly for me, can recommend.
- quesera 5y agoMany people are unhappy about Debian popcon.
- Nextgrid 5y agoIt's opt-in (and the preselected option is "no" so even if you accidentally press enter you won't opt-in) and very clearly explained during installation.
- quesera 5y agoYou are correct. Ubuntu installed Debian's popcon as a default package from 2006-2018, although apparently it was not configured to send data upstream.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- pabs3 5y agoThere are lots of privacy issues in Debian unfortunately, we welcome help trying to find and fix them though. Some resources here: https://wiki.debian.org/PrivacyIssues https://wiki.debian.org/PrivacyIssues
- enlyth 5y agoI doubt it, I bought a new Sonicare toothbrush and it came with an app to supposedly help you track your brushing or whatever; I was curious so I installed it. After updating my toothbrush firmware, I got a prompt on my phone asking for it to track my location. Why does my toothbrush need to know my location constantly?
- 1ris 5y agobecause bluetooth and gps are still not separate permissions, i guess?
- 542458 5y agoOn Android at least this seems to be the case. Bluetooth leaks data that can be used to locate you, so Android just ties the two permissions together. https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/160479/why-do-i-need-to-turn-on-location-services-to-pair-with-a-bluetooth-device https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/160479/why-do-i-... IMO this is counterintuitive for users. It would be like telling people on windows “This app wants to wipe your C drive” every time an app asks for admin permissions - it could wipe your C drive, but that’s not what it’s asking for. IMO the permissions should be separate, but the approval modal should note that info about leaking location.
- gruez 5y ago>IMO this is counterintuitive for users. It would be like telling people on windows “This app wants to wipe your C drive” every time an app asks for admin permissions - it could wipe your C drive, but that’s not what it’s asking for. Well the flip side is that they don't warn the users enough, and they get roasted by the media for "not sufficiently warning the users" or "being complicit in user tracking" or whatever.
- freeone3000 5y agoBy granting an app a permission, it can then do that thing. There's no intent detection possible. Any app with full filesystem access could wipe your C drive. A new Bluetooth API and access model needs to be devised to fix the information leakage present in scanning and beacons -- how can we prevent fixed-position radio beacons from being picked up by people scanning for new gadgets?
- Negitivefrags 5y agoThe paper isn't saying games are spying on you. It's saying that if someone decided to analyse the data about someone playing then they could infer certain things. I mean sure I guess. I'm pretty skeptical that this is really occuring though. I mean, to what end? As someone who runs an online game we have text logs of user actions, yes. They sit there because it's useful debugging info. A server crash happens and we look at the logs of what the user was doing at the time. An exploit is reported and we look at the logs of what the user doing the exploit did so we can fix it. Etc etc. I really don't know what nafarious thing people imagine is really occuring.
- spicybright 5y agoSame. On a naive surface level of this, it's a game, not your banking account. How much is really at stake here?
- RandomBK 5y agoIt'll depend on how much data is being reported back. For some games where users are asked to make certain moral choices, I figure you can infer a lot about someone by analyzing those choices. Imagine if games like Mass Effect phoned home about the choices you took. You can build up a pretty complete psychological profile of someone based on their gameplay.
- spicybright 5y agoI really doubt that, honestly. You have no idea if those models are correct without comparing it to real personality of an actual person. If anything, you'll be dumped into big buckets like "buys lots of cosmetic items", "usually makes good choices first", "likes to try breaking aspects of games", etc
- ev1 5y ago> I really don't know what nafarious thing people imagine is really occuring. Unregulated anticheat software retaining user clipboard contents, sending/uploading arbitrary files, all window titles, all processes and computer and username, and any other IPs on LAN and ARP cache, sending in plaintext across country borders, ignoring GDPR/CCPA/etc.
- devwastaken 5y agoThere's a gradient of spying, as there is a gradient and level to everything. A program that collects diagnostic data is not the same as one that collects all your browser history.
- fsflover 5y agoI'm pretty sure my Pinephone does not spy on me.
- IG_Semmelweiss 5y agoIs it true that if i buy and install drm free games, like those from that european distributor (GOG?) then i have nothing to worry about right?
- resfirestar 5y agoThat would just mean the platform isn’t tracking you (unless you use GOG Galaxy in which case it still is) but nothing stops publishers from having their own analytics code built into the game.
- pabs3 5y agoTo prevent privacy issues from affecting you, it is best to either prevent the games from having network access, or inspect the code of the game to ensure it doesn't access the network, or both.
- gentleman11 5y agoThe game itself can just send data to some server at will if it has network access. DRM is still nice to avoid. Gog is great
- dogma1138 5y agoThe analytics code is built into the engine, for example https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.26/en-US/TestingAndOptimization/Analytics/ https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.26/en-US/TestingAndOptimizat... Nearly all games would have some sort of client side analytics, multiplayer games will also have a lot of server side stuff. In fact analytics in games is so common that today it’s a “meta” mechanic in most games, this is what achievements are. The lazy type of achievements are nothing more than adding fake points to something that the game developers were already tracking internally in the hopes that it would promote engagement. However very few games are actually doing achievements well the best example of how to do achievements in a meaningful manner is probably Halo with its skull mechanics since those actually majorly impact gameplay and thus adding a lot of value to the player.