4 ms·

I signed this, but I'm very doubtful this will ever achieve something. But this made me wonder: is there an history of people complaining about this sort of th

I signed this, but I'm very doubtful this will ever achieve something. But this made me wonder: is there an history of people complaining about this sort of things and actually achieving something? I think this might have happened with MSFT's hailstorm/passport, where in the end industry opposition meant the project was abandoned, but I can't recall other instances.

Mike8435 5y ago
Unlikely to fix Apple. They have sold their souls and are beyond all hope. However it will further motivate efforts to get Linux running properly on Apple hardware. When this trojan inevitably arrives in macOS hopefully someone can figure out how to isolate and remove/disable that piece of malware.
almostdigital 5y ago
Last year Apple reacted after the outcry about MacOS tracking[1] so there is some hope. That was not a deliberate product and probably more of an unintended behavior though. I'm really hoping this was just a team at Apple that got blinded by all the cool cryptography they came up with to solve a problem and that the higher ups will react if we screech loudly enough. [1]: https://sneak.berlin/20201112/your-computer-isnt-yours/ https://sneak.berlin/20201112/your-computer-isnt-yours/
- okamiueru 5y ago
  > Last year Apple reacted How did they react? Isn't it still in effect? Still sending unencrypted messages when apps are opened? As far as I'm aware, they plan on having OCSP encrypted, and plan on giving users a choice. I honestly do not get the outrage over the apple's client side scanning. It's outrageous, sure, but... much of the same people seem to have been ok with unencrypted telemetry being transmitted for every executable run. Not to mention that every executable will also be logged at some point, so apple knows every program you've ever run.
  - almostdigital 5y ago
    Not sure about the OCSP encryption but they did remove their VPN bypass in 11.2 (which was the bigger issue for me at least)
Torwald 5y ago
> is there an history of people complaining about this sort of things and actually achieving something? The WASP did it to bring the browser vendors to comply to web standards, Netscape ans MS back then. In the EU you could make the case that user group lobbying influenced regulation.
userbinator 5y ago
is there an history of people complaining about this sort of things and actually achieving something? One of the few tiny (and now seemingly completely void) victories I remember was the PIII processor serial number (1999): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10106870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10106870
neolog 5y ago
Google cancelled its DoD drone program because of employee protests. https://www.fedscoop.com/google-project-maven-canary-coal-mine/ https://www.fedscoop.com/google-project-maven-canary-coal-mi...
- seanp2k2 5y ago
  I’m sure they just got Lockheed/Boeing/General Dynamics/Northrop/Raytheon/IBM to take it on for 10x the price.
kayxspre 5y ago
Not in a sense of "signed letter", but more like a "huge feedback". Six years ago MSFT planned to reduce free storage for existing OneDrive users to 5GB (after bumping it to 15GB + 15GB of Camera Roll bonus) [1]. Like other users, I was unhappy as I have been using OneDrive with the promise of bigger storage than Google. Sure enough, over 72k votes at OneDrive's UserVoice [2] cause MSFT to back down. They still reduce the storage to 5GB, but existing users (myself included) can opt out of it. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2015/12/11/9890966/microsoft-onedrive-free-storage https://www.theverge.com/2015/12/11/9890966/microsoft-onedri... [2] https://onedrive.uservoice.com/forums/262982-onedrive/suggestions/10524099-give-us-back-our-storage https://onedrive.uservoice.com/forums/262982-onedrive/sugges...

Mike8435 5y ago

Unlikely to fix Apple. They have sold their souls and are beyond all hope. However it will further motivate efforts to get Linux running properly on Apple hardware. When this trojan inevitably arrives in macOS hopefully someone can figure out how to isolate and remove/disable that piece of malware.

almostdigital 5y ago

Last year Apple reacted after the outcry about MacOS tracking[1] so there is some hope. That was not a deliberate product and probably more of an unintended behavior though. I'm really hoping this was just a team at Apple that got blinded by all the cool cryptography they came up with to solve a problem and that the higher ups will react if we screech loudly enough. [1]: https://sneak.berlin/20201112/your-computer-isnt-yours/ https://sneak.berlin/20201112/your-computer-isnt-yours/

okamiueru 5y ago
> Last year Apple reacted How did they react? Isn't it still in effect? Still sending unencrypted messages when apps are opened? As far as I'm aware, they plan on having OCSP encrypted, and plan on giving users a choice. I honestly do not get the outrage over the apple's client side scanning. It's outrageous, sure, but... much of the same people seem to have been ok with unencrypted telemetry being transmitted for every executable run. Not to mention that every executable will also be logged at some point, so apple knows every program you've ever run.
- almostdigital 5y ago
  Not sure about the OCSP encryption but they did remove their VPN bypass in 11.2 (which was the bigger issue for me at least)

Torwald 5y ago

> is there an history of people complaining about this sort of things and actually achieving something? The WASP did it to bring the browser vendors to comply to web standards, Netscape ans MS back then. In the EU you could make the case that user group lobbying influenced regulation.

userbinator 5y ago

is there an history of people complaining about this sort of things and actually achieving something? One of the few tiny (and now seemingly completely void) victories I remember was the PIII processor serial number (1999): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10106870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10106870

neolog 5y ago

Google cancelled its DoD drone program because of employee protests. https://www.fedscoop.com/google-project-maven-canary-coal-mine/ https://www.fedscoop.com/google-project-maven-canary-coal-mi...

seanp2k2 5y ago
I’m sure they just got Lockheed/Boeing/General Dynamics/Northrop/Raytheon/IBM to take it on for 10x the price.

kayxspre 5y ago

Not in a sense of "signed letter", but more like a "huge feedback". Six years ago MSFT planned to reduce free storage for existing OneDrive users to 5GB (after bumping it to 15GB + 15GB of Camera Roll bonus) [1]. Like other users, I was unhappy as I have been using OneDrive with the promise of bigger storage than Google. Sure enough, over 72k votes at OneDrive's UserVoice [2] cause MSFT to back down. They still reduce the storage to 5GB, but existing users (myself included) can opt out of it. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2015/12/11/9890966/microsoft-onedrive-free-storage https://www.theverge.com/2015/12/11/9890966/microsoft-onedri... [2] https://onedrive.uservoice.com/forums/262982-onedrive/suggestions/10524099-give-us-back-our-storage https://onedrive.uservoice.com/forums/262982-onedrive/sugges...