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Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin
- vmception 5y agoHmm, I fail to see the consequences of the Russian market from Google and Apple's perspective. The Russian market is kind of inconsequential if Google, Apple lost the relationship for noncompliance with the Russian state. You think maybe the US State Department told them to comply? There is probably a lot of user data that Google, Apple get from Russians by having access to that market.
- vbezhenar 5y agoMoney is money. There are tens of millions of users there. They don't want to lose a single penny. With adequate profit, capital is very bold. A certain 10 per cent. will ensure its employment anywhere; 20 per cent. certain will produce eagerness; 50 per cent., positive audacity; 100 per cent. will make it ready to trample on all human laws; 300 per cent., and there is not a crime at which it will scruple, nor a risk it will not run, even to the chance of its owner being hanged. (с) Thomas Dunning
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- mensetmanusman 5y agoThey wouldn’t lose much money, would all these people go to Chinese language phones?
- r721 5y agoNotification from Apple: https://twitter.com/ioannZH/status/1438750081402953728 https://twitter.com/ioannZH/status/1438750081402953728
- ipv6ipv4 5y agoApple’s acquiescence to the Russian government’s demand to remove this app was predicted when it first came to light. Exactly at the same time as Apple was assuring world+dog that it would never acquiesce to governmental pressure to extend and expand the scope of its CSAM scanning tool on user’s devices.
- nicce 5y agoYou are comparing ”apples” to oranges. App store apps are built by third parties whereas CSAM is Apple’s own code and design on OS level, applying on global level. App store apps have been under removal threat in every country for many years if they can be considered as illegal.
- factorialboy 5y agoApple has to comply with local laws, regardless of who authored the code.
- nicce 5y agoYes, but they are not forced to add new features, only to remove, which is kinda big difference.
- int_19h 5y agoThey can be forced to do either.
- Hamuko 5y agohttps://www.macrumors.com/2021/03/16/apple-to-offer-government-approved-apps-russia/ https://www.macrumors.com/2021/03/16/apple-to-offer-governme... Is this a removal of a feature?
- nicce 5y ago> Apple struck a deal with the government that will show users a prompt when first configuring a device in Russia to pre-install apps from a list of government-approved software. Users will have the ability to decline the installation of certain apps. Apps you can decline? And uninstall? We are talking about quite different things here. Not to mention every Android with pre-installed bloatware.
- ALittleLight 5y agoVery sad when not even the massively rich will bother to do the right thing. "Sorry, need a few more billion, so we're going to side with an oppressive regime against Democracy." Reminds me of a Dylan line "Will all the money you made buy back your soul?"
- okamiueru 5y agoUsually, we would sanction countries that did this. Maybe time to sanction companies? Otherwise, why do anyone expect them to do anything other than what is the most profitable? Its even illegal not to.
- throw_m239339 5y ago> Usually, we would sanction countries that did this. Maybe time to sanction companies? Otherwise, why do anyone expect them to do anything other than what is the most profitable? Its even illegal not to. Sanction for what exactly? Sanctions against nations don't work. USA has been sanctioning Cuba, Iran for half a century, no regime change whatsoever, it only hurt the population in these countries. USA are sanctioning Russia right now, is Putin gone? No. And you want to sanction Apple or Google for what? under what law? Isn't the whole argument made all the time now that these "private companies" are free to censor whoever they want for whatever reasons and they don't have to respect the concept of freedom of speech on their platform?
- machomaster 5y agoI agree with you that sanctions against countries don't work. But then the next logical step is to propose the action that actually works: sanctions against individuals. Perhaps that's what should be done - sanctions against individual decision-makers at Google and Apple?..
- Dah00n 5y agoThat would make the US more of a pariah than it already is. Already most of the west only follow sanctions imposed by the US screaming and kicking unless it plays into their own agenda.
- ComodoHacker 5y agoSome of my friends from ex-USSR countries (not Russia) are telling me it's available there on Google Play.
- comonadd 5y agoThe vast majority of electoral votes is going to be cast in Russia either way.
- ComodoHacker 5y agoI mean the app isn't removed, maybe just hidden from search for Russian users.
- grishka 5y agoNo, it does show a "not found" page for me on Google Play, as if it never existed. Not even the usual complete app listing with "not available in your country". edit: screenshots https://imgur.com/a/aZqPSQR https://imgur.com/a/aZqPSQR
- mananaysiempre 5y agoNo, if (and only if) your Google Play region is set to Russia, the app isn’t accessible, not even via a direct link. This is how a local ban works: while it isn’t strictly speaking deletion as the files are manifestly still on Google’s servers, the users from the relevant country are locked out.
- ComodoHacker 5y agoSo the circumvention is as easy as changing region, installing the app, changing region back?
- burnished 5y agoSorry, are you asking a clarifying question or trying to suggest that makes it OK?
- Klaster_1 5y agoPreviously, Google usually ignored such requests, but seems to have finally gave in. If they are willing to remove the app, what's next, disclosing personal information to help the regime with repressions, preventing access from Russia to other Google resources, removing YouTube videos? The "we comply with local laws" clause effectively puts citizens of opperssive regime at a disadvantage. It's not like I had an impression somebody else besides citizens of the country in question can help to fight the power, but sad news like this disillusion even more.
- vbezhenar 5y agoGoogle obeys Russian laws. Of course they'll disclose any information they have given proper police request. They did that many times in the past. With Russia and with other countries. Do you expect Google to go partisan war against Russian government?
- mrtksn 5y agoThere's no way Apple or any company to act as an extralegal entity in another country. Every time something like that comes up, I'm baffled by the expectation that an American company will impose the American values or American laws in another country. Back in the day when the internet felt like international thing not bound by any local laws, that was possible to some degrees but legislators caught up with it. It is obvious that you don't sell your crypto finance stuff to Americans, you don't make anti-Putin stuff for Russians, you don't give Saudis encrypted messaging, you don't give Turks gambling apps, you don't sell Nazi stuff to Germans etc. on the internet, unless you are ready to face repercussions. They can try to find a legal angle if they believe there is one and that it will benefit them more than harm them but often there isn't one because gambling is illegal in Turkey, SEC has strict securities regulations in the USA, Putin has an absolute power in Russia and Saudis simply don't allow it. There is no way Apple or Google or any company facing the repercussions of not complying to the laws of Russia, therefore they will remove from the Russian AppStore whatever they are told to remove. Allowing alternative AppStores also wouldn't solve it but only delegate it to the people who run those alternative AppStores. Technological solutions to political problems work up until the politicians catch up. The more effective the technological solution the faster they catch up and take care of it. StarLink for example, a swarm of satellites that can technically provide unrestricted internet to anyone on the planet, will obey the local laws depending on where the user is connecting from. I know the technologist don't like it but there's no way around it. If you are in Russia, you are in Russia. Get rid of Putin, form a functioning democracy if you like to live in western-like country. No company is not going to provide you with the environment that people in the west built through struggles for generations.
- whateveracct 5y agoIt really is a lowest common denominator. American companies would never impose American values, but they'll bend the knee to any authoritarian country with a juicy market.
- mrtksn 5y agoCan you please describe what it means to "bend a knee"? It sounds like following the local laws to me. Do you mean something else? What else they are supposed to do? Act as a rough agent? Be the East India Company of the century, recruit mercenaries and compel foreign nations to work they see fit?
- toshk 5y agoInteresting they made an app in the first place, can they move the activity to a website, maybe multiple domains?
- tvorog 5y agoThey have bot in telegram @smartvotebot
- avaika 5y agoThey won't be able to effectively advertise it. In Russia websites can be blocked without court right away. Means as quick as some domain reaches at least some notable traffic it will be blocked. And in this case cat will be winning the mouse. Cause mouse won't effectively reach the audience. That's also the reason why Navalny's team is heavily utilizing public resources backed by big tech (e.g. Google docs, Appspot, etc) with a hope that big tech won't ban the team and Russian government won't be brave enough to block the entire platform. Also a couple words about resource blocking: every ISP is obliged by law to install some kind of DPI solution to block traffic. And the solution sadly became much more efficient in recent months than it was years ago.
- ordu 5y agoThey used several ways. Website, Telegram bot, mailing list, app. Website and telegram bot are reported to face DDoS, though website seems healthy now. App is blocked. Mailing list managed to deliver me advice of "Smart Vote", I'm surprised now it was not blocked as a spam by all major mail-providers.
- tandav 5y agoMoney is money. Thats sad but predictable. The future web should be decentralized.
- throw_m239339 5y ago> Money is money. Thats sad but predictable. The future web should be decentralized. The web is already decentralized, by design. It's just that people are all flocking to the exact same services and providers for "convenience". Nobody has to use Google services, or buy an iPhone and use iPhone apps. Google isn't the web. What the web needs is to be distributed in order to be more resilient or even evade censorship. But users need to care first. Don't give all your private information to Google, don't use walled gardens like the app store...
- fsflover 5y ago> The web is already decentralized, by design. App stores and Youtube are not decentralized. See: Peertube and Linux repositories.
- throw_m239339 5y agoApp stores and Youtube are not the web.
- fsflover 5y agoThey are important parts of the web, which are used by millions. Technically, web is decentralized, but in practice large parts of it aren't. Same for email, which is owned by Google to a large degree.
- mithron 5y agoChina's too big of a market - companies have to comply with local authoritarian regime demands. Russia's too big of a market - companies have to comply with local authoritarian regime demands. It really helps that North Korea and Afghanistan are dirt poor.
- mikro2nd 5y agoRussia's too big of a market Russia's GDP: $1.710 trillion Texas GSP: $1.9 trillion
- Dah00n 5y agoSo Texas is also too big a market?
- mikro2nd 5y agoJust trying to put some context around "big". FWIW: China GDP $16.64 trillion
- NoGravitas 5y agoTexas is big enough of a market that it can effectively define textbook standards for the rest of the US, so yes. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/06/21/how-texas-inflicts-bad-textbooks-on-us/ https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/06/21/how-texas-inflic... https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/20/us/texas-history-1836-project.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/20/us/texas-history-1836-pro...
- ivrrimum 5y agoRussia Hypersonics Missiles: + America Hypersonics Missiles: - Looks like money isn't everything :D
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y agoIt is time to ask Google and Apple if they were asked to actually remove Telegram from stores, when russian government was trying to ban it. It wasn't removed at the time, and all sources that Apple and Google were demanded to block it in Russia pointed to press-release on RosKomNadzor itself. I suspect that it is possible that all this Telegram block in Russia was a PR campaign coordinated with Russian government to give Telegram a reputation of a messenger that doesn't abide to tyrannical governments.
- rubatuga 5y agoWould be a historical coordination if true.
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y agoIt wasn't really difficult on RKN part, if true. Just announce something and not act on it.
- seniorivn 5y agoit is possible, but it's also true that telegram bot is the only platform of Navalny smart vote service that keeps working(aside text file circulating all over the internet)
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y agoI wonder why all modern hipsters ignore email as a platform. Like, Telegram on behest of Apple and Google repeatedly bans flibusta bots (a site with a great collection of pirated books), why don't they make an email bot? What would Apple do, ban their own mail app? Start censoring emails?
- Omavel 5y agoMany disadvantages comparing with realtime messaging
- loxias 5y ago(Based on reading just one article, I've never seen or used the app) Seems like all the app did was serve as list of candidates, 225 electoral districts long, and a map from street address to electoral district. Surely this can be trivially implemented as a website, in a matter of hours, no? It looks like the mistake Navalny's team made was trusting one method of distribution of information. Even worse, trusting a method with a central and corporate choke point. That aside, I'm disgusted, but not surprised, at Google's actions.
- dmantis 5y agoIt is implemented as website, but blocked by regular DPI censorship mechanisms deployed in Russia. They started a blocking campaign against popular VPN providers as well before elections, making it harder for older and less tech-savvy people to access information from the opposition. I guess that apps have implemented some routing and device caching mechanisms to ensure more user-friendly approach for "regular" people who don't want to spend too much time figuring out how to avoid censorship.
- Arech 5y agoAaah, what a great example of sofa advisor... What makes you think they didn't try? Their websites were blocked long before the regime started to name FBK as extrimists and they switched to apps particularly because apps is harder to block. They probably just didn't expect google&apple to become so much accommodating so quickly. One of the reasons why they did what they did is because the regime said they would take the local staff as hostages if they'll fail to comply (aka "the staff is responsible for the law breaches made by the company").
- akie 5y agoCan you rely on businesses to be ethical or to not succumb to political pressure? The answer is no.
- elephantum 5y agoThe thing is, that it's all very time-sensitive. And I expect pressure was unreasonably high. We have elections in Russia this weekend and Navalny app was used as a tool to coordinate protest voting. It is called "Smart Voting" by Navalny team and it is getting a lot of attention for upcomping elections. If Apple and Google would just be a little bit slower and complied next Monday :) Still there are more ways to coordinate Smart Voting. Google Docs with recommendations are published. There are youtube videos where Navalny team reads whole list aloud. There's a Telegram bot. So I hope this action would just bring more attention to the matter.
- Arech 5y agoPlease don't call it elections. Nothing even close.
- Dah00n 5y agoWell, it's all in the eye of the beholder. As someone living in Scandinavia looking at the US that doesn't look like elections much either. Pick your favourite animal: A: Black horse B: Brown horse Z: Pony
- Arech 5y agoNo it is not. (if you really "living in Scandinavia") You literally don't understand what are you talking about, which is damn obvious when you comparing Scandinavia or even US to Russia. You basically comparing Tesla car to horse-drawn carriage and draw similarities on a basis that both have 4 wheels and therefore they are both great and safe transportation devices.
- jhgb 5y agoI'm not from Scandinavia and the vast majority of US politicians look like interchangeable parts to me as well.
- 5y ago
- Grustaf 5y agoHow would people would feel if there were Chinese backed apps in the AppStore that were used for tactical voting in the US presidential elections? With the express purpose to aid a specific candidate.
- slim 5y agoIs navalny's app backed by a foreign entity ?
- kurokikaze 5y agoThis is the main party line right now - "Navalny is Soros' agent and Smart Voting is election interference".
- Grustaf 5y agoI don't know about Soros, but e.g. the Swedish government is supporting him quite heavily. Would you consider Smart Voting to be "interference" if Chinese backed activists promoted it in the US?
- machomaster 5y agoOf course not, especially if the interference is on the level of "One activist's teenage daughter has a TikTok account" like it is in Navalny's case.
- Grustaf 5y agoI thought Navalny was better organized than that, given the millions we shower him with and his 50+ staff.
- moogly 5y ago> the Swedish government is supporting him quite heavily In what way? The Nordic countries basically made a joint press release calling upon Putin to release him back in 2020, but that's about it? That's not much more than lip service. Also, one of the labs that verified that he was poisoned with Novichok is located in Sweden, I suppose (the other one in France).
- viktorcode 5y agoReuters doesn't report this, but the government officials threatened the companies (Apple and Google) with jail time for their employees yesterday. After that the companies finally conceded. There's a short video fragment from the meeting of the government officials and the companies representatives. It's worth watching, especially if you come from a democratic nation. Letting your Russian employees be persecuted don't amount to "doing the right thing".
- lifty 5y agoIt's hard to maximise profit and have consistent internal moral principles. As the other child comment mentioned, I would have preferred if Apple doesn't collaborate with these regimes and build their systems in such a way that they can't stand in the way of people doing what they want. But when you try to maximise profit, you have to interpose yourself as the gatekeeper, so you can extract as much value from the flow. And that of course makes you vulnerable to these kind of regimes.
- Wolfenstein98k 5y agoPull out of the countries then. Participating in dictatorship is barely better than refusing to do so if that dictatorship will falsely imprison your employees.
- joconde 5y agoThat seems to achieve nothing in practice. If Google and Apple leave Russia, then whatever replaces them will probably be even more compliant with the government. Of course, working in the country means paying tax dollars and "participating in the dictatorship" in that way, but that's not linked to app store restrictions. It's not as if they needed to get ordered to remove that app to realize they were working in a dictatorship, they knew it beforehand.
- lifty 5y agoI am sorry, but that's bullshit. Do you see Russia threatening Microsoft for not banning certain apps from Windows? No, because they can't. Apple and Google have build their ecosystem in such a way that they have full power over these decisions, and now they are forced to use that power. Edit: Google has a slight advantage here because people can still sideload apps on Android, but that's not possible on iOS.
- Pinegulf 5y agoWhile this is bad, yet I see this part as Russian deception in layers: While we are gasping on Google's actions, few note that the results of the election were never in question.
- sedan_baklazhan 5y agoThis is absolutely different from removing Parleur from AppStore and Google Play, of course. Completely different. Apple and Google should immediately pull out of Russia!
- balozi 5y agoTotally different. That slippery slop is just a fallacy.
- googamooga 5y agoInstead of asking Google and Apple to pull from Russia we should better think about ourselves pulling from them.
- sfg 5y agoDo they have a PWA option? Or an ordinary web site? The world needs to get away from closed stores and back to open systems.
- srg0 5y agoOrdinary web sites are quickly blocked and are not accessible without a VPN. Some popular VPN providers are blocked too. The app, once installed, appears to be more resistant to state-level disruption. At least until law enforcement pays a visit to Moscow offices, and then magically Apple and Google side with Putin.
- sfg 5y agoWhy isn't it hard to block access to the back-end services that the app communicates with? If it doesn't require back-end services, then why is it more resilient than an offline PWA?
- srg0 5y agoI do not know what technique this app used, but in practice apps are more resilient. It has been shown by Telegram which more or less successfully evaded blocking in Russia. I think it's a combination of lower-level network API, traffic obfuscation libraries, push notifications, and hosting some info on public services which cannot be blocked without affecting too many people. But it is just a guess.
- mrobot 5y agoLots of chauvinism and nationalism here, pretty offputting really.
- j56no 5y agoA good case showing that centralized walled app stores are bad and reduce users’ choices
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y agoIt is important to note, that in Apple's case the problem is made worse by the fact that on iOS there are no ways to install the app bypassing the appstore. That makes Apple's cooperation with dictators and authocrats so much worse for their users. You know, the people Apple claims to care about and 'protect'.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- kwere 5y agosomebody think about the children!
- fsflover 5y agoYes! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- this_user 5y agoApple itself is pretty much an autocratic company that believes it knows best what its customers should and should not be able to do with their products. So this is not really surprising.
- Dma54rhs 5y agoRainbow flag once a month bails them out as usual.
- busymom0 5y agoThey also care so much about the environment that they release almost identical phones each year with no ability to change batteries, plus make it as hard as possible to replace batteries. Any corporation which promises social Justice is a farce exploiting issues as pawns.
- 57844743385 5y agoThe most important thing for these companies is money. Money above ever other consideration. Money money money. Human rights … whatever. Politics …. Whatever. Democracy …. Whatever. Money money money money.
- luckylion 5y agoIt's the motivator for their employees as well, or did you think they work on profile-creation, all-encompassing tracking and ad-delivery because they honestly believe it's the best thing to do for humanity?
- hsuduebc2 5y agoGovernment officials supposedly threated these companies employees with jail time. I'm mostly critical towards these corporations the only bad guy here is only Russia government.
- bigbaguette 5y agoTo bring a bit of perspective on everything, it's good to remember that democracy, or what the West idealises as such, is not necessarily the ultimate regime that every country in the world needs to follow right now for its own sake. Of course there are places when power is abused, taken, stolen from entire populations but not every society is fit or ready for what we'd like to think as the world standard of governance. Cultural, historical reasons, micro and macro economies, ethnic groups, religions, resources... This kind of evolution takes time. Generations. Ages. And to be honest, even if the grass looks greener in our pasture, the fundamentals of democracy are meant to evolve as well in the West. For the best I hope. Feels like it's been taking hits when we entered the information age.
- roody15 5y agoBut Apple and Google fight for progressive values and are working to ensure a better future by protecting our planet. /s
- stevespang 5y agoYep, Google, Apple bending over backwards for dictators/tyrants, as usual. It's always about the money . . .
- amelius 5y agoLuckily, those who already installed the app can continue to use it. Right?
- latexr 5y agoFrom Tim Cook’s twitter bio[1]: > “Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for others?'” - MLK Considering this, HKmap.live[2], and Telegram[3], he seems to be mighty confused about who “others” refers to in that quote. [1]: https://twitter.com/tim_cook https://twitter.com/tim_cook [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HKmap.live https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HKmap.live [3]: https://www.iphoneincanada.ca/news/apple-telegram-belarus/ https://www.iphoneincanada.ca/news/apple-telegram-belarus/
- kahrl 5y agooth·er /ˈəT͟Hər/ pronoun 1. a shareholder or investor 2. a government entity whose favor you are economically dependent on.
- smoldesu 5y agoApparently, privacy is only a human right when your government considers you a human. Otherwise, Apple takes no issue enterprising on your lack of freedom.
- Siira 5y agoI remember the CSAM scandal being a US exclusive, so it’s more apt to say the illusion of privacy is a human right for the middle class.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- tut-urut-utut 5y agoHow is that different from Apple and Google removing apps of Trump supporters and social media companies closing their communication channels? Is it democratic, as opposed to this case, just because companies did it without an official request from the government/courts? Here's comes to mind the old saying: "a King only has to think about something, and others will do it without him even asking. Smaller players will need to actually request and even use the brute force to get things done". As a side note, Navalny is not a democrat, he's a racist, but somehow gets labelled as democrat in western media just because he's against Putin.
- dilap 5y agoBeyond even Trump supporters, Twitter banned Trump himself. (While he was still the democratically-elected president!) Among those alarmed by the move were...Navalny, who described it as "an unacceptable act of censorship". https://twitter.com/navalny/status/1347969772177264644?lang=en https://twitter.com/navalny/status/1347969772177264644?lang=...
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- glacia01 5y agoHe also publicly supported Biden on last elections. So?
- keewee7 5y ago>he's a racist No, he is not. Navalny was against banning a right-wing group from protesting and exercising their freedom of speech. He explicitly condemned their racism and hatred but said it was wrong to limit their freedom of speech: >In late 2006, Navalny appealed to the Moscow City Hall, asking it to grant permission to conduct the nationalist 2006 Russian march. However, he added that Yabloko (Navalny's party) condemned "any ethnic or racial hatred and any xenophobia" and called on the police to oppose "any fascist, Nazi, xenophobic manifestations".
- 5y ago
- upofadown 5y agoThere is obviously a conflict of interest here, but strategic voting scams are generally harmful to the political process. In particular they tend to concentrate power in the two incumbent parties over time. You don't need an app for strategic voting. The proponents of the scheme will tell you who to vote for.
- Kinrany 5y agoThe app is how they tell you.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- raxxorrax 5y agoIf people had been wiser, you could call out the removal of people from platforms. That ship has sailed because people weren't wise...
- mjreacher 5y agoThis was always the logical consequence when big tech companies started listening to various requests from random countries about their own domestic laws. One wonders what would today look like if they only enforced US law and told the other countries to fuck off and block them if it was really that necessary for national security or whatever reason they give.
- tailspin2019 5y agoWhen watching this week's iPhone keynote, it occurred to me that while they were showing all their environmental credentials, which seems to be given more prominence every time, what I'd really like to see is a slide on "supporting freedom and democracy". Apple do have the resources, influence and brand equity to make some strides here and it doesn't have to be completely philanthropic either - it can make business sense to edge towards being better in some of these areas. At the moment it feels a bit disingenuous to be so self-congratulatory on the environmental progress [1] when we're constantly reading articles about the conditions in their supply chain (which they do have responsibility for, despite the often touted excuse of "they're not their factories"). [1] I don't mean to talk down the importance of the environmental stuff - just that it's only one part of a wide spectrum of ethical areas that I think Apple could be addressing.
- busymom0 5y agoI liked how after showing all their environmental credentials, they released a phone which is basically the same thing as last year and none of their devices allow easy battery changes and they actively make it harder for third parties to do it.
- windowsrookie 5y agoApple makes it easier to replace a battery than Samsung phones. They only charge $69 for an out of warranty battery replacement. You can mail it in or go to an Apple store. Is there any modern (and waterproof) phone you can have a battery replaced easier or for less? https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/service/battery-power https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/service/battery-powe...
- Kenji 5y agoThis is why you need an app ecosystem without remote control.
- vladkovalev 5y agoSad times!
- qwerty456127 5y agoDoes this mean Google and Apple don't believe in its success? It seems logical that if it actually succeeded the elected officials would protect Google and Apple from prosecution.
- blunte 5y agoIn cases like this, why aren’t people using react native or even plain web apps? Seems to me you could avoid that whole obstacle.
- sakopov 5y agoWe're in a pandemic of cowardness.
- soheil 5y ago"Specifically, officials say the four American firms named in the letter are supporting users to access the Smart Voting website set up by supporters of jailed opposition figure Alexey Navalny, as well as a mobile phone application used by campaigners. Navalny’s operations were branded a ‘foreign agent’ by the country’s Ministry of Justice over links to foreign funding, and his organizations were later deemed to be ‘extremist’ and banned by a court in Moscow." [0] You can say whatever you want about how evil Google is or isn't, but this article is super misleading when Google simply following the law of the land it's operating in. It's doomed if it pulls the app and doomed if it doesn't. [0] http://web.archive.org/web/20210913070717/https://www.rt.com/russia/534453-roskomnadzor-elections-warning-google-apple/ http://web.archive.org/web/20210913070717/https://www.rt.com...
- speransky 5y agoif Russians are OK with current regime, why corps should fight for them
- jjj3j3j3j3 5y agoPutin is the only president who spend many many months living in a bunker 24x7, hiding from the coronavirus. I rarely seen a more fearful person than Putin.
- vzaliva 5y agoThis proves one thing - we need non-centralized application distribution mechaism which could not be censored. Neither Apple or Google or any 3rd party should control what I install on my phone. I know that unlike iOS, Android users can install programs directly or via alternative app stores on their phones. Direct installation is burdensome and does not provide updates. Alternative app stores (e.g. Amazon) are also controlled by corporations. We need a trully distributed censon-proof app store!
- jjtheblunt 5y agoIs the functionality of the app not reproducible with perhaps Discord or similar?
- fumeux_fume 5y agoJust another reminder that you should never delude yourself into thinking these companies are a force for anything moral or ethical.
- cronix 5y agoThey censor/remove apps based on political viewpoints of whatever is currently en vogue all the time, even in the US. We have already accepted this slope while it was being used against one political faction in a recent election. Everything from not allowing legitimate news to be posted or deleting your post if you mention specific whistleblower names, to editing the contents of private messages, to banning individuals, to banning apps. You are either for censorship, or you are against it, and it's not an a la carte deal based on your political leanings or an individual topic. As we allow, and cheer on censorship in some cases, I fully expect more and more to come as others look around and see how they got away with it, and it will eventually hit something you hold dear. But you'll happily accept it because you were for censoring that other thing and you're not a hypocrite, right?
- python273 5y agoMore context to why using apps, not websites or email: Smart Voting website is hosted on Google App Engine (appspot.com). The Russian government had no ability to block it for long time without affecting other Google services, since ISPs could block mostly by IP and via DNS spoofing. To block reliably by domain they would need to have DPI (deep packet inspection) hardware, and most ISPs had no DPI, since it's expensive. Even if they had it, they could only block by domain/ip, not by traffic signatures and reaction time was relatively slow. Now they improved censorship infrastructure and basically building Great Firewall. As I understand government controlled DPIs are now installed on Internet exchange points. So it's easier to block specific domains and protocols. Recently they: - were throttling Twitter (and every website with t.co substring, yeah) - blocked some opposition websites hosted on Appspot - DNS over HTTPS (DoH) servers used in the app (Google, Cloudflare, OpenDNS) - Bunny CDN, used in the app - docs.google.com, telegra.ph (voting list was published there) - DHT and BitTorrent - started blocking some VPN providers and attempted to block Wireguard protocol I think some of blocks (e.g. torrent) were used to test capability. Now that they can slow down websites and block more accurately, they have more leverage over tech companies. Apps have more ways to avoid blocking than websites and PWAs. E.g. by getting endpoints/data via updates, notifications, domain fronting. So the obvious next step was to attack app stores. --- You could enter your email on the website, but some of the emails got leaked. Considering many people used personal email addresses, it was possible to combine it with other leaks/DBs to get more personal information. Police visited some people registered on the website. So I guess people trust less giving their email addresses now.
- ezoe 5y agoWell, if their fault. None of this could happen if we have freedom on software distribution. The moral of this story is, don't use non-free computers.
- bradgessler 5y agoHere we go again, “AppleGoogle should stand up to the government!” This is a very naive view of how these companies work. They are so massive that they have to figure out how to operate __lawfully__ under wildly different jurisdictions. When they operate in countries like Russia that have different values than the United States, people get upset and blame the company. What we should really be doing is blaming the governments and try holding them to account. The only other option, which is crazy, would be for these massive tech companies to acquire their own militaries so they can impose their values on the world. Imagine an iPhone 18 commercial that touts privacy. It would show a fleet of Apple aircraft carriers with Apple bombers and Apple special forces teams standing by to coerce a government official that wants to search your iPhone to stand down. It’s kind of a silly joke, but at some level that’s where we’re at.
- bicepjai 5y agoMost arguments are against Apple and Google. Playing devils advocate here. If let’s say trump created an app to show how many people support him in USA and it shows 60% of voting population support him during election time, what would you want these companies to do ? IMHO meddling in countries’ election should be a strong NO.