19 ms·

Audible feedback on just how much your browsing feeds into Google

315 points by zimmerfrei 4y ago

throwaway2016a 4y ago
Perhaps I missed it but a video (with audio, presumably) of this working would be helpful.
- brookritz 4y ago
  https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544 https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544
  - throwaway2016a 4y ago
    Exactly what I was looking for, thank you!
  - InCityDreams 4y ago
    ...non twitter user.. .
cs02rm0 4y ago
Did anyone get it working on MacOS? I couldn't find the audio library in homebrew and gave up.
- viraptor 4y ago
  You can reference it the same way espeak does https://github.com/danielbair/homebrew-tap/blob/0550bfcd3b117a1e2544268473c0f39310c35908/espeak-ng.rb#L23 https://github.com/danielbair/homebrew-tap/blob/0550bfcd3b11... (tap that repo, then install)
- djhworld 4y ago
  other option is to clone the repo but pipe the output to the terminal bell instead - probably not as good as the OPs solution but has a similar effect :) sudo tcpdump -n -l dst net 192.0.2.1/32 $(for a in $(cat goog-prefixes.txt); do echo or dst net $a; done) | xargs -I {} bash -c "tput bel" EDIT: it's definitely not as good as the OPs solution as the bells sometimes get skipped when there are lots of packets.
- weystrom 4y ago
  sudo tcpdump -i en0 -n -l dst host 8.8.8.8 $(for a in $(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert/googerteller/main/goog-prefixes.txt); do echo or dst net $a; done) | while read; do tput bel; done Link to read the list (remember to read what you curl | bash): https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert/googerteller/main/goog-prefixes.txt https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert/googerteller/ma...
nousermane 4y ago
Or alternatively, you can send all the traffic destined to google, into dev-null instead: U=https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert\ /googerteller/main/goog-prefixes.txt for i in $(wget -qO - $U); do ip route add unreach $i done ...but you'd be surprised how many of seemingly unrelated places on the Internet would break without google.
- jnsaff2 4y ago
  Yeah, their captcha is everywhere for starters. Obviously a lot of other deps too.
  - 4m1rk 4y ago
    And Google fonts?
    - jnsaff2 4y ago
      Blocking google fonts creates weirdness but doesn't really break much.
  - 7373737373 4y ago
    How come there isn't a single open source captcha solution?
    - leodriesch 4y ago
      I’d say captchas are reliant on not being open about their detection methods, otherwise they would be easier to game. AFAIK the image selection is only part of determining you’re a human, the other part is tracking your mouse movement and so to see if you’re real.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - bogwog 4y ago
huhtenberg 4y ago
Would've probably piqued more interest if it were a browser plug-in.
- tclancy 4y ago
  How would it work with every other app sending data though?
- bilekas 4y ago
  It would probably burst your eardrums also! I prefer it how it is, very simple and effective, also I can actually gauge how much brave vs chrome etc. Obviously browser in my case will be heavier on google calls. But interesting to remember I have google drive floating around which I havent used in years.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  This would make a great plugin, and could be expanded to other companies: Your computer makes a noise when it tells Google what you're doing. It makes another noise when it tells Facebook what you're doing.
jmiskovic 4y ago
I got it running now and it's incredible how much of my interaction is being immediately reported. Having taken some steps before to block analytics, it's still going off like Geiger counter in the Zone. I always find it amazing when speaker is utilized to 'visualize' occasional events.
Wowfunhappy 4y ago
Not to make excuses for Google, but is this an entirely accurate portrayal? Like, I've been working on a web project that doesn't contain any analytics, but which stores and retrieves JSON data in Google Firebase. I imagine if I opened my website with this tool, I would hear lots of noise. But, I just can't imagine how Google could do anything useful (to them) with my random JSON blobs.
- akie 4y ago
  > But I can't imagine Google would know how to do anything useful (to them) with my random JSON blobs. They're not interested in the blobs, but in the people accessing them. Their whole suite of "free" developer tools (google analytics, google fonts, firebase, ...) are just a means to get information about what people do online.
  - Wowfunhappy 4y ago
    > They're not interested in the blobs, but in the people accessing them But if they don't know what the blobs are, how does this help them? What can they tie it to? The latitude and longitude coordinates of my current location have an sha1 hash of 0950e97d3a2e4839e39ad27deb2e852d498100ae. Is this useful information?
    - weberer 4y ago
      If the requests are client side, they know that the user has accessed your domain. They can analyze the frequency and timestamps of these requests and add that information to the ad profile they have built for that user.
    - viraptor 4y ago
      In isolation, no. But given enough other actors that use the same firebase + can be tracked by adsense, they can infer connections useful for targeting you.
      - akie 4y ago
kornhole 4y ago
A common explanation I get from people with poor digital hygiene is that they do not see how it is affecting them. Making the imperceptible perceptible is a great concept for more innovations. I have sent the kids in my house logs for their devices from the DNS blocker I have running on our network, but it was too much for them to digest. Perhaps I should work on a visualization tool of all the data that shows impacts of their data leakage and puts it in a video format they can consume. It sounds like a lot of work to build.
- nom 4y ago
  Maybe you could make a game out of it. The one with the least amount of request each (or whatever metric works) gets rewarded in some way and give them a dashboard to check progress. Not sure what negative side effects that could cause though, but i see some positives like using less social media, or learning how to cheat the system in clever ways.
  - eru 4y ago
    > Not sure what negative side effects that could cause though, [...] Sneakily use the other kid's device to browse?
- dylan604 4y ago
  Most adults' eyes glaze over when looking at access logs, so I couldn't imagine kids being interested. (Maybe your kids are grown, but the visual from first read didn't come across that way). Charts and graphs are the only way people not interested in data can even remotely become interested. If it's good enough for FPOTUS, then it should be a compelling enough reason to complete your idea.
  - kornhole 4y ago
    Good idea. I should start first with just graphs. Later we could video or gamify it.
    - 4y ago
handity 4y ago
I consider myself very privacy conscious, bordering on the paranoid. I use FOSS as much as possible, avoid FAANG, and remove surveillance from my life wherever I can. This tool shocked me. It exposes in a visceral way just how prevalent Google is, and does a better job getting that idea across than every video, article, post or comment I've consumed on the topic.
- kleer001 4y ago
  As a counter point (and you're not wrong, this is just my take)... I consider myself privacy and security and convenience conscious, not at all paranoid yet as I don't expect I have aroused the interest of a State power (touch wood). I use what most people use and prefer less friction over philosophically and/or ethically pure services. This tool made me shrug. Sure, yea, that's not an unexpected frequency, I guess. I haven't personally seen any disaster come from data shared to be sold or used for advertising. Mostly all I get advertized are things I've already bought (rolls eyes) or things I've said out loud (scowls). The hit rate for something I've been "told" to buy is like 0.001% The last hit was Dan Ariely's IRRATIONAL Game. Pretty cool, no? https://irrationalgame.com/ https://irrationalgame.com/
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - legacynl 4y ago
    "Rationally/ethically X sounds dangerous and bad, but I haven't seen any widespread disaster resulting from X, therefore X is fine/good enough, so I just try to not think about the ways X is bad and unethical"
    - kleer001 4y ago
      No. I never stated my ethics. I was only echoing the comment above, the statement of their ethics. Working your way through life requires heuristics and stereotypes based on our personal experience. If you have to think about which muscle to move and when while walking you'll fall down. If you want to sacrifice your ability to move quickly through the world to dogmatism, knock yourself out. I'm going to stick with fluency and real time behaviour that allows me to act in the world in a timely matter.
abledon 4y ago
needs a youtube link of demo in readme
- ColinWright 4y ago
  https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544 https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544
tehsauce 4y ago
Any videos of this in action?
kleer001 4y ago
Ok. What does it sound like on Firefox or Safari or Brave or anything other than Chrome (a Google product)?
- Kim_Bruning 4y ago
  Pretty much the same. (There's a Firefox video in the same Twitter thread mentioned earlier)
  - legacynl 4y ago
    and what if you disable search-suggestions?
paulwilsondev 4y ago
as if I wasn't already paranoid enough... this makes me more so... I was afraid it was going to read me what google learns, but hearing the pops makes me realize just how much I'm producing for Google every second.
soheil 4y ago
On OSX you can install this to get audio: https://github.com/espeak-ng/pcaudiolib https://github.com/espeak-ng/pcaudiolib
soheil 4y ago
This is absolutely epic and terrifying. Just moving my mouse makes it play the noise. It's not too dissimilar to a Geiger counter, it's most radioactive when you do a google search!
p1mrx 4y ago
goog-prefixes.txt only contains IPv4 addresses, so if you have IPv6, it'll miss most of the traffic.
thimkerbell 4y ago
So this is why when I google for information about [x], a day or so later Google News starts showing me bad news involving [x]?
MarcScott 4y ago
Video and audio here - https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544 https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544
- sippeangelo 4y ago
  I was hoping it would sound more like a Geiger counter!
felipelalli 4y ago
Is it possible to customize / extend? Apple? Twitter? Facebook etc?
jonas-w 4y ago
It's very silent for me. I tried going on google and then bam geiger counter mode activated. But i seem to have blocked enough to not have it go off every second.
su2 4y ago
Cool idea! I replaced the "teller" program part also with shell script, so that one would give you the clicking without the need to compile: sudo tcpdump -n -l dst host 8.8.8.8 $(for a in $(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert/googerteller/main/goog-prefixes.txt); do echo or dst net $a; done) | while read; do paplay /usr/share/sounds/freedesktop/stereo/dialog-information.oga; done Quite enlightening to have that running while browsing...
- bertman 4y ago
  Thanks! And people that don't have pulseaudio can replace `paplay` with `pw-cat -p` from pipewire.

315 points by zimmerfrei 4y ago

throwaway2016a 4y ago

Perhaps I missed it but a video (with audio, presumably) of this working would be helpful.

brookritz 4y ago
https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544 https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544
- throwaway2016a 4y ago
  Exactly what I was looking for, thank you!
- InCityDreams 4y ago
  ...non twitter user.. .

cs02rm0 4y ago

Did anyone get it working on MacOS? I couldn't find the audio library in homebrew and gave up.

viraptor 4y ago
You can reference it the same way espeak does https://github.com/danielbair/homebrew-tap/blob/0550bfcd3b117a1e2544268473c0f39310c35908/espeak-ng.rb#L23 https://github.com/danielbair/homebrew-tap/blob/0550bfcd3b11... (tap that repo, then install)
djhworld 4y ago
other option is to clone the repo but pipe the output to the terminal bell instead - probably not as good as the OPs solution but has a similar effect :) sudo tcpdump -n -l dst net 192.0.2.1/32 $(for a in $(cat goog-prefixes.txt); do echo or dst net $a; done) | xargs -I {} bash -c "tput bel" EDIT: it's definitely not as good as the OPs solution as the bells sometimes get skipped when there are lots of packets.
weystrom 4y ago
sudo tcpdump -i en0 -n -l dst host 8.8.8.8 $(for a in $(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert/googerteller/main/goog-prefixes.txt); do echo or dst net $a; done) | while read; do tput bel; done Link to read the list (remember to read what you curl | bash): https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert/googerteller/main/goog-prefixes.txt https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert/googerteller/ma...

nousermane 4y ago

Or alternatively, you can send all the traffic destined to google, into dev-null instead: U=https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert\ /googerteller/main/goog-prefixes.txt for i in $(wget -qO - $U); do ip route add unreach $i done ...but you'd be surprised how many of seemingly unrelated places on the Internet would break without google.

jnsaff2 4y ago
Yeah, their captcha is everywhere for starters. Obviously a lot of other deps too.
- 4m1rk 4y ago
  And Google fonts?
  - jnsaff2 4y ago
    Blocking google fonts creates weirdness but doesn't really break much.
- 7373737373 4y ago
  How come there isn't a single open source captcha solution?
  - leodriesch 4y ago
    I’d say captchas are reliant on not being open about their detection methods, otherwise they would be easier to game. AFAIK the image selection is only part of determining you’re a human, the other part is tracking your mouse movement and so to see if you’re real.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - bogwog 4y ago

huhtenberg 4y ago

Would've probably piqued more interest if it were a browser plug-in.

tclancy 4y ago
How would it work with every other app sending data though?
bilekas 4y ago
It would probably burst your eardrums also! I prefer it how it is, very simple and effective, also I can actually gauge how much brave vs chrome etc. Obviously browser in my case will be heavier on google calls. But interesting to remember I have google drive floating around which I havent used in years.
pessimizer 4y ago
This would make a great plugin, and could be expanded to other companies: Your computer makes a noise when it tells Google what you're doing. It makes another noise when it tells Facebook what you're doing.

jmiskovic 4y ago

I got it running now and it's incredible how much of my interaction is being immediately reported. Having taken some steps before to block analytics, it's still going off like Geiger counter in the Zone. I always find it amazing when speaker is utilized to 'visualize' occasional events.

Wowfunhappy 4y ago

Not to make excuses for Google, but is this an entirely accurate portrayal? Like, I've been working on a web project that doesn't contain any analytics, but which stores and retrieves JSON data in Google Firebase. I imagine if I opened my website with this tool, I would hear lots of noise. But, I just can't imagine how Google could do anything useful (to them) with my random JSON blobs.

akie 4y ago
> But I can't imagine Google would know how to do anything useful (to them) with my random JSON blobs. They're not interested in the blobs, but in the people accessing them. Their whole suite of "free" developer tools (google analytics, google fonts, firebase, ...) are just a means to get information about what people do online.
- Wowfunhappy 4y ago
  > They're not interested in the blobs, but in the people accessing them But if they don't know what the blobs are, how does this help them? What can they tie it to? The latitude and longitude coordinates of my current location have an sha1 hash of 0950e97d3a2e4839e39ad27deb2e852d498100ae. Is this useful information?
  - weberer 4y ago
    If the requests are client side, they know that the user has accessed your domain. They can analyze the frequency and timestamps of these requests and add that information to the ad profile they have built for that user.
  - viraptor 4y ago
    In isolation, no. But given enough other actors that use the same firebase + can be tracked by adsense, they can infer connections useful for targeting you.
    - akie 4y ago

kornhole 4y ago

A common explanation I get from people with poor digital hygiene is that they do not see how it is affecting them. Making the imperceptible perceptible is a great concept for more innovations. I have sent the kids in my house logs for their devices from the DNS blocker I have running on our network, but it was too much for them to digest. Perhaps I should work on a visualization tool of all the data that shows impacts of their data leakage and puts it in a video format they can consume. It sounds like a lot of work to build.

nom 4y ago
Maybe you could make a game out of it. The one with the least amount of request each (or whatever metric works) gets rewarded in some way and give them a dashboard to check progress. Not sure what negative side effects that could cause though, but i see some positives like using less social media, or learning how to cheat the system in clever ways.
- eru 4y ago
  > Not sure what negative side effects that could cause though, [...] Sneakily use the other kid's device to browse?
dylan604 4y ago
Most adults' eyes glaze over when looking at access logs, so I couldn't imagine kids being interested. (Maybe your kids are grown, but the visual from first read didn't come across that way). Charts and graphs are the only way people not interested in data can even remotely become interested. If it's good enough for FPOTUS, then it should be a compelling enough reason to complete your idea.
- kornhole 4y ago
  Good idea. I should start first with just graphs. Later we could video or gamify it.
  - 4y ago

handity 4y ago

I consider myself very privacy conscious, bordering on the paranoid. I use FOSS as much as possible, avoid FAANG, and remove surveillance from my life wherever I can. This tool shocked me. It exposes in a visceral way just how prevalent Google is, and does a better job getting that idea across than every video, article, post or comment I've consumed on the topic.

kleer001 4y ago
As a counter point (and you're not wrong, this is just my take)... I consider myself privacy and security and convenience conscious, not at all paranoid yet as I don't expect I have aroused the interest of a State power (touch wood). I use what most people use and prefer less friction over philosophically and/or ethically pure services. This tool made me shrug. Sure, yea, that's not an unexpected frequency, I guess. I haven't personally seen any disaster come from data shared to be sold or used for advertising. Mostly all I get advertized are things I've already bought (rolls eyes) or things I've said out loud (scowls). The hit rate for something I've been "told" to buy is like 0.001% The last hit was Dan Ariely's IRRATIONAL Game. Pretty cool, no? https://irrationalgame.com/ https://irrationalgame.com/
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- legacynl 4y ago
  "Rationally/ethically X sounds dangerous and bad, but I haven't seen any widespread disaster resulting from X, therefore X is fine/good enough, so I just try to not think about the ways X is bad and unethical"
  - kleer001 4y ago
    No. I never stated my ethics. I was only echoing the comment above, the statement of their ethics. Working your way through life requires heuristics and stereotypes based on our personal experience. If you have to think about which muscle to move and when while walking you'll fall down. If you want to sacrifice your ability to move quickly through the world to dogmatism, knock yourself out. I'm going to stick with fluency and real time behaviour that allows me to act in the world in a timely matter.

abledon 4y ago

needs a youtube link of demo in readme

ColinWright 4y ago
https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544 https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544

tehsauce 4y ago

Any videos of this in action?

kleer001 4y ago

Ok. What does it sound like on Firefox or Safari or Brave or anything other than Chrome (a Google product)?

Kim_Bruning 4y ago
Pretty much the same. (There's a Firefox video in the same Twitter thread mentioned earlier)
- legacynl 4y ago
  and what if you disable search-suggestions?

paulwilsondev 4y ago

as if I wasn't already paranoid enough... this makes me more so... I was afraid it was going to read me what google learns, but hearing the pops makes me realize just how much I'm producing for Google every second.

soheil 4y ago

On OSX you can install this to get audio: https://github.com/espeak-ng/pcaudiolib https://github.com/espeak-ng/pcaudiolib

soheil 4y ago

This is absolutely epic and terrifying. Just moving my mouse makes it play the noise. It's not too dissimilar to a Geiger counter, it's most radioactive when you do a google search!

p1mrx 4y ago

goog-prefixes.txt only contains IPv4 addresses, so if you have IPv6, it'll miss most of the traffic.

thimkerbell 4y ago

So this is why when I google for information about [x], a day or so later Google News starts showing me bad news involving [x]?

MarcScott 4y ago

Video and audio here - https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544 https://twitter.com/bert_hu_bert/status/1561466204602220544

sippeangelo 4y ago
I was hoping it would sound more like a Geiger counter!

felipelalli 4y ago

Is it possible to customize / extend? Apple? Twitter? Facebook etc?

jonas-w 4y ago

It's very silent for me. I tried going on google and then bam geiger counter mode activated. But i seem to have blocked enough to not have it go off every second.

su2 4y ago

Cool idea! I replaced the "teller" program part also with shell script, so that one would give you the clicking without the need to compile: sudo tcpdump -n -l dst host 8.8.8.8 $(for a in $(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/berthubert/googerteller/main/goog-prefixes.txt); do echo or dst net $a; done) | while read; do paplay /usr/share/sounds/freedesktop/stereo/dialog-information.oga; done Quite enlightening to have that running while browsing...

bertman 4y ago
Thanks! And people that don't have pulseaudio can replace `paplay` with `pw-cat -p` from pipewire.