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It'll be like Android's location sharing with Google. Nothing works unless you agree to a wholesale google location surveillance. Then they can say you agreed t

by deskr 2y ago

It'll be like Android's location sharing with Google. Nothing works unless you agree to a wholesale google location surveillance. Then they can say you agreed to this.

jeroenhd 2y ago
I disagree. Things may be different in the EU, but for every feature that triggered the "enable location history" popup, it made a lot of sense to require it. And, most importantly, you can just turn it off and everything important keeps working. You can disable the "send a list of nearby cell towers to Google's live database" setting, the "send a list of Bluetooth beacons to Google's live database" setting, and the "send a list of WiFi networks to Google's live database" setting, all without losing location access. Your location access will become a lot slower, but that's just a consequence of having to rely on GPS again, like we did before all of these extra features became available. Google is even making their location history feature worse because they don't like how many blanket location history requests they're receiving from authorities, by moving location history to be stored on-device. For years Google lied about consent users supposedly gave for some types of location tracking, but after they got found out (and the authorities got involved) they changed their tune.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- JohnFen 2y ago
  > after they got found out (and the authorities got involved) they changed their tune. So we can expect similar shenanigans when it comes to the "privacy sandbox".
  - deskr 2y ago
    Only until they're found out.
- vmfunction 2y ago
  >For years Google lied about consent users supposedly gave for some types of location tracking, but after they got found out (and the authorities got involved) they changed their tune. And I will never trust google again after that with my person important data! No matter what day do now!
- hedora 2y ago
  The location API sends your gps position to google so they can annotate it. They claim they don’t record your history, but, at the very least, as a US company, they have to share it with the authorities. If you could truly opt out, then it’d be much easier to use third party software without google play services installed.
- rjh29 2y ago
  There is so much stuff Chrome sends to Google though. I was curious how their autofill implementation works and... there is code to send a list of all form and field names to a Google API. That alone could be sensitive information.

by deskr 2y ago

It'll be like Android's location sharing with Google. Nothing works unless you agree to a wholesale google location surveillance. Then they can say you agreed to this.

jeroenhd 2y ago

I disagree. Things may be different in the EU, but for every feature that triggered the "enable location history" popup, it made a lot of sense to require it. And, most importantly, you can just turn it off and everything important keeps working. You can disable the "send a list of nearby cell towers to Google's live database" setting, the "send a list of Bluetooth beacons to Google's live database" setting, and the "send a list of WiFi networks to Google's live database" setting, all without losing location access. Your location access will become a lot slower, but that's just a consequence of having to rely on GPS again, like we did before all of these extra features became available. Google is even making their location history feature worse because they don't like how many blanket location history requests they're receiving from authorities, by moving location history to be stored on-device. For years Google lied about consent users supposedly gave for some types of location tracking, but after they got found out (and the authorities got involved) they changed their tune.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
JohnFen 2y ago
> after they got found out (and the authorities got involved) they changed their tune. So we can expect similar shenanigans when it comes to the "privacy sandbox".
- deskr 2y ago
  Only until they're found out.
vmfunction 2y ago
>For years Google lied about consent users supposedly gave for some types of location tracking, but after they got found out (and the authorities got involved) they changed their tune. And I will never trust google again after that with my person important data! No matter what day do now!
hedora 2y ago
The location API sends your gps position to google so they can annotate it. They claim they don’t record your history, but, at the very least, as a US company, they have to share it with the authorities. If you could truly opt out, then it’d be much easier to use third party software without google play services installed.
rjh29 2y ago
There is so much stuff Chrome sends to Google though. I was curious how their autofill implementation works and... there is code to send a list of all form and field names to a Google API. That alone could be sensitive information.