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Secret Service Says Users Agreed to Location Tracking in Terms and Conditions
- JohnFen 2y agoIt should be illegal for government agencies to do this. Perhaps, though, this will increase people's awareness that these terms and conditions are typically extremely permissive, and that permissiveness is a real risk to them. Especially now.
- java-man 2y agoAll these years (decades?) we've been warning about the dangers of wholesale surveillance, collecting and never erasing tracking, metadata, anything the government of private sector can get the hands on. The end result? The population have spoken. They don't care. It might be too late already, or maybe we have another few years left, I don't know. Everyone aware of the XX century history, I think, sees the rise of the fa^H^H danger as inevitability. It happened after the WWI, it happened after the breakup of the Soviet Union, and the result is the same. We have interesting times ahead of us. This time it will be backed by a fully functional surveillance apparatus capable of finding everything about a _suspicious_ citizens in seconds. We've been warned and we failed to act.
- fsflover 2y ago> The population have spoken. They don't care. What are the options? Protesting? Edit: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20207348 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20207348
- nunobrito 2y agoProtest is good, supporting alternatives is better. Two weeks ago we hosted in Coimbra the first portuguese event dedicated to NOSTR, only 15 people showed up but they travelled north/south of the country to be there. More people or less people it does not matter, we will raise attention that exist options for using the networks without this constant tracking. You can also do something too.
- fsflover 2y agoHow about regulations? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23090393 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23090393
- nunobrito 2y agoIf you dive deeper into EU regulations you will soon find they have near-zero interest in user privacy. They are forced by voters to put a show, the practical result is what you see. We shouldn't wait for a government to apply technological measures for our privacy, we should instead be an active part in making sure they exist and become popular.
- fsflover 2y ago> If you dive deeper into EU regulations you will soon find they have near-zero interest in user privacy. I dived into it and didn't see what you suggested. Even Google added "reject all cookies" in EU recently. > we should instead be an active part in making sure they exist and become popular. Why not both? Sent from my Librem 5.
- nunobrito 2y ago> I dived into it and didn't see what you suggested. Even Google added "reject all cookies" in EU recently. Was a silly measure that is Too litle, too slow and too late. A proper measure could have been to request web browsers to define preferred user settings and to use that instead. Cookies are stored/retrieved from web browsers. > Why not both? Sure, go ahead. Maybe some day, something changes.
- jmclnx 2y agoOptions ? Do not use Smart Phones, maybe a Burner Phone would be ok
- ranger_danger 2y agoyou don't need a smart phone to have your location tracked
- prmoustache 2y agoUsing a web browser with location disabled instead of smartphone apps.
- 0cf8612b2e1e 2y agoMost websites add incredible friction if you do not use the app. I am willing to bear it, but I can understand why many do not.
- prmoustache 2y agowhich brings us back to point 1: people don't care or much less than practicality.
- fsflover 2y agoThis is not true. People just don't know what to do about it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20207348 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20207348
- jauntywundrkind 2y agoIt should be illegal for companies to do this to us. Our only option is to not use cell service? Bah. Further enhances my feel that internet connectivity should be a utility, not a for profit service at all.
- gruez 2y ago>It should be illegal for companies to do this to us. Our only option is to not use cell service? Bah. That's not what the article describes, though: "Locate X which uses location data harvested from ordinary apps installed on phones"
- teeray 2y ago> these terms and conditions are typically extremely permissive T&C are dark, twisty forests of legalese that can shift, seemingly at any time. As a consumer, if you want to do something as simple as pay to park your car, you need to sign the T&C in blood or you get towed. Is it really an agreement if you must agree to it for basic necessities?
- JohnFen 2y agoYes, I totally agree. The T&C situation is dire and need to be addressed. For instance, the idea that you engaged in anything remotely like "consent" because of vague generalities in T&C documents is laughable on its face. That said, it's the legal framework we have to deal with in the now.
- MichaelZuo 2y agoHow do you propose to address it such that end result is a net positive, instead of net negative?
- jerf 2y agoCommon law nominally already has some principles built into it that can answer that in a reasonable way. Contracts that are super lopsided are already nominally invalid. Contracts that are incomprehensible and signed under duress are already nominally invalid. As you may guess from my phrasing, I am well aware that in the present environment, believing that that meant much would be a childish level of naivety. But the principles can still be used to answer your questions in a reasonable way. It really wouldn't be that hard to lay down some principles that privacy violations are an expense above and beyond, say, "parking my car". It is unreasonable for a person to think that the price of parking my car is $1.25 an hour and also arbitrary privacy violations and also you gave up your right to privacy from the government and also in six years if you sue a related entity they'll cite your parking agreement as the reason why you're not allowed to sue them (see recent Disney wrongful death case). $1.25/hour was already a fair price, give or take a couple of multiplicative factors. Taking a whole whackload of additional rights in the fine print under what can reasonably be called duress relative to the claims being made, beyond what a "reasonable person" would expect to be necessary to just complete the basic transaction, is not that hard to write some principles around. This is why judges are still human.
- jmclnx 2y agoTrue, but as people here know, Cell Phones are now nothing by Spy Devices. Any cell company can get your data and pass it on to anyone they chose or who pays enough.
- mrandish 2y agoIndeed. The crazy thing is that so many people still don't understand this. For the last few years I leave my phone's GPS perma-off unless I'm actively navigating. Of course, I also have my location permissions for apps defaulted off and locked down (except for the two apps I grant conditional access to). I realize that cell tower tracking exists and is used by my mobile provider instead but at least it's a little less accurate. As a side benefit, my battery life is much better. I've also adopted the healthy lifestyle choice of not using any social media apps on my mobile device (which is surprisingly wonderful once you make the leap). I mostly just use my phone to make and receive calls and texts (and as a remote for my home automation).
- sgc 2y agoWhat assurances do you have that your "perma-off" setting is even minimally respected? Unless you have a physical disconnect for the chip, I would presume it is still gathering data and that data is being shipped out. There are just fewer companies that can do it.
- gruez 2y ago>What assurances do you have that your "perma-off" setting is even minimally respected? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell's_teapot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell's_teapot >Unless you have a physical disconnect for the chip, I would presume it is still gathering data and that data is being shipped out. There are just fewer companies that can do it. If your paranoia level is this high, what makes you think they won't put a backup GPS receiver in the SoC or modem? They're perfect places for it, because they have tons of traces connected to them that you could piggy back off one to use as a rudimentary antenna.
- Molitor5901 2y agoLocal government agencies do this all the time. They bypass warrants by just buying the data through brokers.
- amluto 2y ago> It should be illegal for government agencies to do this. I don’t understand why the law should specifically limit the government like that. I think it should be illegal for anyone to do this.
- ryandvm 2y agoOpen Source software should fight back with license agreements that include poison pills for companies that distribute products that have nefarious terms in their license agreements. Most of these companies wouldn't get very far if they had to build their own products from soup to nuts.
- potato3732842 2y agoIf they're not using Locate X anymore it's because they've replaced it with something equal or better... Or they're lying. Cops do that a lot too. But I personally think it's more likely that they have a replacement.
- xhkkffbf 2y agoLocate Y. Maybe Locate X2 or Locate X_2
- josefritzishere 2y agoThis feels like crime.
- samatman 2y agohttps://archive.ph/VJKSE https://archive.ph/VJKSE
- mysterydip 2y agoI once went to a website that popped up the usual "we share your data with a few trusted third parties", and when I clicked "more details" it showed a list of nearly 700 it shared data with. I'm not even sure I know that many real people. And I'm sure most just hit OK to get the window out of the way.
- rgbswan 2y agoYeah, and they all have "legitimate interests" in our data ò_Ó
- gosub100 2y agoI swear there's a market to pay for third-world labor to click every link of every major website and store the pages as plain html text, pictures and links. Have image recognition to automatically cut the chum and pop ups, cookies, subscription warnings, and gdpr notices. Users pay $4/mo and access recent copies of whatever they normally browse. Either via a browser extension or a URL router (that served up cached versions, the delay wouldn't work to have someone viewing the site for you and filtering it in realtime). Imagine having your daily news as a clean PDF document with working links. It might also have the psychological effect of signalling when you're "done" similar to reaching the end of a newspaper
- ssl-3 2y agohttps://archive.ph/WUBCL https://archive.ph/WUBCL
- yapyap 2y agoyeah.. they know nobody reads that
- readthenotes1 2y agoThis is probably unpopular, but I think secret service should have the same right to our data that the thousands of companies have. If they want to know my screen orientation, battery charge level, and location every 10 seconds, I don't see why it should be any more illegal for.them to have it than any other agency of any other government in the world, not to mention all the corporate entities...
- catlifeonmars 2y agoWhat makes you think the “thousands of companies” should have the legal right to our data?
- readthenotes1 2y agoNone whatsoever, other than I and millions of others have agreed to it. But my point is the secret service should have the same access. And I don't know why anyone would assume that the United States secret service is the only intelligence agency using that data
- catlifeonmars 2y agoYour argument is basically “things should be equal, so that they are equal”. That’s not very compelling. I assume you have better arguments to make your case. What are they?
- readthenotes1 2y agoI don't think we should be outrage because one piece of the US government has our data. We should be outraged many pieces of many governments have our data. If we're not outraged that whatever it's called in China or North Korea or Brazil has it we shouldn't be outraged that the secret service has it
- catlifeonmars 2y agoWho says I’m not? I don’t understand your point at all.
- worik 2y agoThe app stores want a monopoly, and the right to charge large fees from developers and consumers, to protect us Then they do not Liars
- spanktheuser 2y ago>The Secret Service told 404 Media in an email last week it is no longer using the tool. Given that parsing non-denial-denials is journalism 101, I wonder at 404’s studious incuriosity about the Secret Service statement. Here are some questions I would ask the Secret Service on the record if this was my story. 1. Does the Secret Service use other tools, partners or methods to collect location data on Americans without establishing probable cause and obtaining a warrant? 2. Does the secret service collect the location data of all Americans, or does it target certain groups in particular? If the latter, how does the service decide who to target? 3. What other crimes become non-crimes if the private company hired to commit them gets the victim to check a box labeled “I agree to the terms of service” prior to watching a funny cat video? 4. Hypothetically speaking, is it now legal for me to start the “uber for loansharking” if my terms of service indicate that the penalty for late payment is kneecapping by non-employee gig muscle? 5. Can the secret service identify my source for this story by determining who i’ve been meeting for lunch at the Holiday Inn every Friday for the past two months? If so will your wife be in a lot of trouble?
- gs17 2y ago> if my terms of service indicate that the penalty for late payment is kneecapping by non-employee gig muscle? Why stop there? If ToS overrides the 4th Amendment, why not the 13th?
- bajo11 2y ago[dead]