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Hundreds of smartphone apps are monitoring users through their microphones

Escapade5160 1y ago
Everything comes back to ads. I think the end goal is to monetize every single moment of our lives in some way.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
TekMol 1y ago
When an app gathers information on someone - for example via the microphone - how does it assign the data to a person? Say the person says "I will buy a new car next week". Now what? How will the ad agency bombard the person with car ads? I mean outside of the one app that has gathered the information?
- bix6 1y ago
  They have various fingerprints including email logins and device ids. So then Google says tekmolAtGmail likes cars and lines up the perfect advertiser for you!
  - TekMol 1y ago
    How would the email end up in the ad system? Isn't it just a library the app developer includes and that runs in the background? Does it interact with the user and ask for their email? And fingerprinting? Even if the fingerprint is unique - now what? They still could only target the user while the user is using apps that are complicit in this advertising scheme, right?
    - xnx 1y ago
      Most(?) apps require a login now, so they have the users email address.
    - bix6 1y ago
      I am not an expert in these systems but it seems some have tremendous ability to link disparate data. At the simplest they have things like device IDs and emails from logged in users that make it easy; many users don’t or can’t opt out of the baseline tracking. If you do well now you’re special so they have to use other fingerprinting techniques. You can try and obfuscate which might change your ad package but they still know everything about you. I think your belief that they can only target while using the app is naive. They can sell the data to aggregators for more sophisticated use.
- PhilipRoman 1y ago
  Not an expert but I'd assume they keep track of the public IP of the device. When a site has bought this information and receives a request, they can record the link between person and account, so this needs to happen only once. On top of that you've got additional fingerprinting techniques to improve the accuracy.
- 3np 1y ago
  "Asking for a friend"?
gnabgib 1y ago
(2017) Original source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/28/business/media/alphonso-app-tracking.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/28/business/media/alphonso-a... > Please submit the original source. If a post reports on something found on another site, submit the latter. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
AzN1337c0d3r 1y ago
Duplicate HN submission from over 7! years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16119981 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16119981
- 243423443 1y ago
  5040 years is a long time ago.
klodolph 1y ago
We know that microphone use on iPhone requires an entitlement and if an app is actively using audio in the background, an indicator appears on the screen. This has been true for ages. I assume Android has something similar to this but I’m not in touch with the Android ecosystem. This article is pretty old so I can believe that apps, far enough in the past, could do this. But it is otherwise some fearmongering you would see copy-pasted among tech illiterate.
- izacus 1y ago
  It's the same on Android for a few versions now (including the mic indicator), so yeah.
neilv 1y ago
> Advertisers can then use this information to learn more about consumers and target ads more effectively. Stop writing like that. For decades, this prompted the consumer to say, Why would I care about advertisers showing me ads that are more relevant to me? And so consumers didn't care about privacy. Not realizing that that's not the entirety of what the surveillance will eventually be used for. Hopefully everyone isn't about to learn, the hard way, one of the worst case scenarios.
- orev 1y ago
  You just did the same thing—hinted at some larger risk but didn’t actually spell it out. I do agree that it’s long passed time that media needs to be way more direct instead of hoping the audience figures it out by themselves.
  - neilv 1y ago
    HN knows some of the risks, and I don't have to spell them out. I called out a journalist, writing for a broader audience, who was effectively implying to the populace that those risks don't exist, and that the only thing in question was how relevant the ads they are shown.
jokoon 1y ago
That's probably why I need to charge my phone so often.
blurbleblurble 1y ago
And here I thought we could get some substantive conversation going on this topic. What a huge disappointment. Why is this flagged?

Everything comes back to ads. I think the end goal is to monetize every single moment of our lives in some way.

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

When an app gathers information on someone - for example via the microphone - how does it assign the data to a person? Say the person says "I will buy a new car next week". Now what? How will the ad agency bombard the person with car ads? I mean outside of the one app that has gathered the information?

bix6 1y ago
They have various fingerprints including email logins and device ids. So then Google says tekmolAtGmail likes cars and lines up the perfect advertiser for you!
- TekMol 1y ago
  How would the email end up in the ad system? Isn't it just a library the app developer includes and that runs in the background? Does it interact with the user and ask for their email? And fingerprinting? Even if the fingerprint is unique - now what? They still could only target the user while the user is using apps that are complicit in this advertising scheme, right?
  - xnx 1y ago
    Most(?) apps require a login now, so they have the users email address.
  - bix6 1y ago
    I am not an expert in these systems but it seems some have tremendous ability to link disparate data. At the simplest they have things like device IDs and emails from logged in users that make it easy; many users don’t or can’t opt out of the baseline tracking. If you do well now you’re special so they have to use other fingerprinting techniques. You can try and obfuscate which might change your ad package but they still know everything about you. I think your belief that they can only target while using the app is naive. They can sell the data to aggregators for more sophisticated use.
PhilipRoman 1y ago
Not an expert but I'd assume they keep track of the public IP of the device. When a site has bought this information and receives a request, they can record the link between person and account, so this needs to happen only once. On top of that you've got additional fingerprinting techniques to improve the accuracy.
3np 1y ago
"Asking for a friend"?

gnabgib 1y ago

(2017) Original source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/28/business/media/alphonso-app-tracking.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/28/business/media/alphonso-a... > Please submit the original source. If a post reports on something found on another site, submit the latter. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

AzN1337c0d3r 1y ago

Duplicate HN submission from over 7! years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16119981 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16119981

243423443 1y ago
5040 years is a long time ago.

klodolph 1y ago

We know that microphone use on iPhone requires an entitlement and if an app is actively using audio in the background, an indicator appears on the screen. This has been true for ages. I assume Android has something similar to this but I’m not in touch with the Android ecosystem. This article is pretty old so I can believe that apps, far enough in the past, could do this. But it is otherwise some fearmongering you would see copy-pasted among tech illiterate.

izacus 1y ago
It's the same on Android for a few versions now (including the mic indicator), so yeah.

neilv 1y ago

> Advertisers can then use this information to learn more about consumers and target ads more effectively. Stop writing like that. For decades, this prompted the consumer to say, Why would I care about advertisers showing me ads that are more relevant to me? And so consumers didn't care about privacy. Not realizing that that's not the entirety of what the surveillance will eventually be used for. Hopefully everyone isn't about to learn, the hard way, one of the worst case scenarios.

orev 1y ago
You just did the same thing—hinted at some larger risk but didn’t actually spell it out. I do agree that it’s long passed time that media needs to be way more direct instead of hoping the audience figures it out by themselves.
- neilv 1y ago
  HN knows some of the risks, and I don't have to spell them out. I called out a journalist, writing for a broader audience, who was effectively implying to the populace that those risks don't exist, and that the only thing in question was how relevant the ads they are shown.

jokoon 1y ago

That's probably why I need to charge my phone so often.

blurbleblurble 1y ago

And here I thought we could get some substantive conversation going on this topic. What a huge disappointment. Why is this flagged?