4 ms·

It's not your computer so of course it isn't private. Apparently you do need to be technical to understand that.

by Am4TIfIsER0ppos 1y ago

amelius 1y ago
So basically, everything that happens on an iPhone is not private?
- msgodel 1y ago
  Lol yes we've been warning people about that for years.
9dev 1y ago
Yes, you do indeed need to be technical to understand that. The tech industry, and that includes most of us here (especially all the FAANG people that curiously always stay silent in threads like this one), has worked very hard to make everyone believe that online privacy is a thing, while working even harder to undermine that at every possible step. Ordinary people expect stuff that they don't actively share with others to stay private. Rightly so! It's the ad industry that got it wrong, not the People.
- whatevertrevor 1y ago
  The FAANG people also have a lot of direct personal experience contradicting a lot of mainstream FUD titled "All your data is being sold to the lowest bidder". Having worked at one of those companies (and having quit that job being disillusioned by a lot of things), there is still so much mainstream misinformation about this. Yes data is often used for tracking and training. In aggregate form. Sensitive data is anonymized/de-id-ed. The leading research on these techniques are also coming out from these companies btw. There are layers and layers of policy and permission safeguards before you're allowed to access user data directly as an engineer. And if/when someone tries to exploit the legitimate pathways to touch user data (say customer support), they get promptly fired. But it's much easier to believe that FAANG is some great monolithic evil, out to surveil you personally for some vague benefit that never gets specified. All the legitimate concrete monetary benefits (e.g. tracking for ad targeting work and training ML models) can be had just as well with aggregate data, but privacy FUD doesn't want to listen to that. Meanwhile stupid legislation and the ability of courts and law-enforcement to subpoena any data they want whenever they want keeps data on their servers longer than they'd want to. Yet people will prefer to blame the "Evil Tech Cartel" instead of multiple branches of their government wanting to read their texts and GPS logs.
  - 9dev 1y ago
    > All your data is being sold to the lowest bidder There aren't that many possibilities on how geolocation data vendors get access to high-precision location data of millions of people. A publicly traded company that generates revenue from targeted ads can never be fully trusted to behave. A social network that optimizes for time spent looking at ads will never really care about its users well-being. Algorithmic feeds are responsible for a widening social divide and loneliness. Highly detailed behavioral analysis can hurt people even when aggregated, for example when they get less favorable insurance terms based on their spending habits. Data that can be used to increase revenue will not be left untouched just to keep moral higher ground. Sensitive information shared with an LLM that end up in training data today might have dangerous consequences tomorrow, there is no way to know yet. This isn't even about proper handling of individual pieces of data, but the higher-order effects of handing control over both the world's information and the attention of its inhabitations to shareholder-backed mega-corporations. There are perverse incentives at play here, and anyone engaging in this game carries responsibility for the outcome.
    - whatevertrevor 1y ago
      > There aren't that many possibilities on how geolocation data vendors get access to high-precision location data of millions of people. In a world where cellphones have all sorts of radio antennas on at all times, there are more ways than you'd think. > A publicly traded company that generates revenue from targeted ads can never be fully trusted to behave. A social network that optimizes for time spent looking at ads will never really care about its users well-being. Algorithmic feeds are responsible for a widening social divide and loneliness. I'm really not interested in debating dogmatic philosophy about how cynical one should be in the world. The entire point of my comment was that cynicism induces FUD that's not necessarily backed by direct evidence. One can come up with all sorts of different theories to explain what's happening in the world. Just because they sound somewhat consistent on the surface, doesn't mean they're true. That's just inverted inference. I do agree with you that there are bad incentives in play here, but if we don't want them to be exploited and actually care about privacy, we should convince our effing legislators to plug the loopholes and enshrine online privacy in actual law. Instead of companies being able to write whatever they want in their Terms of Service. And then create mechanisms to enforce said legislation. Instead of moralizing actions of a company as some sort of monolithic (un)-ethical entity. I think humanizing and moralizing the actions of large companies is a gigantic waste of time. Not only it accomplishes nothing, it gives us (the affected party) a distraction from focusing our efforts on the representatives that we elected who aren't doing their job. Maybe it's representative of where we feel we can make change
- msgodel 1y ago
  I never talked about it because it seemed obvious to me until today. I kind of see why people are confused now that I think about it a bit and read other people's replies.
BeFlatXIII 1y ago
Imagine treating the 3rd party doctrine as legitimate instead of a misruling.
ryanjshaw 1y ago
My doctor’s notes aren’t on my computer. Does that mean I should expect them to pop up on the internet?

It's not your computer so of course it isn't private. Apparently you do need to be technical to understand that.

amelius 1y ago

So basically, everything that happens on an iPhone is not private?

msgodel 1y ago
Lol yes we've been warning people about that for years.

9dev 1y ago

Yes, you do indeed need to be technical to understand that. The tech industry, and that includes most of us here (especially all the FAANG people that curiously always stay silent in threads like this one), has worked very hard to make everyone believe that online privacy is a thing, while working even harder to undermine that at every possible step. Ordinary people expect stuff that they don't actively share with others to stay private. Rightly so! It's the ad industry that got it wrong, not the People.

whatevertrevor 1y ago
The FAANG people also have a lot of direct personal experience contradicting a lot of mainstream FUD titled "All your data is being sold to the lowest bidder". Having worked at one of those companies (and having quit that job being disillusioned by a lot of things), there is still so much mainstream misinformation about this. Yes data is often used for tracking and training. In aggregate form. Sensitive data is anonymized/de-id-ed. The leading research on these techniques are also coming out from these companies btw. There are layers and layers of policy and permission safeguards before you're allowed to access user data directly as an engineer. And if/when someone tries to exploit the legitimate pathways to touch user data (say customer support), they get promptly fired. But it's much easier to believe that FAANG is some great monolithic evil, out to surveil you personally for some vague benefit that never gets specified. All the legitimate concrete monetary benefits (e.g. tracking for ad targeting work and training ML models) can be had just as well with aggregate data, but privacy FUD doesn't want to listen to that. Meanwhile stupid legislation and the ability of courts and law-enforcement to subpoena any data they want whenever they want keeps data on their servers longer than they'd want to. Yet people will prefer to blame the "Evil Tech Cartel" instead of multiple branches of their government wanting to read their texts and GPS logs.
- 9dev 1y ago
  > All your data is being sold to the lowest bidder There aren't that many possibilities on how geolocation data vendors get access to high-precision location data of millions of people. A publicly traded company that generates revenue from targeted ads can never be fully trusted to behave. A social network that optimizes for time spent looking at ads will never really care about its users well-being. Algorithmic feeds are responsible for a widening social divide and loneliness. Highly detailed behavioral analysis can hurt people even when aggregated, for example when they get less favorable insurance terms based on their spending habits. Data that can be used to increase revenue will not be left untouched just to keep moral higher ground. Sensitive information shared with an LLM that end up in training data today might have dangerous consequences tomorrow, there is no way to know yet. This isn't even about proper handling of individual pieces of data, but the higher-order effects of handing control over both the world's information and the attention of its inhabitations to shareholder-backed mega-corporations. There are perverse incentives at play here, and anyone engaging in this game carries responsibility for the outcome.
  - whatevertrevor 1y ago
    > There aren't that many possibilities on how geolocation data vendors get access to high-precision location data of millions of people. In a world where cellphones have all sorts of radio antennas on at all times, there are more ways than you'd think. > A publicly traded company that generates revenue from targeted ads can never be fully trusted to behave. A social network that optimizes for time spent looking at ads will never really care about its users well-being. Algorithmic feeds are responsible for a widening social divide and loneliness. I'm really not interested in debating dogmatic philosophy about how cynical one should be in the world. The entire point of my comment was that cynicism induces FUD that's not necessarily backed by direct evidence. One can come up with all sorts of different theories to explain what's happening in the world. Just because they sound somewhat consistent on the surface, doesn't mean they're true. That's just inverted inference. I do agree with you that there are bad incentives in play here, but if we don't want them to be exploited and actually care about privacy, we should convince our effing legislators to plug the loopholes and enshrine online privacy in actual law. Instead of companies being able to write whatever they want in their Terms of Service. And then create mechanisms to enforce said legislation. Instead of moralizing actions of a company as some sort of monolithic (un)-ethical entity. I think humanizing and moralizing the actions of large companies is a gigantic waste of time. Not only it accomplishes nothing, it gives us (the affected party) a distraction from focusing our efforts on the representatives that we elected who aren't doing their job. Maybe it's representative of where we feel we can make change
msgodel 1y ago
I never talked about it because it seemed obvious to me until today. I kind of see why people are confused now that I think about it a bit and read other people's replies.

BeFlatXIII 1y ago

Imagine treating the 3rd party doctrine as legitimate instead of a misruling.

ryanjshaw 1y ago

My doctor’s notes aren’t on my computer. Does that mean I should expect them to pop up on the internet?