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This is pure speculation, neither original nor insightful, and like the parent I'm tired of it. Now, in light of the recent revelations and since we don't know
by Livven 13y ago
This is pure speculation, neither original nor insightful, and like the parent I'm tired of it.
Now, in light of the recent revelations and since we don't know what we don't know, these comments probably can't be labelled as complete garbage like your regular conspiracy theories. But instead of idly speculating about the same things in every single comment thread it'd be far more useful, both for this cause and for the people who want a saner Hacker News, to do some actual technical analysis. Which in this case isn't that hard.
If you're really concerned about your smartphone spying on you, just hook it up to a packet sniffer and analyze the data it transfers over the internet. Since image and audio files will have to be of considerable size in order to be useful they should be fairly easy to spot, especially in the upload direction.
I'm sure nobody here would mind a submission or comment with any kind of technical analysis. Actually I don't even mind speculation, but the constant repeating of the same points, without any technical basis, in almost every single comment thread is what gets annoying for me.
- chris_mahan 13y agoHow do you hook up the phone to a packet sniffer if they want to upload the "extra data" via 3g/4g/4gLTE and not make that appear on your bill, and specifically not go through wifi. Also, 3g/4g is encrypted.
- Livven 13y agoSo disable all background services and don't access anything that uses data on your phone and see what the carrier bills you? Unless you believe that Apple somehow has secret arrangements with every mobile operator... in which case you could simply get a MiFi and tether all your smartphone traffic through that, problem solved. In the end, if you really believe something malicious is happening in this regard, you can either prove (if said data is actually transferred over WiFi) or prevent (if it's only transferred over mobile data) it, rendering mere speculation about this issue useless.
- chris_mahan 13y agoThe carriers are also in cahoots with the NSA.
- Livven 13y agoDid you read my response? Connect your smartphone to a MiFi (which establishes a mobile data connection and shares it through a WiFi hotspot) if you're concerned about that.
- chris_mahan 13y agoAh, sorry.