8 ms·

Simple workaround: don't use safari. Long term solution: don't by Apple products. Or at least don't run their software.

by orng 12y ago

lostlogin 12y ago
Who's products would you suggest as an alternative?
- pserwylo 12y ago
  For browsing, Mozilla is probably the least likely to want to do this sort of logging. There are probably more niche browsers that focus on privacy that I'm unaware of too. As for other Apple products, you can run Linux on a MacBook quite happily (Linus does, after all) and there are some nice Android ROMs which focus on freedom, such as Replicant.
  - TheLoneWolfling 12y ago
    [Citation Needed] Mozilla's "Safe browsing", for instance. If you're going to go with something FF based, at least choose something with such things disabled by default. For instance, I run PM.
    - eli 12y ago
      Mozilla safe browsing does NOT phone home with sites you're visiting.
      - TheLoneWolfling 12y ago
        Quote: > Before blocking the site, Firefox will request a double-check to ensure that the reported site has not been removed from the list since your last update. Source: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-does-phishing-and-malware-protection-work https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-does-phishing-and-m...
        eli 12y ago
        Pretty sure it's still actually sending a hash, not a URL
        TheLoneWolfling 12y ago
        The entity I'm primarily worried about tracking here is Google. And, pretty much trivially, if the URL was added to the blacklist, they have the corresponding URL to the hash. (Not to mention, even if they didn't, their core product is based around crawling webpages. I'd be highly surprised if they didn't have hashes of the URLs they visited.) And, even beside that, URLs are relatively low-entropy. Especially with the path-splitting that safe-browsing does.
        eli 12y ago
        I think your fears are unfounded, but it's easy enough to turn off.
    - zobzu 12y ago
      Firefox Nightly also has a tracking protection in about:config => privacy.trackingprotection.enabled its off by default seems to also block some adverts when on. (probably because those adverts are also trackers)
      - madeofpalk 12y ago
        Wait. People are upset about how unintuitive Apple's preferences are, but Firefox having config hidden away in the advanced about:config is OK?
        zobzu 12y ago
        Nope. Firefox hide away stuff in about:config for testing purposes generally and expose the setting in the user interface after its been tested enough. Sounds logical enough to me.
  - metastart 12y ago
    Epic Privacy Browser - private browser built on chromium for Mac & PCs -- epicbrowser.com (one such niche privacy browser)
pserwylo 12y ago
Not quite sure why you got down voted. I bought an iPod nano several years ago, because I quite liked the hardware/software that Apple made. However when I found out that they intentionally broke compatibility with 3rd party music software that isn't iTunes, I made the decision to never buy Apple products again. I don't feel that I'm particularly missing out by making this decision (although I am aware that many other vendors probably have similar ethical problems associated with them).
- axotty 12y ago
  So the 2007 version of the iPod refused to work with some random 3rd party software you had, and you've sworn off all Apple products for life? That's just childish. Not only can companies change but one product doesn't necessarily reflect everything a company has to offer. You should stop being such an ideologue and learn to use the best tool for the job. Which is sometimes an Apple product.
- ggreer 12y ago
  Can you link to an explanation of how Apple intentionally broke 3rd-party syncing with iPod Nanos? I don't know what kerfuffle you're referencing.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - wfjackson 12y ago
    http://boingboing.net/2007/09/14/new-ipods-reengineer.html http://boingboing.net/2007/09/14/new-ipods-reengineer.html
  - makomk 12y ago
    It's long enough ago that a lot of the technical information has dropped off the web (or in some cases been DMCAed offline by Apple[1]), but the short answer is they started authenticating the iPod Nano music database using a cryptographic MAC with a per-device key derived using a secret algorithm. Without the key, third-party software couldn't add or remove songs. They've got more aggressive about it with each generation too; for the 5th gen iPod Nano the code to generate the key had the same kind of obfuscation as their actual DRM code[2], and there's no open source support for the 6th gen because it's just too hard to reverse-engineer. [1] http://yro.slashdot.org/story/08/11/20/201246/apple-dmcas-ipodhash-project http://yro.slashdot.org/story/08/11/20/201246/apple-dmcas-ip... [2] https://web.archive.org/web/20080901013029/http://www.bluwiki.com/go/Itunes_obfuscation https://web.archive.org/web/20080901013029/http://www.bluwik...
Alphasite_ 12y ago
Of you know: http://imgur.com/tfjoo2k http://imgur.com/tfjoo2k an even simpler workaround.

Simple workaround: don't use safari. Long term solution: don't by Apple products. Or at least don't run their software.

by orng 12y ago

Simple workaround: don't use safari. Long term solution: don't by Apple products. Or at least don't run their software.

lostlogin 12y ago

Who's products would you suggest as an alternative?

pserwylo 12y ago
For browsing, Mozilla is probably the least likely to want to do this sort of logging. There are probably more niche browsers that focus on privacy that I'm unaware of too. As for other Apple products, you can run Linux on a MacBook quite happily (Linus does, after all) and there are some nice Android ROMs which focus on freedom, such as Replicant.
- TheLoneWolfling 12y ago
  [Citation Needed] Mozilla's "Safe browsing", for instance. If you're going to go with something FF based, at least choose something with such things disabled by default. For instance, I run PM.
  - eli 12y ago
    Mozilla safe browsing does NOT phone home with sites you're visiting.
    - TheLoneWolfling 12y ago
      Quote: > Before blocking the site, Firefox will request a double-check to ensure that the reported site has not been removed from the list since your last update. Source: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-does-phishing-and-malware-protection-work https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-does-phishing-and-m...
      - eli 12y ago
        Pretty sure it's still actually sending a hash, not a URL
        TheLoneWolfling 12y ago
        The entity I'm primarily worried about tracking here is Google. And, pretty much trivially, if the URL was added to the blacklist, they have the corresponding URL to the hash. (Not to mention, even if they didn't, their core product is based around crawling webpages. I'd be highly surprised if they didn't have hashes of the URLs they visited.) And, even beside that, URLs are relatively low-entropy. Especially with the path-splitting that safe-browsing does.
        eli 12y ago
        I think your fears are unfounded, but it's easy enough to turn off.
  - zobzu 12y ago
    Firefox Nightly also has a tracking protection in about:config => privacy.trackingprotection.enabled its off by default seems to also block some adverts when on. (probably because those adverts are also trackers)
    - madeofpalk 12y ago
      Wait. People are upset about how unintuitive Apple's preferences are, but Firefox having config hidden away in the advanced about:config is OK?
      - zobzu 12y ago
        Nope. Firefox hide away stuff in about:config for testing purposes generally and expose the setting in the user interface after its been tested enough. Sounds logical enough to me.
- metastart 12y ago
  Epic Privacy Browser - private browser built on chromium for Mac & PCs -- epicbrowser.com (one such niche privacy browser)

pserwylo 12y ago

Not quite sure why you got down voted. I bought an iPod nano several years ago, because I quite liked the hardware/software that Apple made. However when I found out that they intentionally broke compatibility with 3rd party music software that isn't iTunes, I made the decision to never buy Apple products again. I don't feel that I'm particularly missing out by making this decision (although I am aware that many other vendors probably have similar ethical problems associated with them).

axotty 12y ago
So the 2007 version of the iPod refused to work with some random 3rd party software you had, and you've sworn off all Apple products for life? That's just childish. Not only can companies change but one product doesn't necessarily reflect everything a company has to offer. You should stop being such an ideologue and learn to use the best tool for the job. Which is sometimes an Apple product.
ggreer 12y ago
Can you link to an explanation of how Apple intentionally broke 3rd-party syncing with iPod Nanos? I don't know what kerfuffle you're referencing.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- wfjackson 12y ago
  http://boingboing.net/2007/09/14/new-ipods-reengineer.html http://boingboing.net/2007/09/14/new-ipods-reengineer.html
- makomk 12y ago
  It's long enough ago that a lot of the technical information has dropped off the web (or in some cases been DMCAed offline by Apple[1]), but the short answer is they started authenticating the iPod Nano music database using a cryptographic MAC with a per-device key derived using a secret algorithm. Without the key, third-party software couldn't add or remove songs. They've got more aggressive about it with each generation too; for the 5th gen iPod Nano the code to generate the key had the same kind of obfuscation as their actual DRM code[2], and there's no open source support for the 6th gen because it's just too hard to reverse-engineer. [1] http://yro.slashdot.org/story/08/11/20/201246/apple-dmcas-ipodhash-project http://yro.slashdot.org/story/08/11/20/201246/apple-dmcas-ip... [2] https://web.archive.org/web/20080901013029/http://www.bluwiki.com/go/Itunes_obfuscation https://web.archive.org/web/20080901013029/http://www.bluwik...

Alphasite_ 12y ago

Of you know: http://imgur.com/tfjoo2k http://imgur.com/tfjoo2k an even simpler workaround.