When loading this very page, 3 things are blocked from within Safari: Google Adsense, Google Analytics, and Tribal Fusion. Almost every single webpage that I visit on the web has some sort of Google analytics which I block. What are they trying to do, track my every movement on the web?
More or less. But some of this is just used by web page developers to see if the design of their web site works, or whether people use certain parts of a web site. For instance, if they see that a certain part of their website is not used, they may get rid of it, redesign it, or move that part of the website up a click. Most of the data is probably summarized anyways, when third parties see it, so they don't even know who the exact users are. Most users of the data don't really care about YOU specifically, they care about the trend in the data. They care about what a group of people are doing. Basically the same way census data is used, and noone sees the raw data.
Customer: This crappy iPhone can't tell me where the restaurants are in my neighborhood!
Genius: Do you have locations services turned on?
Customer: Hell no I don't! I value my privacy and I don't want anybody to know where I'm at with my iPhone. You can't make me turn it on. It's the law!!!!
Genius: Well without the iPhone knowing where you are it can't really tell you where the restaurants are.
Customer: Crappy iPhone. I paid good money for this useless thing. I'm switching to Android.
Genius: Have a nice day. Come back and see us real soon.
OK, so now the EULA will have an extra sentence in it. "By using your iPad you grant Apple and all Apple's business partners the right to collect your information and do whatever we want with it. "
Absolutely, if you want to make any use out of your expensive device. If it doesn't know where it is half of its features are useless.
And by the way what would "your information" be besides which cell tower you walked by recently? That's what location service is anyway.
Okay Andrew, this isn't your board. Please stop posting commercials for your lame ass show and get back to talking shit at a camera. Your six viewers are gonna miss you.
Customer: This crappy iPhone can't tell me where the restaurants are in my neighborhood!
Genius: Do you have locations services turned on?
Customer: Hell no I don't! I value my privacy and I don't want anybody to know where I'm at with my iPhone. You can't make me turn it on. It's the law!!!!
Genius: Well without the iPhone knowing where you are it can't really tell you where the restaurants are.
Customer: Crappy iPhone. I paid good money for this useless thing. I'm switching to Android.
Genius: Have a nice day. Come back and see us real soon.
OK, so now the EULA will have an extra sentence in it. "By using your iPad you grant Apple and all Apple's business partners the right to collect your information and do whatever we want with it. "
Not true - it would have to be a totally separate approval.
Customer: This crappy iPhone can't tell me where the restaurants are in my neighborhood!
Genius: Do you have locations services turned on?
Customer: Hell no I don't! I value my privacy and I don't want anybody to know where I'm at with my iPhone. You can't make me turn it on. It's the law!!!!
Genius: Well without the iPhone knowing where you are it can't really tell you where the restaurants are.
Customer: Crappy iPhone. I paid good money for this useless thing. I'm switching to Android.
Genius: Have a nice day. Come back and see us real soon.
Apple doesn't collect your info without your consent idiot.
This legislation is aimed straight at Google which *does* collect your info without your consent on almost every product they make and they *do* sell it or give it to third parties as well.
I've never seen an offer from Google to sell identifiable user information. They do use specific user stats to deliver targeted advertisements and offers. But unless you have some evidence they sell packages of personal identification information to 3rd parties, I'd have to say I believe you're mistaken.
Absolutely, if you want to make any use out of your expensive device. If it doesn't know where it is half of its features are useless.
And by the way what would "your information" be besides which cell tower you walked by recently? That's what location service is anyway.
E911 location service is at minimum cell tower triangulation, but on iPhones, Location Services is mostly through the Global Positioning System satellites, with some data through the cellular data channel to speed up the process.
I'm not sure why it's necessary to store a history of positions though. There aren't any apps that I use where it benefits from any more of a history than two data points (one for current position, second, previously known position to derive direction of motion).
Since this would basically destroy Google's reason for existence, I don't see this ever happening.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Prof. Peabody
Apple doesn't collect your info without your consent idiot.
This legislation is aimed straight at Google which *does* collect your info without your consent on almost every product they make and they *do* sell it or give it to third parties as well.
Exactly my thoughts. Google should be deeply worried, because they will be more vulnerable to lawsuits arising from this.
Google only shares personal information with other companies or individuals outside of Google in the following limited circumstances:
We have your consent. We require opt-in consent for the sharing of any sensitive personal information.
We provide such information to our subsidiaries, affiliated companies or other trusted businesses or persons for the purpose of processing personal information on our behalf. We require that these parties agree to process such information based on our instructions and in compliance with this Privacy Policy and any other appropriate confidentiality and security measures.
We have a good faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to (a) satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or enforceable governmental request, (b) enforce applicable Terms of Service, including investigation of potential violations thereof, (c) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues, or (d) protect against harm to the rights, property or safety of Google, its users or the public as required or permitted by law.
If Google becomes involved in a merger, acquisition, or any form of sale of some or all of its assets, we will ensure the confidentiality of any personal information involved in such transactions and provide notice before personal information is transferred and becomes subject to a different privacy policy.
And Apple's policy on sharing your personal data with 3rd parties:
At times Apple may make certain personal information available to strategic partners that work with Apple to provide products and services, or that help Apple market to customers. For example, when you purchase and activate your iPhone, you authorize Apple and its carrier to exchange the information you provide during the activation process to carry out service. If you are approved for service, your account will be governed by Apple and its carrier’s respective privacy policies. Personal information will only be shared by Apple to provide or improve our products, services and advertising; it will not be shared with third parties for their marketing purposes.
Service Providers
Apple shares personal information with companies who provide services such as information processing, extending credit, fulfilling customer orders, delivering products to you, managing and enhancing customer data, providing customer service, assessing your interest in our products and services, and conducting customer research or satisfaction surveys. These companies are obligated to protect your information and may be located wherever Apple operates.
Others
It may be necessary − by law, legal process, litigation, and/or requests from public and governmental authorities within or outside your country of residence − for Apple to disclose your personal information. We may also disclose information about you if we determine that for purposes of national security, law enforcement, or other issues of public importance, disclosure is necessary or appropriate.
We may also disclose information about you if we determine that disclosure is reasonably necessary to enforce our terms and conditions or protect our operations or users. Additionally, in the event of a reorganization, merger, or sale we may transfer any and all personal information we collect to the relevant third party.
Apple doesn't specify they require your opt-in for personal data sharing, while Google does. Otherwise the two don't appear all that different.
I wonder why location services need to store UUIDs, Mac-addresses and being able to link them with other personal data.
Yes I want to use location services, but I don't want to be tracked in this way.
The way that the location system works is that it uses three different sets of information. For starters there is Cell-phone tower positioning, then there is GPS and finally the phone uses local Wi-Fi zones.
The combination of all three allows for faster and more accurate positioning and the latter clearly needs for there to be a database of Wi-Fi databases including their SSIDs and their MAC addresses. That database was originally created by google wardriving through urban areas and has been further refined by crowdsourcing using android handsets.
Fundamentally the issue is that the more accurate location services become the more useful they are, but simultaneously the more scary they are.
here is Ars Technica explaining on why Wi-Fi locating is useful in dense urban areas
The way that the location system works is that it uses three different sets of information. For starters there is Cell-phone tower positioning, then there is GPS and finally the phone uses local Wi-Fi zones.
The combination of all three allows for faster and more accurate positioning and the latter clearly needs for there to be a database of Wi-Fi databases including their SSIDs and their MAC addresses. That database was originally created by google wardriving through urban areas and has been further refined by crowdsourcing using android handsets.
Fundamentally the issue is that the more accurate location services become the more useful they are, but simultaneously the more scary they are.
here is Ars Technica explaining on why Wi-Fi locating is useful in dense urban areas
Thanks for this link cloudgazer. I understand that this data is pretty helpful to get the accuracy we demand from our devices.
From the Cult of Mac article:
"None of this is really a problem? except that now, Google and Skyhook Wireless are making their location databases publicly accessible. That means that if someone knows your device?s MAC address, they can use Google Maps to track every location you?ve ever been with a margin of error between 100 and 200 feet.
According to Cnet, the problem?s pretty wide scale: they found that they can correspond approximately 10% of all laptops and mobile phones to physical addresses. All it takes is knowing your device?s unique hardware ID."
The person who knows my hardware ID likely knows more like my address, perhaps my age, my job, the games I play, the websites I visit and much more simply by gathering those information through apps and websites.
I wonder if it's enough that Google has removed dozens of apps from their market place that collected user information and posting a privacy policy or if the bill in the US Senate is urgently needed.
If the article at Cnet is right every dev of such a malicious app is now able to track me because he sent my hardware ID and other data home and is able to use Google's data to complete the picture.
I doubt that this further aggregation and linking of additional data really helps to improve the accuracy of the positioning but serves other purposes.
May be I'm wrong, but the risk of misuse is pretty high and there are apparently no suitable laws to cover these aspects.
Apparently some of you don't like the effective freshman senators from Minnesota and Connecticut. Ah, well.
I think this is about what you can do here, insist that you be told that the GPS is on each time it's used, by each application. Apple already does this, by the way, and they insist that every app that needs the GPS asks the user each time.
I don't want the government to have trivial access to my location. In the case of tracking a suspect, I'm perfectly all right with that. It might give exonerating evidence just as easily as damning evidence of "where you were when such-and-such was happening. That's available from cellphone companies already. Oddly enough, I'm okay with that, unless it's being abused. The courts can work on that.
But people need some education about this. I think these warnings need to be visible, because that's the way we can avoid mischief from the companies.
Comments
When loading this very page, 3 things are blocked from within Safari: Google Adsense, Google Analytics, and Tribal Fusion. Almost every single webpage that I visit on the web has some sort of Google analytics which I block. What are they trying to do, track my every movement on the web?
More or less. But some of this is just used by web page developers to see if the design of their web site works, or whether people use certain parts of a web site. For instance, if they see that a certain part of their website is not used, they may get rid of it, redesign it, or move that part of the website up a click. Most of the data is probably summarized anyways, when third parties see it, so they don't even know who the exact users are. Most users of the data don't really care about YOU specifically, they care about the trend in the data. They care about what a group of people are doing. Basically the same way census data is used, and noone sees the raw data.
But I'm not sure that's the only way it's used.
Just watch all the unintended consequences. Enough is enough government involvement in EVERYTHING!
Watch Judge Andrew Napolitano's Freedom Watch show on Fox Business if you want a breath of fresh air! Or watch it here nightly!:
http://usaguns.net/patriots/fw10.php
Try Ghostery.
I do use Ghostery and adblock also. That's how I was able to block those things.
Customer: This crappy iPhone can't tell me where the restaurants are in my neighborhood!
Genius: Do you have locations services turned on?
Customer: Hell no I don't! I value my privacy and I don't want anybody to know where I'm at with my iPhone. You can't make me turn it on. It's the law!!!!
Genius: Well without the iPhone knowing where you are it can't really tell you where the restaurants are.
Customer: Crappy iPhone. I paid good money for this useless thing. I'm switching to Android.
Genius: Have a nice day. Come back and see us real soon.
Typical bureaucrats -- think the nanny state is the only way to solve problems.
Just watch all the unintended consequences. Enough is enough government involvement in EVERYTHING!
Watch Judge Andrew Napolitano's Freedom Watch show on Fox Business if you want a breath of fresh air! Or watch it here nightly!:
http://usaguns.net/patriots/fw10.php
Its funny how often the right conflates freedom for corporations with freedom for people.
OK, so now the EULA will have an extra sentence in it. "By using your iPad you grant Apple and all Apple's business partners the right to collect your information and do whatever we want with it. "
Absolutely, if you want to make any use out of your expensive device. If it doesn't know where it is half of its features are useless.
And by the way what would "your information" be besides which cell tower you walked by recently? That's what location service is anyway.
Typical bureaucrats -- think the nanny state is the only way to solve problems.
Just watch all the unintended consequences. Enough is enough government involvement in EVERYTHING!
Watch Judge Andrew Napolitano's Freedom Watch show on Fox Business if you want a breath of fresh air! Or watch it here nightly!:
http://usaguns.net/patriots/fw10.php
Okay Andrew, this isn't your board. Please stop posting commercials for your lame ass show and get back to talking shit at a camera. Your six viewers are gonna miss you.
Conversation at the Genius Bar.
Customer: This crappy iPhone can't tell me where the restaurants are in my neighborhood!
Genius: Do you have locations services turned on?
Customer: Hell no I don't! I value my privacy and I don't want anybody to know where I'm at with my iPhone. You can't make me turn it on. It's the law!!!!
Genius: Well without the iPhone knowing where you are it can't really tell you where the restaurants are.
Customer: Crappy iPhone. I paid good money for this useless thing. I'm switching to Android.
Genius: Have a nice day. Come back and see us real soon.
I can see that as a Joy of Tech cartoon!
OK, so now the EULA will have an extra sentence in it. "By using your iPad you grant Apple and all Apple's business partners the right to collect your information and do whatever we want with it. "
Not true - it would have to be a totally separate approval.
Conversation at the Genius Bar.
Customer: This crappy iPhone can't tell me where the restaurants are in my neighborhood!
Genius: Do you have locations services turned on?
Customer: Hell no I don't! I value my privacy and I don't want anybody to know where I'm at with my iPhone. You can't make me turn it on. It's the law!!!!
Genius: Well without the iPhone knowing where you are it can't really tell you where the restaurants are.
Customer: Crappy iPhone. I paid good money for this useless thing. I'm switching to Android.
Genius: Have a nice day. Come back and see us real soon.
Found this:
http://www.cultofmac.com/google-can-...iongate/100953
I wonder why location services need to store UUIDs, Mac-addresses and being able to link them with other personal data.
Yes I want to use location services, but I don't want to be tracked in this way.
Apple doesn't collect your info without your consent idiot.
This legislation is aimed straight at Google which *does* collect your info without your consent on almost every product they make and they *do* sell it or give it to third parties as well.
I've never seen an offer from Google to sell identifiable user information. They do use specific user stats to deliver targeted advertisements and offers. But unless you have some evidence they sell packages of personal identification information to 3rd parties, I'd have to say I believe you're mistaken.
Absolutely, if you want to make any use out of your expensive device. If it doesn't know where it is half of its features are useless.
And by the way what would "your information" be besides which cell tower you walked by recently? That's what location service is anyway.
E911 location service is at minimum cell tower triangulation, but on iPhones, Location Services is mostly through the Global Positioning System satellites, with some data through the cellular data channel to speed up the process.
I'm not sure why it's necessary to store a history of positions though. There aren't any apps that I use where it benefits from any more of a history than two data points (one for current position, second, previously known position to derive direction of motion).
I'm sorry but I just can't take anything Al Franken says seriously. He really should have just stuck with comedy.
I'm sorry but that would imply that he was funny...
Since this would basically destroy Google's reason for existence, I don't see this ever happening.
Apple doesn't collect your info without your consent idiot.
This legislation is aimed straight at Google which *does* collect your info without your consent on almost every product they make and they *do* sell it or give it to third parties as well.
Exactly my thoughts. Google should be deeply worried, because they will be more vulnerable to lawsuits arising from this.
Al Franken is still an idiot.
I think you meant to say:"has always been" and "will always be"
http://www.google.com/intl/en/privacy/
As regards sharing data with 3rd parties:
Google only shares personal information with other companies or individuals outside of Google in the following limited circumstances:
We have your consent. We require opt-in consent for the sharing of any sensitive personal information.
We provide such information to our subsidiaries, affiliated companies or other trusted businesses or persons for the purpose of processing personal information on our behalf. We require that these parties agree to process such information based on our instructions and in compliance with this Privacy Policy and any other appropriate confidentiality and security measures.
We have a good faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to (a) satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or enforceable governmental request, (b) enforce applicable Terms of Service, including investigation of potential violations thereof, (c) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues, or (d) protect against harm to the rights, property or safety of Google, its users or the public as required or permitted by law.
If Google becomes involved in a merger, acquisition, or any form of sale of some or all of its assets, we will ensure the confidentiality of any personal information involved in such transactions and provide notice before personal information is transferred and becomes subject to a different privacy policy.
And Apple's policy on sharing your personal data with 3rd parties:
http://www.apple.com/privacy/
Disclosure to Third Parties
At times Apple may make certain personal information available to strategic partners that work with Apple to provide products and services, or that help Apple market to customers. For example, when you purchase and activate your iPhone, you authorize Apple and its carrier to exchange the information you provide during the activation process to carry out service. If you are approved for service, your account will be governed by Apple and its carrier’s respective privacy policies. Personal information will only be shared by Apple to provide or improve our products, services and advertising; it will not be shared with third parties for their marketing purposes.
Service Providers
Apple shares personal information with companies who provide services such as information processing, extending credit, fulfilling customer orders, delivering products to you, managing and enhancing customer data, providing customer service, assessing your interest in our products and services, and conducting customer research or satisfaction surveys. These companies are obligated to protect your information and may be located wherever Apple operates.
Others
It may be necessary − by law, legal process, litigation, and/or requests from public and governmental authorities within or outside your country of residence − for Apple to disclose your personal information. We may also disclose information about you if we determine that for purposes of national security, law enforcement, or other issues of public importance, disclosure is necessary or appropriate.
We may also disclose information about you if we determine that disclosure is reasonably necessary to enforce our terms and conditions or protect our operations or users. Additionally, in the event of a reorganization, merger, or sale we may transfer any and all personal information we collect to the relevant third party.
Apple doesn't specify they require your opt-in for personal data sharing, while Google does. Otherwise the two don't appear all that different.
Found this:
http://www.cultofmac.com/google-can-...iongate/100953
I wonder why location services need to store UUIDs, Mac-addresses and being able to link them with other personal data.
Yes I want to use location services, but I don't want to be tracked in this way.
The way that the location system works is that it uses three different sets of information. For starters there is Cell-phone tower positioning, then there is GPS and finally the phone uses local Wi-Fi zones.
The combination of all three allows for faster and more accurate positioning and the latter clearly needs for there to be a database of Wi-Fi databases including their SSIDs and their MAC addresses. That database was originally created by google wardriving through urban areas and has been further refined by crowdsourcing using android handsets.
Fundamentally the issue is that the more accurate location services become the more useful they are, but simultaneously the more scary they are.
here is Ars Technica explaining on why Wi-Fi locating is useful in dense urban areas
http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2...tion-might.ars
The way that the location system works is that it uses three different sets of information. For starters there is Cell-phone tower positioning, then there is GPS and finally the phone uses local Wi-Fi zones.
The combination of all three allows for faster and more accurate positioning and the latter clearly needs for there to be a database of Wi-Fi databases including their SSIDs and their MAC addresses. That database was originally created by google wardriving through urban areas and has been further refined by crowdsourcing using android handsets.
Fundamentally the issue is that the more accurate location services become the more useful they are, but simultaneously the more scary they are.
here is Ars Technica explaining on why Wi-Fi locating is useful in dense urban areas
http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2...tion-might.ars
Thanks for this link cloudgazer. I understand that this data is pretty helpful to get the accuracy we demand from our devices.
From the Cult of Mac article:
"None of this is really a problem? except that now, Google and Skyhook Wireless are making their location databases publicly accessible. That means that if someone knows your device?s MAC address, they can use Google Maps to track every location you?ve ever been with a margin of error between 100 and 200 feet.
According to Cnet, the problem?s pretty wide scale: they found that they can correspond approximately 10% of all laptops and mobile phones to physical addresses. All it takes is knowing your device?s unique hardware ID."
The person who knows my hardware ID likely knows more like my address, perhaps my age, my job, the games I play, the websites I visit and much more simply by gathering those information through apps and websites.
I wonder if it's enough that Google has removed dozens of apps from their market place that collected user information and posting a privacy policy or if the bill in the US Senate is urgently needed.
If the article at Cnet is right every dev of such a malicious app is now able to track me because he sent my hardware ID and other data home and is able to use Google's data to complete the picture.
I doubt that this further aggregation and linking of additional data really helps to improve the accuracy of the positioning but serves other purposes.
May be I'm wrong, but the risk of misuse is pretty high and there are apparently no suitable laws to cover these aspects.
I think this is about what you can do here, insist that you be told that the GPS is on each time it's used, by each application. Apple already does this, by the way, and they insist that every app that needs the GPS asks the user each time.
I don't want the government to have trivial access to my location. In the case of tracking a suspect, I'm perfectly all right with that. It might give exonerating evidence just as easily as damning evidence of "where you were when such-and-such was happening. That's available from cellphone companies already. Oddly enough, I'm okay with that, unless it's being abused. The courts can work on that.
But people need some education about this. I think these warnings need to be visible, because that's the way we can avoid mischief from the companies.