Editorial: Why is privacy-minded Apple putting its new TV app on smart TVs notorious for s...

Posted:
in iPod + iTunes + AppleTV edited December 2019
Apple has worked to make user privacy and data security primary features it promotes in its products and platforms. So why is the company porting its new TV App to smart TVs and streaming devices from Samsung, Amazon, LG, Roku and others that are notorious for spying on users and collecting data about their viewing behaviors? Here's a look.

1984 Smart TV DED
Where's the sledgehamer?

Deal with the devil

Even non-technical viewers are increasingly aware that their smart TVs are spying on them. A BuzzFeed report by Nicole Nguyen detailed to mainstream audiences that smart TVs are a pretty sold bag of bad software and creepy spying policies. And it's not by accident or mistake, but quite intentionally by design.

Nguyen initially noted that Samsung TVs could be hacked by the CIA to appear to be turned off while they're actually being used to record conversations in the room. But Smart TVs from LG, Samsung, Sony, and Visio were all designed to track what you're watching, as are streaming devices including Amazon's Fire TV, Google's Chromecast, and Roku. One notable exception, Nguyen added, was that "Apple TV doesn't collect viewing or search data."

Why would Apple be willing to put its TV app--effectively the streaming subset of its Apple TV features-- on other makers' smart TVs that are notorious for spying on users, collecting their data, and uploading it to various collectors, in some cases without any encryption? Apple's historical porting strategy detailed in the previous segment offers some perspective.

Like giving a glass of ice water to somebody in hell

In 2003 Apple ported iTunes to Windows at a time when PCs were so plagued with spyware, viruses, and other problems that Apple turned the pain points of PCs into its "Switchers" and then "Get a Mac" ad campaigns. It wasn't hypocrisy. Apple's recommendation to PC users was to switch, and using iTunes made it that much easier.

When Steve Jobs discussed Apple's distribution of iTunes for Windows with Walt Mossberg for the Wall Street Journal "All Things Digital" conference in 2007, he noted that there were more than 300 million installations of iTunes for Windows, several times the number of iPods sold.

"So that makes you an enormous Windows software developer," Mossberg noted, setting up Jobs's jab that Apple's iTunes on Windows "is like giving a glass of ice water to somebody in hell."






Apple Music was similarly delivered for Android In 2015 despite the increasing awareness of how sloppy Google and its licensees have been with users' data privacy and invasive behavior tracking. Like iTunes, Apple Music is a trojan horse that invites Android users into the Apple ecosystem, giving them the opportunity to upgrade to the full experience with an iPad or iPhone and leave their troubles behind.

Apple doesn't sell televisions. But by putting its TV app on the smart TVs that other companies make, it can highlight the vast difference between its experience and the befuddled, cluttered mess around it that is actively trying to spy on them. It opens a door for users enlightened to the surveillance adware exploitation that's now being built into smart TVs. It invites them to buy the full Apple TV box that does everything their smart set does without watching them and reporting their behaviors.

I've used a series of Samsung televisions over the past decade, including new Tizen models, and while their hardware is fine, their software is terrible: inscrutable UI, frustrating controls, and features that actually crash and require a reboot. A piece by Alexis C. Madrigal for the literary and cultural commentary magazine The Atlantic agreed: "smart TVs are dumb."

Cheaper by the dumbing

The surveillance "smarts" of smart TVs are, however, subsidizing the delivery of cheap TV sets. Legendarily cheap TV maker Visio called the practice of selling loss leader sets that earned back some profits by leaching your home of salable marketing data "post-purchase monetization."

In an interview with the Verge earlier this year, the company's chief technology officer Bill Baxter stated that building TVs is a "cutthroat industry" with 6% margins, and that by running content monitoring, surveillance advertising, and data mining, "I really don't need to make money off of the TV."

Last year, Roku's chief executive Anthony Wood freely admitted the same about his company's TVs and streaming media sticks and boxes, explaining, "we don't really make money [from the hardware] we certainly don't make enough money to support our engineering organization and our operations and the cost to run the Roku service. That's not paid for by the hardware. That's paid for by our ad and content business."

Back in 2014, Apple's chief executive Tim Cook expressed a very different stance on his company's approach to building products. He stated, "our business model is very straightforward: We sell great products. We don't build a profile based on your email content or web browsing habits to sell to advertisers. We don't 'monetize' the information you store on your iPhone or in iCloud. And we don't read your email or your messages to get information to market to you. Our software and services are designed to make our devices better. Plain and simple."




Tim Cook: "You're not our product."


By offering a clean, functional taste of the Apple TV experience on higher end models of these surveillance sets, Apple's new TV app can expand the market for the company's Services while also recommending its Apple TV hardware as a superior set of smarts, without any spyware model. Affluent customers tend to prefer privacy and security and are willing to pay for it.

That's not just conjecture. A report by Parks Associates stated that almost half of smart TV owners also used a streaming media player, and that they used their media player much more frequently than their TV's built-in services. And it specifically stated that consumers rated Apple TV highly in setup, usability, gaming, and for purchasing content.

Dumbing by the cheapers


Most typical consumer reviews of TVs and media sticks focus almost entirely on price and the most basic checklist of features. Many reviewers have a really hard time understanding how Apple is competing against $35 data collection streaming boxes, and seem to have no grasp on why anyone would care about the quality of their overall experience, or about issues including privacy, spying, and data security.

That total inability to comprehend how people who might pay $1,000 or more for a television set might also be able to afford an Apple TV that makes their experience that much better was reflected in the steaming hot takes that virtually everyone in the tech industry cynically ran with earlier this year, which confidently announced that Apple's porting of its TV app (then referred to as iTunes) was further evidence that Apple was failing in hardware.


David Katzmaier of CNET revealed an incremental awakening to Apple's TV strategy that took him months to put together.


Christopher Mims of the Wall Street Journal declared that Apple putting its software on other platforms was a "radical shift in its corporate strategy," stating that Apple "appears finally willing to sacrifice some hardware revenue in the hopes of growing its services," despite having also lived through the last twenty years of Apple putting iTunes on PCs without sacrificing any Macs and still selling the most iPods, and putting Apple Music on Android while retaining virtually all of the valuable smartphone sales.

The new Apple TV

Apple's September 2015 introduction of the 4G Apple TV introduced tvOS as a new platform for smart TV. Prior to that, Apple TV had mostly been a convenience device for AirPlay streaming from Macs and iOS devices to a television, and for watching iTunes videos or rentals and viewing iCloud photos.

The new tvOS not only enabled new apps and games for TV, but also made it easy for video services to take their existing content and offer it as a subscription, and for cable operators to turn their scheduled programming of linear TV channels into digital catalogs of content users could watch at any time, any way they like. So far, Apple has created partnerships with Charter Spectrum, Sony's PlayStation Vue, and AT&T's DirecTV.

Charter Spectrum cable Apple TV
Apple TV is expanding to serve rentals, channels, streaming and non-linear cable


Over the three years since, tvOS has established a strong base of users. That's particularly notable because Apple TV itself is significantly more expensive than cheap dongles or media boxes offered by Amazon, Roku, Google, and others. It also competes against the "free" smart tv interfaces integrated into most new televisions. But Apple's position in TV, particularly among affluent users, is not bleeding away into irrelevance.

4K is to Apple TV what 3G was to iPhone

One factor that's helping: the emergence of affordable 4K televisions is creating interest in high-quality content that viewers can pay for. Apple TV is exploiting the emergence of high-quality screens and fast Internet to deliver a superior experience. Twelve years ago, technology was ripe for a game-changing smartphone but wasn't really ready for Apple TV.

In the same way that consumers upgraded to iPhones despite a price disparity and the fact that Apple's competitors were rushing out certain features first, a large segment of buyers are now moving to Apple TV despite its additional cost because it works better and offers a better experience. And the emergence of better technology makes that difference in experience even more valuable.

A report by Joshua Fruhlinger for ThinkNum based on sales data from Best Buy noted that in sales of 4K streaming devices, "Amazon has taken the clear lead, with Apple TV a close second.

"The Fire Stick is an inexpensive way to get into 4K streaming at just $35. And despite the Apple TV's higher cost [$180] compared to the others in this list, people appear to be turning to Apple for its ease of use and integration with other Apple and iCloud devices."

He added, "now that 4K TVs are ubiquitous and Apple has made its iTunes ecosystem relatively seamless, it appears the Apple TV 4K is becoming the go-to device."

So rather than joining the surveillance model of smart TV and media stick vendors, Apple is riding the wave of subsidized TV sets to provide a premium alternative that users can opt to pay for as a way out of being spied upon and tracked as a product for advertisers.
bakedbananaswatto_cobra
«134

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 62
    frantisekfrantisek Posts: 756member
    Why would not they. It wont increase surveillance but can lessen it ans service alone needs enough subscribers to become viable. Something they can hardly achieve on own boxes.
  • Reply 2 of 62
    LatkoLatko Posts: 398member
    The minimal distinction between Apple and the “evel” data collectors is that Apple collects and sells aggregate, anonymized data.
    That is, you as an individual still exist, but only under a cumbersome id (instead of your name) that others may very well relate to your name via usage patterns - even while Apple won’t.
    So that distinction is MINIMAL to ZERO, further in the value chain.
    So - contrary to what the article suggests - Apple IS collecting data on users collectively and selling TONS of aggeregate data to enable spying purposes.
    edited May 2019
  • Reply 3 of 62
    dewmedewme Posts: 5,328member
    Very nice article, especially the "ice water" point that is a proven impetus for pulling switchers away from the dark side. Another thing to consider, at least from my personal experience, is that very low price point products, e.g., Amazon's Echo devices, do attract a lot of experimenters and toe-dippers to a product category. However the low price point on these try-it-out products also makes them very easy to abandon with nearly zero remorse. Buying a low-end or ad-supported device can serve to introduce buyers to a product category but the inferior customer experience with the product and its limitations can ultimately drive these same buyers to a better product in the same category that more fully satisfies their needs without sacrifices such as security and privacy compromises and the dehumanizing effects of being subjected to advertising, or much worse, the customer-is-the-product hell. That's a hell that needs more than a glass of ice water to obtain relief.     
    Dan_Dilgerwatto_cobra
  • Reply 4 of 62
    GeorgeBMacGeorgeBMac Posts: 11,421member
    I DO NOT want anybody spying on me in my home.   Period.  
    (Although I kinda wish that I had anything worth spying on!)

    So, anyway, I keep coming back to using a dumb computer monitor as a TV.  
    Yes, they are mostly designed for close-up work.   But technically and practically there is no good reason why they can't work as TVs driven by some type of computer like an Apple TV.

    Part of that is simply the result of my aversion to unnecessarily bundled systems (meaning systems where the bundling does not add functional value).   I prefer separate components that can be assembled (as well as replaced) as needed to suit the job at hand.
    hmurchisonAppleExposed1983bakedbananaswatto_cobra
  • Reply 5 of 62
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,176member
    Latko said:
    The minimal distinction between Apple and the “evel” data collectors is that Apple collects and sells aggregate, anonymized data.
    That is, you as an individual still exist, but only under a cumbersome id (instead of your name) that others may very well relate to your name via usage patterns - even while Apple won’t.
    So that distinction is MINIMAL to ZERO, further in the value chain.
    So - contrary to what the article suggests - Apple IS collecting data on users collectively and selling TONS of aggeregate data to enable spying purposes.
    Apple is not selling user data anymore than Google is AFAIK. Anything they happen to have stored regarding the personal "you" is safely and reliably stored and not sold to others. You do accurately note that when it comes to advertising both companies put you in a package of Advertising ID numbers, not names and addresses, which you can change or entirely opt out of at any time. Any access to "you" is anonymized at least by the principles themselves.

    The whole "you're being sold" conversation as it concerns Apple specifically (and Google too) is in general a FUD campaign.

    There really are companies out there selling the real you, personal details and all: Credit bureaus who sell more than a credit rating, insurance brokerages who sell claims histories and specifics of home, auto, boat, or whatever else you have of insurable value, state licensing agencies who sell driving records and ownership registrations among other stuff, even the principle CC licensing agencies like Visa and Mastercard who sell personal purchase histories. Oh and don't forget your bank, brokerage and pharmacy and until at least the past few weeks your cell carrier. EVERYONE seems to be in on it.

    Worries about an ad placement seem kind of petty don't they?
    edited May 2019 1STnTENDERBITSctt_zhrogifan_newsarthosjony0
  • Reply 6 of 62
    9secondkox29secondkox2 Posts: 2,663member
    It’s simple. 

    Aple TV “created” the smart tv back in the day. 

    Now tv makers create their own. Most play nice with competitors’ platforms. 

    So Apple NEEDS to do this to not only keep their platform healthy, but to grow it. 

    Asking why a pricavy minded apple would put its ap on TVs from manufacturers that do whatever they do is like asking why safari, iTunes, Apple Music, etc was ever put in windows or android. 

    You do do what you can in the confines of your own ecosystem to lock it down. But it doesn’t mean you can’t be allowed to benefit from other markets as well. That was the kind of thinking tat hurt Apple so bad the first go. 
    AppleExposedwatto_cobra
  • Reply 7 of 62
    “Like giving a glass of ice water to somebody in hell”  B)
    DED’s articles aren’t made to be objective - they are made to be enjoyed. And sure I did!
    Dan_Dilgerlostkiwiwatto_cobra
  • Reply 8 of 62
    Dan_DilgerDan_Dilger Posts: 1,583member
    Latko said:
    The minimal distinction between Apple and the “evel” data collectors is that Apple collects and sells aggregate, anonymized data.
    That is, you as an individual still exist, but only under a cumbersome id (instead of your name) that others may very well relate to your name via usage patterns - even while Apple won’t.
    So that distinction is MINIMAL to ZERO, further in the value chain.
    So - contrary to what the article suggests - Apple IS collecting data on users collectively and selling TONS of aggeregate data to enable spying purposes.
    Sorry, No

    Apple collects and sells aggregate, anonymized data = false

    chasmbb-15lostkiwibakedbananaswatto_cobrajony0
  • Reply 9 of 62
    rotateleftbyterotateleftbyte Posts: 1,630member
    Latko said:

    So - contrary to what the article suggests - Apple IS collecting data on users collectively and selling TONS of aggeregate data to enable spying purposes.
    If you are certain that Apple is not only collecting use data but selling on then please go ahead and provide us with proof of this action.
    chasmlostkiwibakedbananaswatto_cobra
  • Reply 10 of 62
    rotateleftbyterotateleftbyte Posts: 1,630member
    double post - sorry
    edited May 2019
  • Reply 11 of 62
    Dan_DilgerDan_Dilger Posts: 1,583member
    gatorguy said:
    Latko said:

    Apple is not selling user data anymore than Google is AFAIK. Anything they happen to have stored regarding the personal "you" is safely and reliably stored and not sold to others. You do accurately note that when it comes to advertising both companies put you in a package of Advertising ID numbers, not names and addresses, which you and can change or entirely opt out of at any time. Any access to "you" is anonymized at least by the principles themselves.

    The whole "you're being sold" conversation as it concerns Apple specifically (and Google too) is in general a FUD campaign.

    There really are companies out there selling the real you, personal details and all: Credit bureaus who sell more than a credit rating, insurance brokerages who sell claims histories and specifics of home, auto, boat, or whatever else you have of insurable value, state licensing agencies who sell driving records and ownership registrations among other stuff, even the principle CC licensing agencies like Visa and Mastercard who sell personal purchase histories. Oh and don't forget your bank, brokerage and pharmacy and until at least the past few weeks your cell carrier. EVERYONE seems to be in on it.

    Worries about an ad placement seem kind of petty don't they?
    False. Google collects and stores tons of information about you and uses this against you, the product it's selling to its customer. You know this but yet you keep posting that Apple and Google are the same and "Google cares about your privacy" propaganda. That's purely false. 

    Companies that collect data, the way Google collects your Google Home mic recordings, Nest videos, and other data, routinely lose it, hand it over to police--in ways that innocent users have lost their jobs over--and mistakenly leave it open for hackers to access.

    You keep blatantly lying about Google and pretend that Apple is doing the exact same things. There must be a reason why you spend so much time fabricating totally false claims about Google. Can you lay out for us your business model, who you are, who you work for, and who pays you to sit on AppleInsider posting totally false information all of the time? Because it seems to be your full-time job.


    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/18/technology/google-facebook-surveillance-capitalism.html ;

    Platforms like Google and Facebook may track and analyze our every search, location, like, video, photo, post and punctuation mark the better to try to sway us.

    Google, in its early days, used the keywords that people typed in to improve its search engine even as it paid scant attention to the collateral data — like users’ keyword phrasing, click patterns and spellings — that came with it. Pretty soon, however, Google began harvesting this surplus information, along with other details like users’ web-browsing activities, to infer their interests and target them with ads.

    The companies’ pivot — from serving to surveilling their users — pushed Google and Facebook to harvest more and more data, Dr. Zuboff writes. In doing so, the companies sometimes 
    bypassed privacy settings or made it difficult for users to opt out of data-sharing.

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2018/10/13/smart-home-surveillance-governments-tell-googles-nest-to-hand-over-data-300-times

    Anyone pumped for this week's launch of Google's Home Hub might want to temper their excitement. A smart home is a surveilled home. That’s been the concern of privacy activists since citizens started lighting up their abodes with so-called “smart” tech in recent years.

    Take Google’s current smart home division, Nest Labs. It’s been told to hand over data on 300 separate occasions since 2015. That’s according to a little-documented transparency report from Nest, launched a year after the $3.2 billion Google acquisition. The report shows around 60 requests for data were received by Google’s unit in the first half of this year alone. In all those cases recorded from 2015 onward, governments have sought data on as many as 525 Nest account holders.



    bb-15StrangeDayslostkiwibakedbananaswatto_cobra
  • Reply 12 of 62
    bloggerblogbloggerblog Posts: 2,462member
    Actually, people will have a lesser need to buy Apple TV since it’s already installed on their smart TV. 
    edited May 2019
  • Reply 13 of 62
    sfolaxsfolax Posts: 49member
    gatorguy said:
    Latko said:

    Apple is not selling user data anymore than Google is AFAIK. Anything they happen to have stored regarding the personal "you" is safely and reliably stored and not sold to others. You do accurately note that when it comes to advertising both companies put you in a package of Advertising ID numbers, not names and addresses, which you and can change or entirely opt out of at any time. Any access to "you" is anonymized at least by the principles themselves.

    The whole "you're being sold" conversation as it concerns Apple specifically (and Google too) is in general a FUD campaign.

    There really are companies out there selling the real you, personal details and all: Credit bureaus who sell more than a credit rating, insurance brokerages who sell claims histories and specifics of home, auto, boat, or whatever else you have of insurable value, state licensing agencies who sell driving records and ownership registrations among other stuff, even the principle CC licensing agencies like Visa and Mastercard who sell personal purchase histories. Oh and don't forget your bank, brokerage and pharmacy and until at least the past few weeks your cell carrier. EVERYONE seems to be in on it.

    Worries about an ad placement seem kind of petty don't they?
    False. Google collects and stores tons of information about you and uses this against you, the product it's selling to its customer. You know this but yet you keep posting that Apple and Google are the same and "Google cares about your privacy" propaganda. That's purely false. 

    Companies that collect data, the way Google collects your Google Home mic recordings, Nest videos, and other data, routinely lose it, hand it over to police--in ways that innocent users have lost their jobs over--and mistakenly leave it open for hackers to access.

    You keep blatantly lying about Google and pretend that Apple is doing the exact same things. There must be a reason why you spend so much time fabricating totally false claims about Google. Can you lay out for us your business model, who you are, who you work for, and who pays you to sit on AppleInsider posting totally false information all of the time? Because it seems to be your full-time job.


    Google is the default search provider on Apple devices, so how's that helping the Apple privacy stance?
    ctt_zhrogifan_newmuthuk_vanalingamavon b7
  • Reply 14 of 62
    crowleycrowley Posts: 10,453member
    Companies that collect data, the way Google collects your Google Home mic recordings, Nest videos, and other data, routinely lose it, hand it over to police--in ways that innocent users have lost their jobs over--and mistakenly leave it open for hackers to access.
    Any evidence that Google has done either of the two things in bold?
    ctt_zhmuthuk_vanalingamavon b7
  • Reply 15 of 62
    So that I don't misunderstand your points DED, is it your contention that Apple

    1. doesn't do tracking for targeted advertising?

    2.  doesn't do tracking for analytics on how customers interact on their website?

    3.  doesn't hand over data to authorities?

    I hope those aren't your points and I don't want to assume you mean something you don't.  Please don't let those be your points.  I'll be sad for you if they are.

    Also there's nothing false in Gatorguy's post relative to Apple.  I'd actually like to see you find something false in it.  Not by using your stock and trade: deflection, hyperbole, and ad hominem like you did above, but directly refuting the points he made... with actual facts that counter them.   I don't think you can.
    ctt_zhmuthuk_vanalingamavon b7
  • Reply 16 of 62
    FolioFolio Posts: 698member
    Savvy move, IF one can pinpoint the blame for any privacy slip and therefore shift to Apple TV to get wholly within protected ecosystem. Case in point: Last night I was searching in private mode using Safari iOS 12.3 iphone X on Duck Duck Go. Everytime I clicked on a link (for fish sauce) I was served an advertisement, based on past browsing history days ago (cat scratching issue). Even though I keep in phone in private dark mode and use DDG, someone was tracking! When one small banner ad exploded and took up 80 percent of real estate I cut short my search. Looked up DDG on Wiki and see they still make big claims but are allied with Yahoo and Bing. But I'm not sure who to blame really. DDG? ATT my provider? Siri who I've given much tracking leeway? How do I (and Apple) prevent in future? It's a dystopia come true, when ads takeover and infringe on productivity. Most of time I switch off Javascript on mobile, but not last night.
    gatorguymuthuk_vanalingam
  • Reply 17 of 62
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,176member
    gatorguy said:
    Latko said:

    Apple is not selling user data anymore than Google is AFAIK. Anything they happen to have stored regarding the personal "you" is safely and reliably stored and not sold to others. You do accurately note that when it comes to advertising both companies put you in a package of Advertising ID numbers, not names and addresses, which you and can change or entirely opt out of at any time. Any access to "you" is anonymized at least by the principles themselves.

    The whole "you're being sold" conversation as it concerns Apple specifically (and Google too) is in general a FUD campaign.

    There really are companies out there selling the real you, personal details and all: Credit bureaus who sell more than a credit rating, insurance brokerages who sell claims histories and specifics of home, auto, boat, or whatever else you have of insurable value, state licensing agencies who sell driving records and ownership registrations among other stuff, even the principle CC licensing agencies like Visa and Mastercard who sell personal purchase histories. Oh and don't forget your bank, brokerage and pharmacy and until at least the past few weeks your cell carrier. EVERYONE seems to be in on it.

    Worries about an ad placement seem kind of petty don't they?
    False.

    Companies that collect data, the way Google collects your Google Home mic recordings, Nest videos, and other data, routinely lose it, hand it over to police--in ways that innocent users have lost their jobs over--and mistakenly leave it open for hackers to access.
    I posted absolutely nothing false, which seems to require tugging away on some goalposts to create something you'd like to suggest I could have said in another universe, and that "something I didn't actually say" therefor proves I'm lying. Well okay then.  

    I've not ever claimed "Google and Apple are the same". What is it, Red Herring Day and nobody told me? 

    Plainly they are not which is exactly why you might try to use that to dismiss what I've factually said.While you've always had a unique spin on words IMO some of it is silly when used to avoid a conversation. To some it might make you appear to have a weak argument.

    Does Google sell private user data? Nope and I've said so. Prove that's lying DED

    Does Google relegate users into baskets of anonymized Advertising ID numbers and not names and addresses for advertising activities? Yup and I said so. Prove that claim I made is lying DED

    Has Google left open personal data files for "hackers to access" as you claim. Not that I'm aware of. Prove that claim is false DED (and check the facts of that Nest claim you're about to make) since you've hinted otherwise.

    Do both Apple and Google hand over personal user data when presented with a legal demand from a lawful authority to do so? Yes I do believe they do. Prove that's a false claim DED since you've hinted otherwise at only applying to one of them.

    I won't at this point go into how Apple profits (in the $Billions) from offering personal access to and ad tracking of Apple users, but if you'd like to have that conversation I'm game. There are not truly clean hands when it comes to monetizing users of a platform. It comes down to a matter of degrees not devil and angel, and in the degrees Apple and Google are certainly not the same. That's one point we can both agree on if nothing else. I have never claimed otherwise, but feel free to prove that's false too. 

    A bit of honest debate instead of so much puffery (IMO) goes a long ways Daniel.  I'd appreciate you not resorting to forum rules breaking to lob a few more personal insults this way either as tho using them proves you must be right. We can talk like adults, silly personal stuff doesn't make anyone "more right". 
    edited May 2019 ctt_zh1STnTENDERBITSmuthuk_vanalingam
  • Reply 18 of 62
    kruegdudekruegdude Posts: 340member
    crowley said:
    Companies that collect data, the way Google collects your Google Home mic recordings, Nest videos, and other data, routinely lose it, hand it over to police--in ways that innocent users have lost their jobs over--and mistakenly leave it open for hackers to access.
    Any evidence that Google has done either of the two things in bold?
    This is done via the spy chips imbedded in the google servers :-)
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 19 of 62
    rogifan_newrogifan_new Posts: 4,297member
    Because when Apple’s MO and greatest source of revenue/profits is selling pricy hardware then they can push the privacy and security angle. Now that they’re moving in to subscription services they’ll do whatever is necessary to grow that business model. Also for all of Apple’s bravado around privacy they still take billions from Google for it to be the default search engine on iOS. And then most downloaded free apps are usually from Google or Facebook. Man DED is obsessed with Google. Is it possible for him to write an editorial that isn’t just a long way of saying Apple good, Google bad?
    edited May 2019 muthuk_vanalingamavon b7
  • Reply 20 of 62
    kruegdudekruegdude Posts: 340member
    gatorguy said:
    gatorguy said:
    Latko said:

    Apple is not selling user data anymore than Google is AFAIK. Anything they happen to have stored regarding the personal "you" is safely and reliably stored and not sold to others. You do accurately note that when it comes to advertising both companies put you in a package of Advertising ID numbers, not names and addresses, which you and can change or entirely opt out of at any time. Any access to "you" is anonymized at least by the principles themselves.

    The whole "you're being sold" conversation as it concerns Apple specifically (and Google too) is in general a FUD campaign.

    There really are companies out there selling the real you, personal details and all: Credit bureaus who sell more than a credit rating, insurance brokerages who sell claims histories and specifics of home, auto, boat, or whatever else you have of insurable value, state licensing agencies who sell driving records and ownership registrations among other stuff, even the principle CC licensing agencies like Visa and Mastercard who sell personal purchase histories. Oh and don't forget your bank, brokerage and pharmacy and until at least the past few weeks your cell carrier. EVERYONE seems to be in on it.

    Worries about an ad placement seem kind of petty don't they?
    False.

    Companies that collect data, the way Google collects your Google Home mic recordings, Nest videos, and other data, routinely lose it, hand it over to police--in ways that innocent users have lost their jobs over--and mistakenly leave it open for hackers to access.
    I posted absolutely nothing false, which required you to tug away on some goalposts to make something you'd like to suggest i could have said in another universe to show I'm posting something false.

    I've not ever claimed "Google and Apple are the same". What is it, Red Herring Day and nobody told me? 

    Plainly they are not which is exactly why you might try to use that to dismiss what I've factually said.While you've always had a unique spin on words IMO some of it is silly when used to avoid a conversation. To some it might make you appear to have a weak argument.

    Does Google sell private user data? Nope and I've said so. Prove that's lying DED

    Does Google relegate users into baskets of anonymized Advertising ID numbers and not names and addresses for advertising activities? Yup and I said so. Prove that claim I made is lying DED

    Has Google left open personal data files for "hackers to access" as you claim. Not that I'm aware of. Prove that claim is false DED (and check the facts of that Nest claim you're about to make) since you've hinted otherwise.

    Do both Apple and Google had over personal user data when presented with a legal demand from a lawful authority to do so? Yes and I've stated as much. Prove that's a false claim DED since you've hinted otherwise.

    I won't at this point go into how Apple profits (in the $Billions) from offering personal access to Apple users, but if you'd like to have that conversation I'm game. There are not truly clean hands when it comes to monetizing users of a platform. It comes down to a matter of degrees not devil and angel, and in the degrees Apple and Google are certainly not the same. that's one point we both agree on. I have never claimed otherwise, but feel free to prove that's false too.

     A bit of honest debate instead of so much puffery (IMO) goes a long ways Daniel.  I'd appreciate you not resorting to forum rules breaking to lob a few more personal insults this way either as tho using them proves you must be right. We can talk like adults, silly personal stuff doesn't make anyone "more right". 
    Wait? Corrections is Daniel? 
Sign In or Register to comment.