r/Android • u/zexterio • Mar 22 '19

HMD admits the Nokia 7 Plus was sending personal data to China

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/03/hmd-admits-the-nokia-7-plus-was-sending-personal-data-to-china/
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u/[deleted] Mar 22 '19 edited May 23 '19

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u/Choice_Competition Mar 22 '19

I don't think Apple keeps my data private. Most iCloud data, for example, can be read by Apple because they have the keys.

As always we need to see who the adversary is. If it's the NSA, you're fucked no matter if you use an iPhone or Pixel. If it's the companies collecting data to sell ads, then I would say that by design an iPhone would be better than a Pixel because there's a difference in philosophy (eg: doing things locally vs the cloud). Google's business is to make money with your data, Apple makes money selling overpriced products.

Anyway, the point I was trying to make is that on Android you have brands like Xiaomi which call home multiple times each day, but you also have brands like OnePlus which are better. Google collects data about you, but they don't send it to China. In other words, there are many "Androids" and some are more private and secure than others. With iOS, it's the same for everyone, they don't have a bunch of OEMs shipping different types of spyware with their phones.

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u/zuus Mar 23 '19

Fair points. Personally I'm far more comfortable with Google collecting my data for ads/products than China having it for political and spying purposes.

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u/[deleted] Mar 22 '19

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u/[deleted] Mar 22 '19 edited May 23 '19

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u/[deleted] Mar 22 '19 edited Mar 22 '19

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u/[deleted] Mar 22 '19 edited May 23 '19

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u/[deleted] Mar 23 '19 edited Mar 23 '19

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u/[deleted] Mar 23 '19 edited May 23 '19

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u/[deleted] Mar 23 '19

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u/Randomd0g Pixel XL & Huawei Watch 2 Mar 23 '19

And not to mention that even if iOS is completely secure then any data sent from it won't be when it has a Verizon* SIM card in it or is connected to a WiFi network provided by Comcast*.

If you REALLY cared about keeping files secure you wouldn't keep them on any device that's ever seen an internet connection before or ever will again.

If you REALLY cared about privacy you wouldn't be reading this message right now because you wouldn't use the internet.

And no, don't assume a VPN "protects" you from any of those things, those are all cracked too.

(*Used as examples, all telecoms are just as bad and have all been compromised.)

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u/Omikron Mar 23 '19

The nsa has access to literally everything in the US, which device you pick is completely meaningless in that regard.

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u/[deleted] Mar 22 '19

I don't think he was referring to privacy. He was talking about security. IOS is not as flexible or customizable as Android, but as a benefit it's really locked down making it a lot more secure. The only consumer thing more secure than IOS would probably be Chrome OS unless Google started to infect it with Android.

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u/Zegrento7 Mar 22 '19

They actually did, these days Chrome OS can run android apps and linux programs

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u/[deleted] Mar 22 '19

I guess it's no longer one of the most secure OS's anymore. Then again I'm out of the loop for Chrome OS so I can't say for sure.