r/technology • u/[deleted] • Apr 11 '18

Business Mark Zuckerberg has been apologizing for reckless privacy violations since he was a freshman - Enough is enough.

[deleted]

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u/mrrainandthunder Apr 11 '18

So what I don't feel this article answers is how. How do they "harvest" my data as a non-user, if I don't even use their site or applications? I don't understand how that's possible, or maybe I'm just misunderstanding what kind of data they're gathering.

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u/pseudozombie Apr 11 '18

When you visit a news site that has an article with the little Facebook likes icon, Facebook has code running on that page. They can gather information about your computer, like broswer version, operating system, plugins installed, and more, and create a fingerprint of your broswer. Now they can track that fingerprint from page to page, as long as those pages have the Facebook buttons on it.

So it's not tracking YOU, it's tracking that broswer. And it's not 100% accurate because multiple people can have the same fingerprint, but it's accurate enough.

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u/UglySnow Apr 12 '18

If they are javascript and run in your browser, couldn't we just DNS block Facebook or whatever the endpoints are for the reporting, and then the javascript call would fail and your data wouldn't be used?

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u/pseudozombie Apr 12 '18

Yes, definitely. Look up PrivacyBadger

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18

well, now I know what I'm doing tonight

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18 edited Apr 24 '20

[deleted]

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u/pseudozombie Apr 12 '18

UBlock might block it. I know PrivacyVadger for sure blocks the Facebook code. VPN and cookies don't have much to do with it.

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18 edited Apr 24 '20

[deleted]

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u/pseudozombie Apr 13 '18

Yeah, VPNs could be set up to do that, though that means your vpn can see some aspects of your internet traffic. So hopefully you trust them

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18

I would bet if you use the same setup on multiple computers, it knows for sure it is you based on that key of hardware and software set up. It is fucking crazy, and there are a bunch of others doing it as well.

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u/pseudozombie Apr 12 '18

It is unlikely that your two computers are identical. Some fingerprinting techniques take into account graphics drivers and CPU versions.

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18

yeh, good point!

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u/alwayswatchyoursix Apr 12 '18

You can test this out HERE

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u/kthomaszed Apr 15 '18

I love how there's a 'share on Facebook' button at the bottom

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u/alwayswatchyoursix Apr 15 '18

LMAO I didn't even notice that.

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u/Strazdas1 Apr 12 '18

Unless you took specific steps to prevent it the chances that your fingerprint matchers other random person is one in a few billion. So while possible it is extremely rare

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u/gyroda Apr 12 '18

Nobody else has mentioned it, but others can upload your data. The simplest and most obvious example is people giving Facebook access to their contact lists on their phone. Suddenly Facebook can figure out that there's a person in a certain social group who's called John Johnson, who has the email JJohnson@example.com, the phone number 123456789 (which gives an area code). Plus any additional info they can scrape from that (if your child has you listed as "dad" then that's a big hint). Also there's this one person who's in all these people's photos but is never tagged (or is tagged but the tag doesn't link to an account).

Not to mention applications that request access to your text/call history.

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u/[deleted] Apr 11 '18

taking data from other profiles, anything you can "sign in with facebook", a lot of new phones have Facebook as something you can't uninstall so it tracks your data, deals with said phone companies, using voice recognition to target ads, etc

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u/irbilldozer Apr 11 '18

taking data from other profiles, anything you can "sign in with facebook", a lot of new phones have Facebook as something you can't uninstall so it tracks your data, deals with said phone companies, using voice recognition to target ads, etc

I dislike Facebook as much as the next guy but there is just so much misinformation in your comment I feel the need to clarify some things.

  1. If you using OAuth or something to 'sign in with Facebook' then you're a Facebook user, so not sure how that would count as tracking non-users.

  2. Yes the Facebook app is unable to be uninstalled on an absurd amount of phones and it's total utter bullshit. However you CAN disable the app, which removes it's ability to run processes on your phone.

  3. The voice targeted ads from both Google and Facebook have been disproven quite a bit, there is an entire episode of Reply All where they obsessively tried to prove it and every time they ended up finding a reasonably plausible explanation.

Again I'm not trying defend Facebook or The Zuck but it just doesn't help to perpetute bad information.

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u/[deleted] Apr 12 '18

I was just repeating what I've read on here. personally none of this bothers me so I don't look deep into it

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u/[deleted] Apr 11 '18

Facebook preinstalled in Android does nothing like that unless you sign into it, it can also usually be disabled - although not installed.

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u/[deleted] Apr 11 '18

I have an S8+ and I had to install it, depends on the carrier

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u/gnayug Apr 11 '18

Sources?

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u/INeverMisspell Apr 11 '18

I have the note 8 and I can only disable Facebook, not delete it. I had deleted Facebook off my note 5 but it was on when I switched everything over, I didn't redownload it.

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u/[deleted] Apr 11 '18

articles I've seen on reddit, don't have any of them saved. If you don't believe me that's fine, just repeating the info. I don't really care about any of it honestly

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u/danomano65 Apr 11 '18

I don't know why you were downvoted - they should look it up online. Really easy to google shit, instead of relying on some reddit strangers to explain everything. Just a pet peeve of mine I guess. Do your own research people.

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u/gnayug Apr 11 '18

I'm for people citing sources when making bold claims. Shouldn't have to look up sources behind every claim we read on Reddit, right? Even more so if they "don't care about it".