[mbirth]

Just because Apple is no angel doesn't change anything the Google. Also, hacks on Google's software in the future won't protect us from it has and will collect and save on its servers.

Oh please, take off your tinfoil hat and show me any proof that Google has been hacked and "lost" personal information of their customers in the past! The only cases I know of were where the users gave away their passwords or used silly passwords to begin with.

Apple OTOH … just remember "The Fappening" where hackers gained access to hundreds of accounts just by asking the Apple Care Hotline.

[medic22003]

Who said they were wrong?

Posted via CB10

They ain't wrong lol

[moosbb]

Haha, no, I only said that if Google should try to do bad things with Android, there are lots of people with copies of the (unaltered) source code who can provide "good" firmwares.

And as far as I know, Google is one of the few companies who actually tell you what data they collect and let you opt-out. Let's just remember that thing with Apple where people stumbled upon a file on their phones which contained the locations they've been to in the last months …

Let's remember that they was forced by many justice courts to do so, as here in Europe!
Without constraint, I doubt you would opt'out those today!

Posted via CB10

[JSmith422]

Seriously, if the US became some kind of evil rogue Empire then we would have much more serious things to worry about.

I think the point is not what would happen after the US became an evil rogue empire, but that in the wrong hands, Google's data provides the tools necessary to BECOME an evil rogue empire.

Posted via CB10

[JSmith422]

Oh please, take off your tinfoil hat and show me any proof that Google has been hacked and "lost" personal information of their customers in the past! The only cases I know of were where the users gave away their passwords or used silly passwords to begin with.

Apple OTOH … just remember "The Fappening" where hackers gained access to hundreds of accounts just by asking the Apple Care Hotline.

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

The bottom line is, nobody really knows what Google collects and what happens to that information.

Posted via CB10

[markmall]

Oh please, take off your tinfoil hat and show me any proof that Google has been hacked and "lost" personal information of their customers in the past! The only cases I know of were where the users gave away their passwords or used silly passwords to begin with.

Apple OTOH … just remember "The Fappening" where hackers gained access to hundreds of accounts just by asking the Apple Care Hotline.

Please read what I wrote again.

Posted via CB10

[conite]

I think the point is not what would happen after the US became an evil rogue empire, but that in the wrong hands, Google's data provides the tools necessary to BECOME an evil rogue empire.

Posted via CB10

So some kind of army is going to storm the Google server farm, access everyone's shopping preferences, and rule over us with an iron fist?

[The_Passporter]

So some kind of army is going to storm the Google server farm, access everyone's shopping preferences, and rule over us with an iron fist?

I knew it!
:O

Posted via CB10

[markmall]

So some kind of army is going to storm the Google server farm, access everyone's shopping preferences, and rule over us with an iron fist?

A court order to tender the information. It's how most information is obtained from corporations about consumers. The police already get information from cell companies in criminal cases. What if we started investigating hate speech in private Facebook chats? Or in SMS messages? Given the climate on college campuses, it's not hard to see where this could end up when these Millenials are running things. People lose jobs over errant comments in private emails.

Posted via CB10

[conite]

People lose jobs over errant comments in private emails.

Posted via CB10

Private email? Please provide a citation.

DTEK60 / Z30

[JSmith422]

So some kind of army is going to storm the Google server farm, access everyone's shopping preferences, and rule over us with an iron fist?

Haha, unlikely. Perhaps a more probable scenario would be a government (domestic or otherwise), gaining access through executive order, congressional mandate, court order, "spying" or by Google flat out granting them access in the name of some popular cause....probably "safety and security" and then said government using that data in a format to further it's own agenda. In 2001 the government was granted access to all of your financial data, and I'm sure you're familiar with the NSA and prism. Is it really a stretch to think that eventually they're going to come for the data Google has?

That said, one doesn't have too look very far into history to find plenty of examples of a government using information against certain minority groups of citizens, (even within western democracies) in the name of betterment, safety, security, economy, etc, etc, that many consider to be atrocities.

I pose the question, how would the world look today if Google existed in 1939?

Sub- question, would your answer be the same if Google had servers located within Germany?

Posted via CB10

[conite]

Haha, unlikely. Perhaps a more probable scenario would be a government (domestic or otherwise), gaining access through executive order, congressional mandate, court order, "spying" or by Google flat out granting them access in the name of some popular cause....probably "safety and security" and then said government using that data in a format to further it's own agenda. In 2001 the government was granted access to all of your financial data, and I'm sure you're familiar with the NSA and prism. Is it really a stretch to think that eventually they're going to come for the data Google has?

That said, one doesn't have too look very far into history to find plenty of examples of a government using information against certain minority groups of citizens, (even within western democracies) in the name of betterment, safety, security, economy, etc, etc, that many consider to be atrocities.

I pose the question, how would the world look today if Google existed in 1939?

Sub- question, would your answer be the same if Google had servers located within Germany?

Posted via CB10

Same can be said of cloud services like OneDrive, Dropbox, etc. My investment advisor has my financial information, my doctor has my health records, and (if I had one) my priest has my confessions.

There are serious privacy laws in Canada and the US. It would take a major upheaval to change that - and if that indeed happened, we would be screwed anyway.

[JSmith422]

Same can be said of cloud services like OneDrive, Dropbox, etc. My investment advisor has my financial information, my doctor has my health records, and (if I had one) my priest has my confessions.

There are serious privacy laws in Canada and the US. It would take a major upheaval to change that - and if that indeed happened, we would be screwed anyway.

You didn't answer my question. =)

I don't think anyone is defending Dropbox, OneDrive, (or any other company) and specifically demonizing Google, those services have inherent risks too....it just happens that Google is the worst offender, and does so generally without the end user's knowledge. If I save a file to Dropbox, I know what information Dropbox has. Do you know what information Google has?

The biggest risk though is in aggregating the data, not in the fact that it exists. A small piece of information does very little, but the whole pie is dangerous. Google has made it clear that they want the whole pie.

I think these are the wild wild west days of cloud computing and data mining. I fully expect anti-trust laws to be enacted within the next several decades dictating what a company can collect, store, use, sell, when and to whom.

Posted via CB10

[JSmith422]

Android is not Google. Android is Open-source, so BB could continue developing and releasing their variant of Android.




You can run your phone without logging in to a Google account. You can disable all Google apps on your phone. Also AFAIR, you get asked a few questions about sharing your data when you first setup an Android phone. So if you're afraid to share your data, just don't do it.

Our company is currently researching this, and though nobody can give us a clear answer, our understanding is that even if you delete Google Play, and don't have a Google account that the OS still "phones home" and delivers certain data back to Google.

Posted via CB10

[mbirth]

Our company is currently researching this, and though nobody can give us a clear answer, our understanding is that even if you delete Google Play, and don't have a Google account that the OS still "phones home" and delivers certain data back to Google.

Posted via CB10

I'd love to see proof about that and whether the (anonymous) data, if existing, is of any value or just some one-time statistical counter to see how many Android users are there.

[Thud Hardsmack]

You didn't answer my question. =)

I don't think anyone is defending Dropbox, OneDrive, (or any other company) and specifically demonizing Google, those services have inherent risks too....it just happens that Google is the worst offender, and does so generally without the end user's knowledge. If I save a file to Dropbox, I know what information Dropbox has. Do you know what information Google has?

The biggest risk though is in aggregating the data, not in the fact that it exists. A small piece of information does very little, but the whole pie is dangerous. Google has made it clear that they want the whole pie.

I think these are the wild wild west days of cloud computing and data mining. I fully expect anti-trust laws to be enacted within the next several decades dictating what a company can collect, store, use, sell, when and to whom.

Posted via CB10

Google makes it very clear what they collect and provides a dashboard for users to keep tabs on their data. I don't know about other people but I get monthly reminders from Google to check that page.

[JSmith422]

Google makes it very clear what they collect and provides a dashboard for users to keep tabs on their data. I don't know about other people but I get monthly reminders from Google to check that page.

"Very clear?" I'm willing to bet that if you read those pages it's going to be dense legalese effectively giving Google the right to collect anything it wants and do anything it wants with the data. I've yet to read any TOS that aren't written that way.

Posted via CB10

[Thud Hardsmack]

"Very clear?" I'm willing to bet that if you read those pages it's going to be dense legalese effectively giving Google the right to collect anything it wants and do anything it wants with the data. I've yet to read any TOS that aren't written that way.

Posted via CB10

If you haven't read it yourself aren't you merely parroting what you've heard as opposed to presenting concrete facts? The ToS isn't terribly dense in the slightest.

[Superdupont 2_0]

Oh please, take off your tinfoil hat and show me any proof that Google has been hacked and "lost" personal information of their customers in the past! The only cases I know of were where the users gave away their passwords or used silly passwords to begin with. [...]

Maybe you will find this article interesting:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world...4dd_story.html

What I read there is:
"According to a top-secret accounting dated Jan. 9, 2013, the NSA’s acquisitions directorate sends millions of records every day from internal Yahoo and Google networks to data warehouses at the agency’s headquarters at Fort Meade, Md."

BTW, we don't know whether other countries have found the same security hole in Google's network.
But afaik the Russians and the Chinese employ ten thousands of very competent hackers and they obviously have very nice tools as well, so, maybe you should be a little bit concerned.

[Superdupont 2_0]

While we don't know how "evil" Google is compared to "BlackBerry", Google users also have to deal with this:

https://arstechnica.com/security/201...-android-user/

https://arstechnica.com/security/201...s-sought-root/

TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogTwo Games Released in Google Play Can Root Android Devices - TrendLabs Security Intelligence Blog


Please anyone, could you provide me one single app that can root BB10 and deeply compromise the OS?
I think, if you are looking for games but don't want your OS to be compromised, BB10 is still woth a look.

[mbirth]

What I read there is:
"According to a top-secret accounting dated Jan. 9, 2013, the NSA’s acquisitions directorate sends millions of records every day from internal Yahoo and Google networks to data warehouses at the agency’s headquarters at Fort Meade, Md."

Wait, we have to differ here between the data Google collects willingly and that what 3-letter-agencies (say they) can collect if they want to. That's two completely different pairs of shoes. And what the article suggests is that thing where Level3 (manufacturer of network hardware) supposedly helped the NSA. Google (and Yahoo) had nothing to do with that.

[mbirth]

Google users also have to deal with this:

https://arstechnica.com/security/201...-android-user/

https://arstechnica.com/security/201...s-sought-root/

TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogTwo Games Released in Google Play Can Root Android Devices - TrendLabs Security Intelligence Blog

Have you read into those articles or are you just searching random things to support your opinion?

Those apps containing the ransomware were so obviously bad that whoever willingly downloaded, ran them and gave them permissions to access the storage deserved whatever happened.

The "rooting" apps are also using bugs in the operating system. Bugs that have long been fixed, but because many manufacturers are still thinking they don't have to care about the devices they've already sold, those affected devices (not mentioned in those articles, by the way) were most probably running older/ancient versions of Android where the bugs are still there.

Please anyone, could you provide me one single app that can root BB10 and deeply compromise the OS?
I think, if you are looking for games but don't want your OS to be compromised, BB10 is still woth a look.

With all these people here randomly installing bar files to their phones, you don't have to go through the BB World... just saying.

[kvndoom]

Oh please, take off your tinfoil hat and show me any proof that Google has been hacked and "lost" personal information of their customers in the past! The only cases I know of were where the users gave away their passwords or used silly passwords to begin with.

Apple OTOH … just remember "The Fappening" where hackers gained access to hundreds of accounts just by asking the Apple Care Hotline.

I love you, Jennifer Lawrence!

JLaw > ScarJo

Blackberry Poptart SE - Cricket Wireless

[Superdupont 2_0]

Wait, we have to differ here between the data Google collects willingly and that what 3-letter-agencies (say they) can collect if they want to. That's two completely different pairs of shoes. And what the article suggests is that thing where Level3 (manufacturer of network hardware) supposedly helped the NSA. Google (and Yahoo) had nothing to do with that.

Well at first, the security hole was that lack of SSL, so everyone with access to the cable connection was able to snoop that traffic.
And at second, I was just responding to your post:

Oh please, take off your tinfoil hat and show me any proof that Google has been hacked and "lost" personal information of their customers in the past!

In my book Google has lost a lots of personal information of their customers.

[Superdupont 2_0]

Have you read into those articles or are you just searching random things to support your opinion?

Yes, I read enough of these kind of articles, but maybe my opinion is not clear.

To me BB10 has a future, because I can sideload any bar file from the shadiest sources without compromising the OS.
Yes, yes, all my information can be stolen from a bad app, but the OS cannot be deeply compromised.

And I think it is worth to mention that Google Play is not a safe place to download apps.
Many advices start with "Download only from Google Play...", but to me that's like advising to use AV software on a computer.