Mastodawn

Kreig Jul 6, 2023

The Zuck suck is in full swing. In the few short hours since I started using #Threads, #DuckDuckGo has already blocked over 200 data tracking attempts. These include things like "headphone status" and "screen density."

EDIT for clarity: The 200+ attempts *may* have been overcounted as DDG hadn't tooled their VPN for Threads yet.

#DataPrivacy #Meta #ThreadsApp

EDIT: To anyone who is using this post to bash anyone and everyone who is using Threads, please read this https://writing.exchange/@kreig/110673494921536371

Kreig Durham (@[email protected])

Since my post about the #DuckDuckGo app and #Threads is still getting lots of attention, I want to be clear about how I actually feel about #DataPrivacy. It's a lot like #recycling. Yeah it's a good thing to protect your own personal data, but if we're being honest, it's not effective on an individual scale. We need good legislation at a national level to meaningfully change the game for the benefit of us all. Until then, no matter how careful you are, you're still being negatively affected.

Writing Exchange

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SyrupSplashin Jul 6, 2023

@kreig Most of these metrics seem important to the function of the app. Whether it be orientation for portrait/landscape modes, resolution and density for scaling, internal storage for saving videos / pictures, etc. Gender, birthday, and location beyond country (and less justifiably but not entirely, state) is a bit unnecessary though. Nonetheless, I see good reason to collect most of the information there for a good modern app experience.

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ilyess Jul 6, 2023

@SyrupSplashin I disagree. How much of similar data does Mastodon collect? Close to none, despite offering a “good modern app experience”.

Also, I don’t think the justification you put forward for collecting that data is accurate. For example, the app doesn’t need to collect Device Total Memory in order to figure out media storage. The way it works is that the app asks the OS to add a file to the filesystem and, if storage is low, gets an OS error.

@kreig

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Henry Maddocks

@ilyess @SyrupSplashin @kreig its device finger printing. Because they can’t use tracking cookies they try to build a fingerprint of your device by matching as many parameters as they can.