š½š©š šš„Saudi Arabia Buys PokĆ©mon Go, and Probably All of Your Location Data
DimlyLitFlutteringMothIām a level 50 PokĆ©mon Go player, who has played since release day, and thatās the app deleted.
Next up will be requesting removal of my data under GDPR.
Yet another good thing ruined by the Saudi government. Why canāt we have nice things? :(
NOT_RICKI donāt disagree with the sentiment but PoGo has been pretty trash for a while now
Yeah, but beforehand it was just a bad game (i donāt play it, but itās clearly popular) but now itās directly profiting the worst group alive. If there wasnāt a reason to leave before, there 100% is now.
Yeah. The second they announced it would be a thing, I said "what a great way to collect users data, and sell it to companies. PASS!
Iām known as someone who in general predicts the worst case scenario, and then time and time again is proven right. Even I didnāt predict the ones buying this location data would be the Saudi government. Iām not surprised. Iām just surprised thereās levels BELOW my pessismistic mindset, and now weāre going there.
I never predicted nazis in usa government. I never predicted the usa government would be used as a shadow government for russia.
I viewed it more as āugh, can you imagine going as low as I think we will? Itās going to be badā¦ā. And now weāre sinking so much lower. I THOUGHT we hid bedrock a few years ago. The only big thing I predicted that hasnāt happened yet is the second american civil war. I still think itās coming, but now other things are going much lower than I thought they ever could.
cool story bro
patatahooliganBold of you to assume this wasnāt always the plan for Pokemon Go. A ton of online services are basically designed from the get go to be mass surveillance machines and the founders know theyāre eventually going to be sold as exactly that.
Judging by what they did with the data from Xitter, this will cost someone their life. Anything to make a quick buck, thoughā¦
Of course it was. Niantic came out of Google with Ingress which was designed to collect data for Google!
But at least Niantic always identified itself as a data collection company and not as game developers.
Just wait until the āsovereign fundā trump is starting puts up assets like āformer national parkā, āfederal water rightsā, āstate and federal timber landāā¦itās all just an asset to be plundered to him. A hotel company to flip.
PokĆ©mon GO hasnāt been good for a long time, sadly. The game was peak during the pandemic before Niantic absolutely turned it into a dumpster fire.
Orna does a much better job of scratching that GPS RPG itch for me, and itās a better game in every way.
As far as I know, Saudi Arabia is not subject to the GDPR. They already have your data and will do whatever they want with it. I really donāt think thereās anything you can do to stop them.
But if Iām wrong, please let me know.
With a bit of luck they still have a GDPR deletion process in place.
If they handle personal data of EU citizens, they need to comply with GDPR.
Now, whatās gonna happen if they donāt? I donāt know what mechanics are in place to deal with that.
While you are technically correct in that, everyone operating in Europe is required to comply with a GPR, there are many who donāt. And they face varying levels of punishment.
But Saudi Arabia is not in the EU, and social media company can register in whatever country they want despite their ownership.
So what will happen? They will fragrantly violate the GDPR, and escape any fines due to jurisdictional limitations. And even if they do face fines, there are someā¦ āPolitical āways to negate them.
Sadly, even Europe, as progressive as it is, sterilize on Saudi oil. That can always be used to pressure government representatives into complying with their well rather than the Will of the people.
Wow, level 50ā½ (Now that I have your attention with my asshole openerā¦) Were you unaware of the last 10 years of Niantec/Google openly admitting that they were using camera and location data to train their models? Were you blinded by the fun of the game? Or did you just think the data you were uploading wasnāt that important?
I donāt usually buy the ābut itās ok if the company is American!!!ā accusations because no corporation should be abusing your privacy, but I was just sitting here wondering why they think it is suddenly not ok if a foreign company is the one harvesting data.
I remember it being pretty big news when it was revealed, with government agencies making the app forbidden for their employees.
For myself, it is much more about the ties to Saudi Arabia given that the country and government arenāt all too happy with LGBT people.
The US government is well on its way to be the same.
Yip, absolutely. Which is why Iām moving away from big tech products (one of the reasons Iām on Lemmy!).
Saudi Arabia is considerably worse though for LGBT rights so I donāt think there is any benefit in pushing whataboutism in this case. Both are awful, one is definitively more so.
I donāt understand why Americans are more concerned with foreign governments having their data than their own.
Your own government can do much more nefarious things with it than a country a continent away.
Why would an American be mentioning GDPR?
Niantic and Google are (were?) not companies with very strong links to the Saudi Arabian government.
Iāve seriously reconsidered how much I use Google in recent months, but Google and Niantic arenāt owned by a government that is incredibly repressive and discriminatory of people like myself.
They are, however, owned by the people who own the government that is repressive and discriminatory to people like yourself.
Itās all fair though, fuck Nazi Saudi and USA.
Yes, absolutely, which is why Iām moving away from those services. This just speeds things up in the case of PoGo since Saudi Arabia has has been much, much more blatant and apparent with this in prior years (c.f. The tragic case of Eden Knight).
Yes, I was aware though under the impression of improving geospatial and mapping models. There are many ways in which we are now entwined into these systems and so itās a matter of deciding, on a personal level, what you are comfortable with.
I am certainly not comfortable with the data going to Saudi Arabia where access to such is used for active suppression and harm.
Maybe it was a naive viewpoint at the time, but the climate of 2016 was very different to what it is now.
LucidlethargyLol, but you were fine with Niantic collecting your data??
Goodness. Justā¦ Goodness.
Location data? Yeah, naively I was since Iād previously been fine with Nianticās work with Ingress. Hindsight is 20/20 though.
PetteriPanoIāve tried some of scopelyās games. Theyāre following this playbook to the letter.
Youāll be getting freebies when your friends spend cash. Youāll get time limited offers. Youāll be paying to ātry againā, against other players.
Who wins when a wall street broker and an oil sheikh use their wallets to fight over a PokƩmon gym? Scopely wins.
Letās go whaling: Tricks for monetising mobile game players with free-to-play
merdaverseScopely games are just a bunch of mixed dark patterns reskinned with some popular IP
I guess Iām going back to not walking.
NelotsRunescape but it requires physical exercise? Sign me the fuck up!
šš¦šGreat app, 1.52M steps since last April. Super simple walking app that gives you progress through steps. You can gain progress in chopping trees, smelting, crafting gear, etc. passively through your phoneās pedometer.
Was just about to post this! Been in the closed beta since January. Usually checking into the app before I leave for work/home or on the bus.
woelkchenMoving over to another proprietary location data hoarder is not really a good solution, though.
Location Data. We collect location data such as information about your deviceās location, which can be either precise or imprecise. How much information we collect depends on the type and settings of the device you use to access the Services. For example, we may use GPS and other technologies to collect geolocation data that tells us your current location (based on your IP address). You can opt out of allowing us to collect this information either by refusing access to the information or by disabling your Location setting on your device. However, if you choose to opt out, you may not be able to use certain aspects of the Services.
This is awesome. Thanks!
Maproulette.Org itās built to give you challenges around you that help improve and add to open street maps.
TehdastehdasStreetComplete helps improve OpenStreetMap.
Great app, I recommend everyone give it a try
Just curious what they end up doing with any of the location data?
notsoshaihuludAsk Jamal Khashoogshi
*Khashoggi
Iād assume same thing they did with Xitterās data. Track down arab dissidents and butcher them, then dissolve their remains in acid so no one can find their corpse.
Probably throw planes at you.
ClotI am a level 47 player, altho havent played the game for several months now due to its downfall. Guess, wont be going back
But you were fine with Niantic? Why? They were an awful and evil company. Did you never look them up?
I donāt think anyone playing a game in which the main mechanic is tracking your location is the type of person to look anything up.
Lol if anyone looked at my pokemon go data, theyād think I was some playboy with a private jet that visits Jakarta one day, and Tokyo the next. They also think I have insomnia and wander around in half mile circles all night. They think I have some insane government access when I visit chernobyl or tour the entirety of Italy right in the middle of their worst covid lockdowns.
I disassembled one of my phones and physically detached the extra antenna bits for the GPS, making it extremely unreliable, and a little aluminum foil on top can start to throw my location 500ft in a random direction.
Pokemon go provides direct feedback for gps spoofing in a way I havenāt seen available anywhere else. The game isnāt too fun, but learning where I can break GPS is a pretty fun game. The game of cat and mouse with Niantic detecting spoofers has been interesting to say the least.
oce šI didnāt understand how making your GPS more unreliable allowed you to be located in far away countries.
I thought the break would suggest two separate ideas, but in a sense it does help. Some spoofing can start ārubber bandingā between the spoofed location and the actual location, and if youre spoofing 1000 miles away, thats an insant soft ban. but if your phone never gets a proper fix on like 5 GPS satellites, you wonāt rubber band.
I mostly used the damaged GPS phone to idly increase walking distance. If I set it to charge in a basement my character just bounces all around the outside of the house and I can wake up to a cool 10km walked. Thereās better options for fake walking though.
If youāre interested in GPS spoofing, you can find a wealth of information by searching for āgps spoofingā with āpokemon goā tacked on the end. It takes an idea that otherwise makes you sound like a paranoid person and turns it into just cheating at a videogame.
Or probably not as I have never played the gameā¦ Iām still annoyed by this headline format.
FreddyNOTime to never any of their products again
Can you prove this is worse than an insideous, shitty, company like Niantic? No. No you cannot.
FUCK Niantic, and fuck this xenophobic noise.
TattorackYes I can. Saudi Arabia is where modern slavery still happens. Women have no rights. The country funds proxy wars in the Middle East. Everyone whoās rich in that country is rich through exploiting oil, religion, terrible work conditions, or some combination of all the above. The only other country that out-does them on this front is The United Arabic Emirates.
A succesful company in that country would be party to all those things. Giving money to such a company would be giving money in support of all these things, as the money you give them becomes part of their economy. Pokemon GO would only be bought by any company because they see the potential of it becoming a money printing machine.
Being critical =/= xenophobic.
Yes, iād love my data to be owned by oil barons that want to see me decapitated.
The sauds are the most evil people alive. And iām saying this as an arab.
The sauds are the most evil people alive. And iām saying this as an arab.
Koreans might disagree with this statement.
OOTL, who is it for them, then?
OOTL, who is it for them, then?
The Kim dynasty. How can one be out of the loop about the basics of North Korea?