- cross-posted to:
- news@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- news@lemmy.world
Google agrees to settle Chrome incognito mode class action lawsuit::2020 lawsuit accused Google of tracking incognito activity, tying it to users’ profiles.
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Wait, so when I politely “ask app not to track”, they might still be tracking me? No way!
It’s more that if you ask the app not to track you, there’s nothing stopping the server you’re connecting to with that app from continuing to track you. The server doesn’t even know you opened incognito mode versus just a different browser profile and it would be more of a risk for fingerprinting/sites blocking you if it did have the ability to know if you were in incognito.
It’s not the browser that’s really the problem in this case, it’s the tracking and building of user profiles across browser profiles and devices on the server side.
Not surprising in the least. Just another ‘Trust us bro’ from one of the tech firms.
And yet we /still/ have people who assume that a corporation that routinely pulls shit like this, that has more or less complete control over your Android phone, default to tying everything on your phone to your Google account, and then also put an enormous amount of effort to making the default easiest option to log in to nearly any online service or app also be your Google account…
…we still have people that do not believe that the phones are always listening when seemingly any website or app you use gives you advertisements about what you were just talking about in the other room with the phone locked.
Its possible to go in and reset or delete your advertising id and use firefox and deny hardware access to every possible google process you can without breaking the OS to stop this, but 1) the capability to eavesdrop shouldnt even exist 2) it should be disclosed /plainly/ 3) it should be waaaaay easier to disable.
we still have people that do not believe that the phones are always listening when seemingly any website or app you use gives you advertisements about what you were just talking about in the other room with the phone locked.
Oh come on. Don’t bring this into conspiracy territory. Yes, eavesdropping does happen, but it’s not something an uncompromised Android phone will do when locked. Even when it does happen in the case of spyware, the people doing it aren’t selling your transcriptions to advertisers.
People should still opt out of as many of GAPS’s spyware-like features as possible, as you suggest, but not because it’s a special anti-listening-device warding spell.
Read the document:
The growing ability to access microphone data on devices like smartphones and tablets enables our technology partner to aggregate and analyze voice data during pre-purchase conversations.
Key word is “technology partner”. They’re buying voice transcripts ripped from someone else’s spyware and selling the service of scraping it for keywords and maybe somehow tying that back to an individual by cross-referencing the hit against data from traditional above-board ad platforms.
Google isn’t buying transcripts, Facebook isn’t buying transcripts. It’s Cox Media buying shady recordings stolen from spyware-compromised devices and then trying to whitewash it into something sellable with their (unverifiable) cross-analytics middleware.
Oh sure, so now you’re gonna insist they’re buying shit that totally doesn’t exist.
No, I am not contradicting myself. Let me say it again with the ambiguity removed:
- Cox Media isn’t an advertiser, they sell a dressed-up analytics service. Think spreadsheets (that’s literally the service they’re selling in this copy, a monthly report spreadsheet).
- The “technology partner” selling this data to Cox is accessing it by bypassing the normal and correct operation of the device using malware.
- What does not “exist” is a shadowy cabal of smartphone manufacturers scheming to hide listening devices in the pockets of their consumers.
I’m sure you still believe this is a load of apologia and frankly you can think what you want, but you should probably know that I’d already read about the Cox story when it first broke and specifically chose my words with that knowledge in mind.
So who are they settling with? Where’s my cut? Why do I have to settle for what those other people agreed to?
I anal, but also IANAL. If you ever opt in or are part of a class action lawsuit by default, you do not have to accept the results. You can refuse your cut, but you typically have to actively refute it, otherwise you’re assumed to be cool with it. If you do refuse the settlement, you can pursue your own legal actions.
I got a check for 73 cents.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Google has indicated that it is ready to settle a class-action lawsuit filed in 2020 over its Chrome browser’s Incognito mode.
Arising in the Northern District of California, the lawsuit accused Google of continuing to “track, collect, and identify [users’] browsing data in real time” even when they had opened a new Incognito window.
It also alleged that sites using Google Analytics or Ad Manager collected information from browsers in Incognito mode, including web page content, device data, and IP address.
Google initially attempted to have the lawsuit dismissed by pointing to the message displayed when users turned on Chrome’s incognito mode.
Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers rejected Google’s bid for summary judgement in August, pointing out that Google never revealed to its users that data collection continued even while surfing in Incognito mode.
According to the notice filed on Tuesday, Google and the plaintiffs have agreed to terms that will result in the litigation being dismissed.
The original article contains 289 words, the summary contains 156 words. Saved 46%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
was it always supposed to look like Heisenberg?
I always assumed incognito was just disabling history and cookies.
Yup that’s it
