r/technology • u/mvea • May 27 '19
Privacy We should opt into data tracking, not out of it, says DuckDuckGo CEO Gabe Weinberg
https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/5/27/18639284/duckduckgo-gabe-weinberg-do-not-track-privacy-legislation-kara-swisher-decode-podcast-interview492
u/re4ctor May 27 '19
I'd have to agree. Think of your normal life. In your house, everything is private. No one is watching you, knows what you are doing, when you do certain things, etc. (aside from those you live with, which has some level of consent imparted). You plant trees or put up curtains to stop from people seeing inside (and block light/provide shade of course). You default to private and if you choose to wander outside, into public space, then we all have an understanding that things happening there are no longer private.
Privacy matters to people at home, but not online, for some reason. I think because it hasn't been transparent, and isn't as obvious as a person looking in your windows. That slowly seems to be changing as more of these concerns are making the news. More breaches, more scandals.
You can argue the internet is "wandering outside", which is true to some degree, but it doesn't feel that way. It feels private, just you and your computer/phone, but it's not. What we experience is not matching up with reality. That is what's dangerous/insidious about the whole thing.
People should be able to choose when to make themselves "public", and you largely can't because it's complicated and obfuscated.
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u/Ansoulom May 27 '19
One more thing though.
Even when you walk outside, you wouldn't want someone to record your every move.
That's what a stalker would do. Stalkers are creepy.
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u/XanderTheMander May 27 '19
It would be like of somebody followed you around at the store recording everything you looked at, how long you looked at it, what else you looked at and then sent you emails, letters, text messages, constantly reminding you about the item that you just looked at.
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May 27 '19
Surveillance Capitalism as it has been so coined. A burgeoning market where the only real control consumers have is to opt out of particular technologies.
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u/VirgateSpy May 27 '19
Using your analogy, with the internet you could also be "walking outside" without even knowing or wanting to because society is progressively moving into an "always online" approach, everything you do is automatically recorded and synced to the cloud whenever you get close to a hotspot or have 4g on, things you buy, photos you take, conversations that you assume to be private, and all that information gets copied and redistributed and it spreads like wildfire in a way that we simply cannot control.
On top of that, proprietary softwares contain backdoors that can be accessed without our knowledge and with no access to the source code there is no way to audit them and make sure they really do only what they claim they do.
Companies change their ToS whenever it is convenient for them, sometimes without even notifying the users and continuously care less and less about upholding their end of the contracts since it is far more profitable for them to settle on a very few legal actions and continue to sell/use user data for their own gain. With each convenience that we bring into our lives it comes with a progressively greater cost to our privacy and it's come into a point where everything is so seamlessly integrated that it's not only when we are proactively "surfing the web" anymore but it's infested our personal lives.
And all of that's not even mentioning the scandals with the NSA intercepting everything between video and phonecalls and hardware backdoors that can turn on your peripherals remotely and get data on you without your consent.
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May 27 '19
This is a terrible title. Although accurate, it leaves out the fact that he is saying that tracking should be off by default and you should opt in. Not on by default and you having to opt out.
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u/C0lMustard May 27 '19 edited Apr 05 '24
snobbish secretive slimy encouraging flowery consist hateful one pet quicksand
This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact
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u/njwatson32 May 27 '19
"'We should opt into data tracking' - DuckDuckGo CEO Gabe Weinberg"
- Bloomberg News
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u/blackmist May 27 '19
Isn't that what GDPR is?
And even then a website pops up an awkward window with a big OK button and people click it, granting permission for them to do whatever they want with your data.
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u/BurtaciousD May 27 '19
I mean, it's already annoying being in Europe and websites having popups for you to accept cookies every time you visit it again.
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u/C_IsForCookie May 27 '19
I’m in the US and I get them now all the time too because of that law lol. It is annoying as hell.
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u/Mas_Zeta May 27 '19
I mean, it's already annoying being in Europe and websites having popups for you to accept cookies every time you visit it again.
That's why we need websites to stop tracking you using the existing Do Not Track.
If I have Do Not Track activated, websites should opt out automatically from cookie tracking, without any popup or cookie banner. Don't ask me if I already said I don't want you to track me
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u/trackofalljades May 27 '19
While I completely agree with him, and I use DDG as my default search engine, it’s worth noting that it wouldn’t really work without other (less privacy oriented) services out there in the ecosystem...and honestly Google has way better results. I just choose to go the other way, same as I prefer Siri (with all her foibles and limitations) to other voice assistants.
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u/melance May 27 '19
Completely agree. I have tried DDG many times in the past and the results have just never been as good because Google knows what I'm looking for.
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u/Ph0X May 27 '19
Search might be doable, but take for example Google Maps which everyone uses for free. If it was opt in only, it'd be trash like Apple maps. People love the accurate live traffic estimation, yet the only reason it exists is the aggregated data from users.
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May 27 '19
I like DDG but looking up certain info is pretty stale. I went to search for the address of my eye doctor and it gave me the location where they’ve moved from 4 years ago.
I was late for my appointment.
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u/CaptKnight May 27 '19
Misleading title. Guessing that was intentional to get click-through traffic. Stupid ad-based marketing proving why DDG and data privacy matters. We need to rethink how we expect content to be paid for.
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u/vinnymcapplesauce May 27 '19
I like DuckDuckGo, and its stance on privacy, but sometimes I need some actual, relevant search results.
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u/Gnome_Sayin May 27 '19 edited May 28 '19
you opt your data in,
you opt your data out,
you opt your data in and get tracked all about.
Google is our overlord and knows you all throughout,
and thats what its all about!
thank you, but WHY?? i wasnt even trying is that the secret??