This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
How can they tell I'm popping?.... Oh....what if I stopped flushing? So is that why some people don't flush? They're trying to be stealthy!
May be even dozens
Article is from 2018. Someone must have pasted the url from hacker news where the same story was dug up recently.
Is that to say that it's no longer valid? Or just that it's old news? The list of apps associated with the software is still pretty extensive; Google Assistant even showed up.
Well these days Android asks for more permissions so I guess it would prevent it in many cases by preventing access to the microphone for apps where you don't want to allow it...
it has always asked for mic permission so no change on that front
Yeah, most people just click beyond that in a millisecond because it's just an an annoyance between them and the needed dopamine.
I think app stores can do a whole lot more, especially with he insane amounts of money they're earning from it (hello and fuck you, apple). They can make microphone access a special privilege that requires the developer to make a special request that gets verified on the app store before the app can be released, for example
I think a middle ground may be having that requirement for background mic usage, or usage without a specific user prompt that turns on a mic.
Lots of apps have legitimate use for the mic. Apps having legitimate use for the mic while you're not actively using the app on screen are more limited and need stricter permissions.
I'd also like to have a hardware mic mute switch that physically disconnects the mic, so I can just keep it off unless I want it like I do with the mic and Webcam on my computer.
Android also shows an indicator when any app is accessing the microphone or camera now.
7 years is a long time in tech.
Google Assistant is supposed to listen for the "Hey Google" trigger word. How else do you expect to use your device hand-free.
No, 2018 wasn't 7 years ago... No... Wait please..! :'(
Old news. It was old news in 2018
Wasn't there just a storey a couple days ago that apps where not doing this but taking screenshots and videos on the screen and sending that. And both iOS and Android have the microphone notification now.
I know I'm usually on the more paranoid side, but I've always assumed everything I do on a smartphone is potentially being monitored via camera or mics.
If the apps are just taking screenshots, or recording a few seconds of data via mic, it would be almost guaranteed that certain corrupt (and also paranoid) governments that are dismissive of privacy rights could force or bribe those apps to allow them to also access screens, mics, and cameras anyway, right?
I'm in the U.S., and especially with how glitchy my phone has suddenly become over the last few months, I'm just at the point where I just assume that's what's going on.
I had the same android for like 4 years without many issues, then suddenly around February it just became almost impossible to use. Weird glitchy things with the size of the tool bar at the bottom of my screen and the popup keyboard. Redirect notifications all the time for certain websites, and my VPN connection is just constantly interrupted and having to be reset.
I finally was like fuck it, this is an old phone so maybe that's it. Brand new phone, but most of the same issues.
I use signal instead of text most of the time, and switched a lot of things to proton mail, but if someone is potentially recording your screen, does it really matter if what you're doing is encrypted?
i used to think this as well (i have never used any facebook apps), but last night something happened that made me question it.
My wife and i were going through a chipotlane that was right next to a Popeye’s. As we were waiting i looked over to popeyes and saw some posters for their new pickle chicken stuff and asked my wife “the fuck is a pickle ‘glaze’?”
she said “i have no idea but i kinda want some fried pickles now.”
literally a few seconds later she opens instagram on her phone and is shown a video of a person making pickle brined chicken.
yes yes it could be a coincidence, but i am a lot less certain of that now.
But… they can't access the microphone without the user explicitly allowing
Tell that to Facebook. Shit, I'll talk about something with my wife and see ads about it ten minutes later. Been happening for years.
I tested this with my Facebook app in 2013. Found a Spanish radio station, set my phone down next to it overnight, and for several weeks I was seeing ads exclusively in Spanish. Deleted the app the first day I saw them in Spanish, and deleted my account not long after that.
My wife still uses them after 5 years together and me pointing out all the times it's obviously eavesdropping on us, and she's even been creeped out by it before. Still uses it...
Unless my microphone and camera have physical switches, I will assume they are being used. Those little "your camera and microphone are off" icons in the corner of the screen don't reassure me.
It's more likely that your wife or someone nearby was further researching the same topic you were talking about.
Facebook and other ad companies use your location, relationships, and other data they already had on you to serve you relevant ads.
At this stage, they know more about you than the government, or your wife.
I’ve read about this phenomenon in the past. Generally it’s found that due to audio processing cost and the sheer amount of other data easily gathered, there’s no reason for them to snoop with your microphone because other data is so readily available, much easier to process, store and ship.
That's monitoring you and your closests' other behavior, as well as monitoring then nudging you towards wanting certain things. The ad itself is the last nudge in that chain that tries to go "you wanted this, don't you?" after all of the other thinking it's making a case for your life being better with it.
my wife and I had been married for 2 years. been together for close to 10.
not once did we EVER say "Adirondack Chair". Just never came up in conversation. we were broke as fuck and couldn't afford something as superfluous as one of those.
One day, were driving down the road home and see one on the side of he road.
what's that?
looks like an Adirondack Chair
Adirondack Chair? For free?
yeah, it looks broken though.
we get home go inside. I sit down to veg on my phone on the sofa. what does Amazon put in my "things you like" feed? mother fuckin Adirondack Chairs. Google news feeds? Adirondack Chairs on sale.
My wife had YouTube videos that were reviewing Adirondack Chairs.
this was ten years ago. Imagine what they're doing now...
I keep my phone in a chip bag and only pull it out to LARP the preparation for the assassination Franz Ferdinand in general terms without naming actual places or names.
That's a good way to always keep chips on hand.
Instagram at least listens thru your mic, for sure. At least on my wife’s phone, she gets targeted ads based on conversations we have in the car with no music playing
