Iphone is getting a little scary

azure said:
Interesting. The only prompts I get are for calendar appointments where I give it an address in the "location" field. Those are actually quite welcome. But if it started giving me ETAs and directions to some random business I just talked to for the first time 10 minutes ago... yeah, that would be creepy.
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This. I have never gotten unexpected prompts from my iPhone either.
 
James331 said:
Also google is very much a statist, and has historically given user information much more easily than apple.
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Apple also believes that it is the moral arbiter of what you may and may not think or speak using their devices:
 
He made two additional videos where he prerecorded the video using the same procedure and then uploaded the completed video for viewing. In his third video he was strictly talking about dental hygiene and how he "brushes his teeth in the shower". Remarkably numerous ads appeared with shower heads and shower accessories but none regarding dental hygiene except for dental implants ad.
 
inactive15 said:
He made two additional videos where he prerecorded the video using the same procedure and then uploaded the completed video for viewing. In his third video he was strictly talking about dental hygiene and how he "brushes his teeth in the shower". Remarkably numerous ads appeared with shower heads and shower accessories but none regarding dental hygiene except for dental implants ad.
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I suppose not too many dental hygienists advertise on Adwords. I'll bet if he said "electric toothbrush" enough times, that would trigger ads.

Rich
 
Unit74 said:
Fox News as where I was getting it.....
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Cap'n Jack said:
I have only seen it (so far) on three sites using the iOS browser. I'm pretty sure it is some scammy advertiser, and I stopped visiting those sites. I also have chrome on my iPad, I wonder if using their incognito mode may help. I agree that I hope Apple puts a stop to it as well.
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Well, Chrome didn't stop it, even in incognito mode. Since 2 different browsers showed the same activity, I suspect it is built into the iOS somewhere.
 
GPS will trigger ads supposedly. A buddy told me he was in Menards, located next to a Meijers, and started getting ads from Meijers.
Although invasive-ish....my feeble mind may use the reminder lol.

Oh yeah, cookies.
 
Use a Android device, stop most services/apps, either disable or uninstall. Kill location services, turn it on if/when you need directions. If you're Googlized, suspend all the tracking junk on your Google account, don't allow access to contacts, clobber the calendar sync (or just don't use it), cripple Google Play, access your email via the browser, vice enabling the Gmail app on the phone, etc. If you just need a phone, root an Android - you can pick up a GPS app to add-on, if you want.

Watch the apps you add, like Starbucks, Amazon Prime, etc. They'll track you as you pass near their hotspots/wifi. It's a balancing act - privacy versus convenience. I really just need voice, very occasional texting, and sometimes directions/traffic. Mostly I have location services "off", by default.

Again, if you have a Google account, look at "Data and Personalization", under "Account" - if you've been sloppy (or don't mind), you'll see that your whereabouts have been tracked back quite a while (Timeline), etc. Also Youtube access, web browsing, etc. You can shut all that down ("Suspend" in Google-speak) via the "Review your privacy settings" .
 
Heh I’ve never had my phone just spontanuously do anything on it’s own before.
 
Privacy is ridiculously difficult in this day and age. When I first started using the Internet 20 years ago I was so pumped about the possibilities. These days I bounce back and forth between wondering if technology will free us or completely enslave us; it definitely feels like it's more of that latter the past few years. https://www.privacytools.io/
 
JOhnH said:
I didn't mind too much when I started noticing that I would often get in my truck after running a few errands, and the iphone would alert me of the distance and time to get home. It never seemed to do it unless I was actually ready to go home and I never knew how it knew that, but it would not be too difficult to guess.

Then it didn't surprise me too much recently when a couple of times I got in my truck at home to go to the gym, and the alert gave me distance and time to get to the gym. After all, I go there almost every day, so that is not too hard to predict. It also correctly predicted I was going to the library a couple of times, but again, I go the library almost every Tuesday morning so that is somewhat predictable, even though I often go other places first.

But the other day, I called my audiologist (on my iphone) because my hearing aids were starting to cause ear pain. She said to come right in, so I got in my truck and the damn iphone alerted me with distance and time to get to the audiologist. HOW DID IT KNOW THAT WAS WHERE I WAS GOING, unless it was listening to my phone call? I only go there a few times a year and appointments always vary by day and time.
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It's all in settings, you can turn it off.
 
Sell it and get yourself one of these.

90E6BEFC-7FAB-4CF4-A666-334A887DAFD2.jpeg
 
Skyrys62 said:
GPS will trigger ads supposedly. A buddy told me he was in Menards, located next to a Meijers, and started getting ads from Meijers.
Although invasive-ish....my feeble mind may use the reminder lol.

Oh yeah, cookies.
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Definitely cookies! I never have location services on on my iPad (older model, iPad 2) but have to clear out many cookies or else similar behavior happens. I HATE apples "solution" for an interface for this. The default behavior ought to be you can choose "all" and then go uncheck for cookies you do want to keep. Or even better, check the few you want and delete the rest. Instead, if you don't do it every week, it is a once every few months job that take a while afternoon. When are consumers going to get to be the focal point for the operating systems?
 
Challenged said:
Privacy is ridiculously difficult in this day and age.
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I've given up on the illusion of privacy. True privacy doesn't exist. Even if you kept off the grid and never used the internet, all of your information is out there courtesy of the government and anyone you have ever met. I proved that once to an older co-worker of mine. He was talking about young people putting all their information out there through social media, etc, and how he doesn't even have a smart phone or email.

10 minutes of Googling his name for him blew his mind. County website showed his home, its value, and a recent photo. Using that address Google Maps did its thing. One of the people search sites came up, and showed how long he lived at that location, his phone number, associated people (including an estranged wife living out of state, even listed her new address). Public records turned up his speeding tickets, his annual salary (govt employee), and a host of other records.

All for someone who avoided technology and thought he was pretty off the grid.

Privacy is just an illusion.
 
midwestpa24 said:
I've given up on the illusion of privacy. True privacy doesn't exist. Even if you kept off the grid and never used the internet, all of your information is out there courtesy of the government and anyone you have ever met. I proved that once to an older co-worker of mine. He was talking about young people putting all their information out there through social media, etc, and how he doesn't even have a smart phone or email.

10 minutes of Googling his name for him blew his mind. County website showed his home, its value, and a recent photo. Using that address Google Maps did its thing. One of the people search sites came up, and showed how long he lived at that location, his phone number, associated people (including an estranged wife living out of state, even listed her new address). Public records turned up his speeding tickets, his annual salary (govt employee), and a host of other records.

All for someone who avoided technology and thought he was pretty off the grid.

Privacy is just an illusion.
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Yep, the public record stuff is pretty open - the deeper stuff you can definitively obscure, or use other counter-measures, though. . .little things, like using cash in brick-and-mortar retail, dithering your birthday on Facebook, or just having a minimal profile on FB or LinkedIn, with no useful info. Using a VPN service for web browsing is a good one, as well. If your situation requires it, a burner phone can be anonymous. There are even countermeasures for your newer vehicle's telematics.

I think the rational balance is to be just a little bit harder to hack than the average user - like the old joke abut the campers and the grizzly bear - you don't have to outrun the bear, just outrun one of your companions.

Hopefully, eventually, the Feds will start coming down hard on public companies that get hacked - they are no longer the victims, they are the incompetents. Imagine a bank that left their deposits on the front steps overnight, then claimed to have been robbed when the money is gone the next morning - yeah, they were robbed, but they failed in the simplest of duties. Given the current state of security, hacks are no longer inevitable, if the target is competent and using best practices. Just have to start frying people - it sure took way, way too long to fire the OPM IT chief, for example.
 
Sundancer said:
Yep, the public record stuff is pretty open - the deeper stuff you can definitively obscure, or use other counter-measures, though. . .little things, like using cash in brick-and-mortar retail, dithering your birthday on Facebook, or just having a minimal profile on FB or LinkedIn, with no useful info. Using a VPN service for web browsing is a good one, as well. If your situation requires it, a burner phone can be anonymous. There are even countermeasures for your newer vehicle's telematics.

I think the rational balance is to be just a little bit harder to hack than the average user - like the old joke abut the campers and the grizzly bear - you don't have to outrun the bear, just outrun one of your companions.

Hopefully, eventually, the Feds will start coming down hard on public companies that get hacked - they are no longer the victims, they are the incompetents. Imagine a bank that left their deposits on the front steps overnight, then claimed to have been robbed when the money is gone the next morning - yeah, they were robbed, but they failed in the simplest of duties. Given the current state of security, hacks are no longer inevitable, if the target is competent and using best practices. Just have to start frying people - it sure took way, way too long to fire the OPM IT chief, for example.
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I couldn't believe how easy it is for some of the hacks. Target stores were hacked for credit card info because their central system was linked to their HVAC contractor so they could access the stores HVAC controls remotely. The hacker breached the contractor's software, and had access to everything Target had. The fact that the credit card info was even linked to HVAC controls blows my mind.
 
Yeah, ain't that a hoot? Retail businesses don't have the IT expertise, or aren't willing to pay for it. Far fewer pure hacking "incidents" within the financial sector, though some insider stuff has happened because of pretty lame controls.
 
Not an iPhone guy - but cripple Google Play on an Android, and you'll notice just how often it's trying to call home. . .plenty of activity happening in background/under the covers, and likely the same for iPhones.
 
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