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[rant] google sucks (discuss.tchncs.de)

submitted 23 hours ago by gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.de to c/actually_infuriating@lemmy.world

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Google pls go eat shit.

I just found out that my phone has somehow automatically enabled "find my device" - a service provided to you by google where they automatically send your last location data to google sothat you can find your device again in case you lost it somewhere.

Not only do i seriously question that that service is even useful at all - i mean, if somebody stole it, the first thing they would do is reset the device which obviously wipes any way to track the device anyways; but also what's actually infuriating is that google is building these databases of a billion android devices and their movement data without my consent. like, not in a single moment have i consented to this; in fact i only found out through an accident. fuck google. it needs to die, quickly.

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[–] cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 0 points 22 hours ago

Apple does the same. Apple had their Find My first, and of course Google had mapping first. Now they both do it.

The mapping is useful if you're a commuter, but everyone contributes their data, supposedly anonymously, and then your phone provider basically can tell you how many people are on the road by looking at how many use their platform, and figuring their market share in the area. They assume if 20 people are using their phone and they have a 20% market share, then there are probably 100 people on the road at that time and they can tell you with relative accuracy how congested one motorway is, and suggest an alternate route.

Apple's Find My network is pretty useful, and your identity is not shared. Basically every iPhone, cellular iPad, and cellular Apple Watch knows where every other Apple device is because they all talk to each other. You mark yours as lost, the others that see it ping you and say "right here! here it is!". If your iPhone is helping someone find their Mac or their luggage or whatever, they'll never know who you are, and you'll never know who they are, let alone that you helped them. It's all done on the DL. Google... I'm not so sure about. But, it's also not easy to disable. If I lose my iPhone and you pick it up, it's junk to you, unless you have some really expensive and rare hacking tools (governments for example). If it's in Lockdown Mode, you're still screwed. Used to be, you could factory reset a locked Android device and start over with it, losing all the data stored on it... now, I'm not so sure.

Just saying, what annoys you saves a lot of people a lot of money. I'm not talking about the billionaires — every device does that. I mean people who could lose their job if they don't get to work on time, or someone who really can't afford to buy a new phone but they lost theirs. Google sucks for privacy. Apple says they're better but we're really not sure, and they're putting ads in Apple Maps now because being the second, third, whatever largest company in the world isn't enough, they gotta make more money.