this post was submitted on 14 May 2025

90 points (93.3% liked)

Privacy

38187 readers

138 users here now

A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.

Some Rules

Posting a link to a website containing tracking isn't great, if contents of the website are behind a paywall maybe copy them into the post
Don't promote proprietary software
Try to keep things on topic
If you have a question, please try searching for previous discussions, maybe it has already been answered
Reposts are fine, but should have at least a couple of weeks in between so that the post can reach a new audience
Be nice :)

Related communities

much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)

founded 5 years ago

MODERATORS

BeReal - The Privacy Nightmare (lemmy.ml)

submitted 2 weeks ago by aleksandr_gabushev@futurology.today to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

22 comments fedilink hide all child comments

BeReal is not good (most appropriate way i could say this). It is a Privacy nightmare. Just think about it, a bunch of random strangers are getting access to every single day what you and your family are doing. I know nobody is concerned about privacy anymore. Seems like we have lost that but still Also BeReal has a bunch of Ads. And since the inclusion of Ads bereal has quickly lost in popularity. If you are searching for a Alternative, you should try out DD-DigitalDiary It doesn't have a lot of the features like social sharing. It is basically a journaling application. But still could be a good alternative. Also there was another app Minutaie which first started this trend so i suggest you should also check it out

all 26 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[–] Vendetta9076@sh.itjust.works 43 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I had no idea what this was. Its just another shovelware social media platform. Of course its a privacy nightmare. Its a social media platform.

[–] aleksandr_gabushev@futurology.today 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Shouldnt there be better... Hopefully. Like a different Like Protonmail did to Gmail

[–] Vendetta9076@sh.itjust.works 11 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I don't follow what youre saying

[–] stink@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 2 weeks ago

Asking for an alternative I think.

[–] Tatar_Nobility@lemmy.ml 40 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

I have a friend who uses it religiously, and I found out they would sometimes sneak pictures of people around them, including me. Totally uncool behavior!

[–] Bezier@suppo.fi 21 points 2 weeks ago

What the shit, that is not okay

[–] haui_lemmy@lemmy.giftedmc.com 6 points 2 weeks ago

I would tear them a new one.

[+] EngineerGaming@feddit.nl 14 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

[deleted]

[–] stink@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 2 weeks ago

I used it when it came out for a while, it was really nice coming from Instagram or Facebook where everyone tailors their posts around successes or glam shots. BeReal was cool because it sends a notification once a day for when you can post your photo, and you have to take it then.

It ended up being a lot of people just sitting in bed or watching TV, which gave me a lot of satisfaction seeing nobody does social things 24/7.

I give it a lot of credit for giving me the push to quit social media altogether to be honest

[–] ritchie@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

The idea is that is it more "real" than the other social media apps, because you cannot prepare your best self for the photo and not necessarily the best memory of that day will be recorded. Reality is that most people (maybe all people) have a relatively boring life (it's not everyday that something worthy of attention happens) and there is not much value in sharing e.g. your lunch. Most people had it that day and yours was also not that extraordinary.

Unfortunately since facebook (maybe instagram topped it) everyone may have their own tabloid platform to share their everyday life as celebrities do on tabloids and people seem to love it.

Not to mention the huge privacy concern that you post of a photo everyday, which may include your location, definitely your face and other useful information that may be used to hurt or annoy you in some way.

[–] ocean@lemmy.selfhostcat.com 9 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

This is an okay write up but okay? Who uses this anymore? Who used it at all?

[–] Sunny@slrpnk.net 8 points 2 weeks ago

It was literally everywhere only a year ago or so in my country. Luckily its started to die out, hoping that trend continues.

[–] Dreaming_Novaling@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 weeks ago

I was in high school when it first popped off so about 50-60% of teens (especially girls) were addicted/using it. I've never liked Instagram, Snapchat, Tiktok, or similar social media sites at all, so when it first came out I thought people were saying BeReal as in "B-reel", as if it was some sort of site where you had to make an accompanying video to another one a friend made or some shit.

But BeReal is still known, has 10M+ downloads on Google Play, in the top 100 for social apps at 89th.

[–] LeTak@lemm.ee 7 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I started using it a while ago. One big difference between iOS and android version. Android version is published by voodoo. Also, because of Adblock, I did not know or notice that it has ads. And my posts are only visible to friends for a day , not strangers for ever.

Do you know anything else , like what data they might collect?

[–] sunzu2@thebrainbin.org 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Check permissions on your phone that should give some idea and read the tos. You likely won't like it tbh but that's standard with anything not foss

[–] LeTak@lemm.ee 2 points 2 weeks ago

https://tosdr.org/en/service/6742

Same as always, everything

[–] autonomoususer@lemmy.world 7 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Obviously, BeReal fails to include a libre software license text file. We do not control it, anti-libre software. So, there was never a reason to think it is private.

[–] technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 2 weeks ago

Damn I came here in defense of Cypress Hill but wrong thread...

[–] reboot6675@sopuli.xyz 4 points 2 weeks ago

I mean you can set it so that only your friends see your posts. And they are French so I suppose they at least follow GDPR. But yeah, of course it collects your data and all that stuff like all social media

[–] finalaccountforreal@lemm.ee 3 points 2 weeks ago

Heard about them last year from a relative. I couldn't believe this was actually a thing that people use.

[–] jinx@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 weeks ago

there's also Daily You and OneShot

[–] thesmokingman@programming.dev 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Privacy and social media are mutually exclusive. The ones you have linked are no exception. DD requires a phone number so I didn’t get any further. Minutiae has you taking photos and sending them to a centralized service. That’s not private. I don’t understand why you’d say that no is concerned about privacy with the implication that’s a bad thing then immediately recommend something as bad.