Privacy-conscious Indians are gonna have a nightmare. Indians excessively use whatsapp.
Everyone outside of the US uses whatsapp.
Viber is more popular in eastern europe
Sure , in 2010.
Still is. At least in my country its probably more popular than the rest of them combined.
In Norway we use Facebook Messenger, which is worse. Wattsapp’s at least usable as a messaging platform for more than 1-to-1 communication
I got a privacy update for Gmail tools too. It used to be to enable smart tools you needed to allow google to read your email. That does stuff like automatically add calendar events for flights and such.
Now you must also allow the email to be read by their AI services too. I can’t recall precisely how it was worded, but it was an easy decision to keep the “smart” features off.
I mean, I really just use Gmail as the email address I give to sign up for sites and such, but would be good just not to have it one day.
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Lol and Apple doesnt do any of that?
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No proof.
But even the US is scared of encrypted exfiltrated data because their adversaries could crack the encryption later on.Same here.
They have the data and for now decided to not yet do do anything too bad with it.
But Google also had the motto “Don’t be evil” at one point.deleted by creator
Look up a YT channel called Tech-Bore
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Yes it is, because he shows you
Apple absolutely does collect huge amounts of data from the users. The difference is they don’t directly ‘sell’ that data to advertisers. Instead they get paid to personalize the ads themselves and wear that as a badge for ‘advocating privacy’. Stock Android is horrendous compared to what Apple does, yes. However you usually have the option to ditch it for a more privacy respecting Android.
Same for you. Proof that Apple isn’t using it to analyze your (usage) data.
And it’s not okay just because it’s the 1st party analyzing it because they arent selling it.I am really tired of the hypocrisy of some lemmy users advocating for maximum privacy to the detriment of everyone around them but on the other hand just saying “yeah, that’s totally fine” and basically breaking all their principles.
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They haven’t done anything with that data yet*
While clearly the lesser evil in this moment, I wouldn’t count on that lasting forever.
As every user at some points mentions: They are a public company and once they can’t satisfy their shareholders, they will turn on the data faucet to 3rd parties. They already have the an advertisement CDN.
They already have everything in place to achieve that situation.
I can’t. Everything they release is proprietary and locked down, so let’s just trust their narrative.
I can only recommend well researched eyeopener from Techaltar: https://youtu.be/JHnBOUNxHsw
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I will be honest that I don’t know what exact shit are we discussing here I rather wanted to point out that Apple might not be as much privacy first company as they like to present themselves.
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These instructions are awful. There’s no Gemini listed in my apps, and Settings > Apps doesn’t show it either. But if I search for “Gemini” in settings, THEN it shows up, but doesn’t have access to anything the article says to do.
However, from that screen, I was able to apparently turn off its access to everything, and switch back to assistant, which appears to have turned it off completely, but who knows if it’s still lurking in the background.
I haven’t turned it on. Am I safe?
Nop. Disable it in the settings/apps
I cannot find it as an app in the app listing.
I find it only through search in settings, and it opens a screen - asking to activate it.
It seems weird.
What I hate most about this is the lack of control over this it implies. Sure, maybe you don’t install this on your device, but all that’s needed for Google to access your messages now is for someone you message to have it installed and enabled, then anything you send to them will be gobbled up by Google.
I’m pretty sure I disabled/removed it when I got this phone. I don’t specifically remember doing it but when I get a new phone, I watch some YouTube videos on how to purge all the crap I don’t want.
I read an article that mentioned using command line stuff to eliminate it and it kind looked familiar. I think I did this. I really should write stuff down.
I can’t find Gemini on my phone.
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Signal is also a great alternative to WhatsApp. Molly for the extra privacy focused.
Me on my de-googled phone:
Yeah, and it’s presumptious of them to access the WhatsApp account I don’t have…
And to want to access my calendars to book appointments for flights I can’t afford
Not that I support this, but hasn’t Google Assistant been able to do that for years? Sending texts via the voice assistant has been, like, one of the main selling points.
Cool, the app that doesn’t exist on my phone will access an account I don’t have. I’ve never used WhatsApp and I don’t plan to start now.
My gf got one of those emails, but she doesnt have the Gemini app installed on her phone. All of the instruction articles I can find only explain how to turn it off if you have the app.
Does not having the app mean that she’s safe from this, or does it mean that she needs to download the app to disable the “feature”?
I also don’t have a Gemini app but if you search for Gemini in the Settings main menu, it shows up.
I don’t have the app, and searching for “gemini” only gives “gemini settings” which when clicked opens the promt of “do you accept changing Google assistant to gemini”, clicking “not now” just sends me back to setting search.
Thank you. We had actually already checked this but had not found Gemini in the settings.
Turns out typing “gem” in the settings search is not enough. Only typing “Gemini” returned a result.
Sneaky, aren’t they?
They’d have to install it first.
Google play services says bonjour
Yes, but the phones of all your peers will have that shit on them.
Don’t go and manually install it.
The misinformation about this has been wild.
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Nope
