Facebook Accused of Watching Instagram Users Through Cameras

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-09-18/facebook-accused-of-watching-instagram-users-through-cameras

by drewem • 6 years ago

319 201 6 years ago

bloomberg.com

andreareina• 6 years ago

https://archive.is/uCMN9

samoa42• 6 years ago

much appreciated

dvfjsdhgfv• 6 years ago

Conditi will have a hard time proving it wasn't a bug and the data was actually being used in the way she describes it.

mtgx• 6 years ago

This thing where Facebook collects a lot of data in ways to which most people would object for years and years, and then when they get caught they claim it was a "bug", is getting really old.

To make matters worse, they usually tend to re-introduce the "bug" as some kind of feature a few years later, as their way of saying "yes, we really do thing our users are that stupid to not realize what we've done, why do you ask?!"

bitL• 6 years ago

Google started it with the WiFi collection "bug" and offline location collection "bug".

im3w1l• 6 years ago

That makes me think... what kind of insight into facebook's inner workings might we get from the discovery?

throwaway2048• 6 years ago

ah yes, another "bug" that happens to result in massive data collection, oops.

CGamesPlay• 6 years ago

Is this the same scandal from before: where the app had the camera on because when you swipe to record a story they wanted it to be instantly available? Did it just take a while to reach lawsuit status or is this about some new thing?

ignoramous• 6 years ago

Is this the same scandal from before:

Scandal(s):

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23950892

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21513471

Though, my favourite (unrelated to the camera "bug" here) is the one Will Strafach uncovered: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1090394419902197761.html

Zenbit_UX• 6 years ago

One of us would have had to write this code, a PM would have had to authorize and break it down, a UX designer might have had to design its internal dashboard for "how to perv on users most efficiently" including flows and user stories, and then that code would have had to be pushed to the Instagram git repo which surely has some ~hundred devs on it that saw it go in, or may notice it at some time in the future.

Now I know it takes a healthy dose of cognitive dissonance to work for facebook in this day and age but the main reason this doesn't seem likely to me is that that's way too many people involved in something beyond shady (even for Facebook) for this to not get out. There's even a [formula](https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...) to calculate how likely it is for a conspiracy to remain a secret depending on the number of people involved.

lalos• 6 years ago

Multiple (horrible) events through history can provide the insight that as long as you partition each task enough, people will happily work and contribute to a horrible end goal and later claim they were only following orders and had no idea of the side effects of their individual actions.

jclardy• 6 years ago

You have a very optimistic outlook on corporate culture. Do you code review every piece of code that goes into a corporate project? I work at a relatively small company with three apps and 5 iOS devs, and I look at maybe 20% of things committed. If every dev looked at every line of code every other dev produced, 100 devs would get nothing done, ever.

The reality is this was probably a marketing initiative - "Can we tell what users are most interested in on the screen" and the answer is yes - on-device eye tracking is very simple to achieve using Apple's vision framework.

amelius• 6 years ago

Why isn't the user better protected by the OS from these kinds of malpractices?

speedgoose• 6 years ago

Protecting the user is obviously not the priority.

PhantomGremlin• 6 years ago

This is starting to happen. E.g.:

New iOS 14 feature warns you if someone is spying on you through your iPhone: Look out for the orange dot at the top of your screen

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-8744423/iOS-...

antegamisou• 6 years ago

This is the exact same thing as the red microphone banner popping up at the top left in all previous iOS versions.

Also, strongly reconsider citing tabloids as accurate - reliable news' source, especially when it comes to tech.

anaganisk• 6 years ago

What else do u expect when major OS is an ad company. Basically everything the google does is to funnel data.

can16358p5• 6 years ago

Don't want to be the devil's advocate here but just because camera is on doesn't mean anything is being recorded. As an iOS developer who worked with apps that access camera frequently, I can confidently say that it's just a UX optimization. Starting the camera takes a brief few hundred milliseconds which is easily noticable from a user perspective. By keeping the camera ready, they are making the experience smoother. I think this is it. Just because Facebook is an evil company doesn't mean this directly is a malicious move.

kevingadd• 6 years ago

One of the most annoying things is to try and launch your camera on a phone and have to wait multiple seconds before you can hit the shutter, at which point the thing you want to photograph might already be gone. So I can definitely understand the logic behind this, even if it's creepy.

IIRC, Apple has invested specifically in reducing startup latency for the camera, but I don't know if that applies to apps.

can16358p5• 6 years ago

From what I can tell the startup time is more or less the same for both the built in camera app and the third party apps. IIRC built in camera used to start a bit faster in the past but that's not an issue anymore. The problem is that we launch the camera app and because the icon animates from home screen to fill the device window the latency is less noticeable, but for example in Instagram, the app is already open in full screen so starting the camera from a user action, even though it takes the same time with launching the camera app, is more noticeable from a user perspective.

pferde• 6 years ago

Doesn't keeping camera on increase battery drain, though? Also, with Facebook being evil and all, what's stopping them from hopping on "hey, the camera is already on, let's not waste that, and use the incoming visual data for something while we're at it" line of thinking eventually?

can16358p5• 6 years ago

It does, indeed. Not like constantly recording though. I think they apply some heuristics that keep the camera on in the background (e.g if you open on story camera frequently and on the main screen, but not while at a screen when camera is not accesible). Otherwise the device would become noticeably hot, but I haven't encountered such an issue.

qwertox2• 6 years ago

Assuming that this happens only when the user is actively using the app, I'd guess that the display would consume dramatically more energy, making the camera's usage of the battery negligible, also compared to the benefit of then having a very responsive camera.

In any case, I do think that providing visual feedback to the user is very important. Like a small picture-in-picture-overlay.

saagarjha3• 6 years ago

Many flagship apps absolutely destroy battery life. Just something users put up with…

wheybags• 6 years ago

If this was the case, they wouldn't have claimed it was a bug. Besides, big tech companies have lost the benefit of the doubt.

iRomain• 6 years ago

Besides, big tech companies have lost the benefit of the doubt.

This is so spot on and pretty much sums up everything that's going on at the moment.

bagacrap• 6 years ago

Fb* has lost benefit of the doubt.

I don't understand why people read yet another story about FB's bad behavior somehow conclude all of big tech are bad guys. Is it really so hard to keep them straight?

SpicyLemonZest• 6 years ago

It's quite common to characterize intended features which cause unintended problems as "bugs".

TrainedMonkey• 6 years ago

This could be a disconnect between engineers who wanted to make a smooth experience on all devices and PR manager who does not want anything that could be construed as unethical behavior. IMO if this does affect performance it should probably be an option.

higerordermap2• 6 years ago

Tangentially related. Big tech (FB, Google etc..) used to be favourite workplaces for programmers. Now what are the exciting workspaces for engineers considering big tech is doing lot of unethical things?

corobo• 6 years ago

I'd rather the lag tbh. If Facebook has options just assume they picked the scummiest one

Frost1x2• 6 years ago

I'd say that's most corporate entities as a general rule of thumb.

Saint_Genet• 6 years ago

If you keep doing malicious things, you no longer get to enjoy the benefit of doubt.

izacus3• 6 years ago

It's one thing to enjoy benefit of doubt, it's another to just make up utterly unbelievable fringe crap that can be explained by hundreds of other explanations.

tchalla• 6 years ago

As an iOS developer who worked with apps that access camera frequently, I can confidently say that it's just a UX optimization.

Here's what Facebook does once you give access to the iOS Photos app. Every time you open the Facebook app, it asks you - "Would you like to post these photos on Facebook?". Basically, they are reading the Photos library repeatedly to scan for recent (or past) photos along with their meta data. It could be just UX optimisation. It could also be UX optimisation for harvesting data.

izacus3• 6 years ago

Or, more likely, it's an engagement optimization to have people post more photos and keep those metrics up.

These bizarre over-the-top conspiracy theories are really starting to get old, it's almost flat earth believers level.

rozab• 6 years ago

Sounds like iOS's fault for not providing a way to keep the camera on standby at the expense of battery life, without compromising privacy. Just like how there should be more privacy-preserving methods for querying clipboard contents, as in the similar TikTok scandal when a UX optimisation was mistaken for a data collection issue.

saagarjha3• 6 years ago

at the expense of battery life

iOS doesn't really like providing APIs like that.

rbg2462• 6 years ago

So you are saying..

A developer went to their tech lead and said 'hey we can make the app much better by leaving the camera on all the time saves 200ms on camera startup time'

Tech lead: this is brilliant no potential problems here

Tech lead to management team: got this great new feature, we leave the camera on all the time makes the app 200ms faster.

Management: wow that's great can't see any problem with that, no chance of reputational damage there.

And it's all innocent and noone has any idea why anyone would get the wrong idea?

AndrewThrowaway2• 6 years ago

Developer: Damn camera takes almost half a second to start!

Tech lead: Can we just leave it on or pre-start it somehow?

Developer: But...

Tech lead: I will think of something.

Tech lead to management: We made camera start 150% faster!

Management: Wow wow wow. It is so great to have such an experienced tech lead we pay so much for.

Tech lead drives into the sunset with his brand new Tesla.

srtjstjsj3• 6 years ago

Is it Facebook's fault that the OS had a bug that triggers the camera notification when the camera is in standby mode?

There's no reputational damage because the world is already split between people who think FB is the devil and people who don't care.

dathinab• 6 years ago

The problem is I can see exactly that happening.

jariel2• 6 years ago

No, he's saying that API usage is not obvious, things are complicated and not obvious and that mistakes happen.

I don't believe for one second that FB is going to be purposefully taking 'illegal videos' of people.

Nor do I believe Facebook is even evil. It's just a social network, end of story.

maxsilver• 6 years ago

Management: wow that's great can't see any problem with that, no chance of reputational damage there.

Absolutely agree, but it also wouldn't surprise me if they didn't think about it or didn't care.

If 2020 has taught me anything, it's that a surprisingly high number of people / companies / groups managers and/or leaders, do not think about or care about long-term repercussions of the vast majority of their decisions.

koonsolo• 6 years ago

I see you don't have much experience in development. It probably went more like this:

business: "Opening the camera seems slow", dev: "it takes 200ms for the system to start it", "Can you make it faster?", "Not really, unless we keep the camera on", "Do that!", "Won't it have privacy issues?", "Don't worry about that".

EDIT: And in the end business is correct, because nobody really cares about this. Every happy instagrammer keeps happily instagramming.

fatnoah• 6 years ago

So you are saying..

If I had to bet my own money on what really happened, I'd guess that it's something along these lines:

DEVELOPER: Camera initialization is adding 200ms to app startup

TECH LEAD: Holy crap! We need total startup to be less than 500ms or users start to think things are slow

DEVELOPER: What if we initialize the camera early?

TECH LEAD: Can you do that without recording? It would be very bad if we were recording things.

DEVELOPER: Yes.

TECH LEAD: Do it.

Conspiracy ensues.

AlwaysRock• 6 years ago

Since net zero people are going to stop using Instagram from this coming out... Yes.

krisgenre• 6 years ago

Long back there was similar bug in iOS camera itself https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2413926

switch113• 6 years ago

This is very well put

Not sure why someone is assuming Facebook did this for an honest reason when Facebook is the best example of an extremely dishonest large tech company

The founder Zucker berg literally wrote - They trust me, the dumb fucks

He wrote this in college

He has shown a pattern of treating his users as 'dumb fucks'

Again and again more and more data comes up that Facebook is a dishonest company. not a 'by mistake' dishonest, but a fundamentally dishonest company

And always White Knights like this guy show up claiming 'it is to optimize loading speed)

Now Facebook is finally getting into trouble with even the left, because instead of helping Obama get elected it seems now they are helping Trump get elected

So their own dishonesty is so extreme that they are trying to help both Democrats and Republicans thinking both sides are dumb fucks that will forget what Facebook did to screw them over in past elections

rglover• 6 years ago

This isn't a good excuse for spying on people.

CaptArmchair2• 6 years ago

Don't want to be the devil's advocate here but just because camera is on doesn't mean anything is being recorded.

This is about consumer trust.

To the vast majority of consumers, a smartphone is a magic box with a lens and a display. What happens inside - how data is stored and processed, how the OS functions, how apps work,... - has been abstracted away behind those "UX optimized" interfaces you just mentioned.

Consumer don't buy black box devices because they trust the few big companies that manufacture the hardware and software: they buy them because there aren't any alternatives that provide the same level of convenience, and can solidly guarantee a due level of privacy as to what happens behind the screens.

When consumers buy a smartphone or download an app, they have to blindly put their trust in manufacturers acting in good faith. And just that has been damaged by plenty of scandals in the past decade.

So, next time you're in public, try to pay attention to this: how many people have taped off the camera of their devices? And why is this product a thing? [1]

[1] https://www.amazon.com/s?k=webcam+cover

It's because there's a fundamental trust issue. Consumers tape those things on their devices because they don't feel in control of what a device does or doesn't record. Covering the camera is literally the only way they feel they are 100% in control.

So, that should leave you with two questions here. (a) If there's a fundamental trust issue about "magic" technology, do you think people will remotely accept any rationalization about "UX optimization" and "not recording" (e.g. your asking them to trust them on your word)? and (b) If people go so far as to tape off their camera lenses because of a deep trust issue, how much sense does it even make to implement such an UX optimization in the first place? Isn't that a tone deaf act of sorts?

I totally understand why this happens, and I can see the convenience of having a snappy camera. It's just that the technical solution to enable this, flies against what people perceive as acceptable.

yoz-y• 6 years ago

So, next time you're in public, try to pay attention to this: how many people have taped off the camera of their devices?

I usually do pay attention and so far I have seen one person with a camera taped over. This is just not a thing, no matter how the media wants it to be.

heartbeats2• 6 years ago

Consumer don't buy black box devices because they trust the few big companies that manufacture the hardware and software: they buy them because there aren't any alternatives that provide the same level of convenience, and can solidly guarantee a due level of privacy as to what happens behind the screens.

They still consent to it, though. People do perceive it as acceptable, and use it to share their private information. If they don't want to use smartphones, they're free to move to another country.

hkai2• 6 years ago

It looks to me like the media are still bitter about Facebook allegedly helping Russians elect Trump, and so they make up this non-news and instill panic and fear into people.

Pretty sure that now most people will be convinced that Facebook is recording them secretly.

rorykoehler• 6 years ago

It doesn't matter. It's still shady as shit and figuring out good UX with the camera off is a design constraint.

TeMPOraL• 6 years ago

As an iOS developer who worked with apps that access camera frequently, I can confidently say that it's just a UX optimization. Starting the camera takes a brief few hundred milliseconds which is easily noticable from a user perspective.

Look at it from a user's perspective:

As a user, I don't know you. I have no reason to believe you. If I see my camera being accessed, I have no way to tell whether the data stream gets processed by the app or sent straight to /dev/null. I'd have to assume the latter on trust. But what reasons to do that does your app give me? The loads of ads assaulting me? Or perhaps the malicious UX dark patterns sprinkled everywhere? The regular media stories about omnipresent surveillance capitalism don't reassure me either.

It may very well be a performance optimization in Instagram, or in many other applications. But users have no way to know it, no way to be sure of it, or (in most cases) no way to even conceive that such optimization is needed. Meanwhile, they have perfectly good reasons to assume nefarious purpose.

can16358p5• 6 years ago

Yup, I don't trust Facebook either. But many regular users (not the people here on HN or reddit) don't even know that that means, let alone care. Facebook knows only a minority would make this an issue whatsoever, and they keep it. Not defending right or wrong, but I think this is just it.

fabrice_d• 6 years ago

It's true that initializing camera hardware takes noticeable time. We had the same complaint from app developers in Firefox OS and we implement a small trick to improve the experience: when launching an app that has the "camera" permission listed, we start to initialize the camera hardware in parallel with other app startup tasks. That doesn't trigger stream acquisition so it's fully safe, but we gain a few hundred of ms overall when the app actually needs the camera preview.

danudey3• 6 years ago

Your point is well said and accurate, and was the first thing I thought of as well.

That said, I think we're well past the point of no return vis-a-vis giving Facebook the benefit of the doubt on basically anything privacy-related. I don't know anyone who would argue that Facebook wouldn't do this if they thought they could get away with it; the "Facebook is listening to my conversations and showing me ads" conspiracy theory gained so much traction, not because people want to believe in conspiracy theories, but because people have no difficulty imagining that Facebook would do something like that if they could.

stjohnswarts• 6 years ago

It seems like a dumb move, which is why I don't think they're doing what they're being accused of. It could certainly just be a technical glitch. I don't think they are spying on uses like that. They have -plenty- of data already and getting more everyday..

noexcuses7• 6 years ago

We've gone from "it's a service to share photos with friends" to "Sure, the camera is on, but it's not recording or transmitting!"

Advocating for the Devil generally gets you sent to hell. At this point I don't even really care to hear legitimate technical reasons for this because time and time and time and time again, Facebook continually acts in antisocial ways, and it does so with impunity. I'm so sick of it, and I'm so sick of the apologetics.

Facebook is incentivized to do bad things. Facebook indeed does bad things. Any action they take needs to be examined through that lens. Facebook started out as a social network (well, originally it was a tool to stalk women), and rapidly grew to be a democracy-ending ad machine.

So please don't sit there and make excuses for this company.

sizzle• 6 years ago

Why is there no LED light when the camera gets power on a smartphone like a macbook? This is insane that smartphone manufacturers thought it was a good idea to not indicate when your camera(s) activated. I've never understood this antipattern...

can16358p5• 6 years ago

Starting from iOS 14 which was released just a few days ago (I don't know about Android side), it does. It also displays which apps have used camera/microphone in control center recently in case you've missed the subtle dot. I think they've nailed it this time. (Though I personally think the design can improve)

boublepop• 6 years ago

Very good point. User experience is very important. This is also why Amazon periodically breaks into your home and makes sure they have a complete inventory of what you own, so they can ensure a speedier and more appropriate ordering workflow. At face value this seems unethical, but you have to remember that they are improving your user experience and making money, so it’s all ok. And I mean it’s not like they are stealing anything anyway, and you can’t really expect them to respect your privacy when you’ve signed the eula.

Ups sorry, that seems to be a message out of Bizarro world that crossed over.

kyberias• 6 years ago

Yes. For example, Webex on Windows seems to keep the camera on (led lit) even though I'm not in a call. Irritating. One more reason why I don't love that software. Teams (and many others) handle the camera correctly.

noisy_boy• 6 years ago

With the VR/AR initiatives they have, people will voluntarily share what they are looking at. Make sharing information integral part of the experience and you get everything without any wrongdoing.

emsy• 6 years ago

Let’s assume for a moment the story turns out to be true: would people stop using Instagram because of it?looking at the history of privacy violations and the market’s responds to it I doubt it. There is a minority of users who will feel rightfully violated in their privacy (imagine browsing instagram naked while possibly being ogled at by some creep at FB). The worst that will happen is that FB will be sanctioned to pay a laughably low fine. I think we need much harsher repercussions against these practices, up to barring them completely from operating.

bogwog• 6 years ago

People still smoke even though everyone knows it's bad for you. Maybe like smoking we need a minimum age for social media that's actually enforced and heavily penalized?

devit• 6 years ago

A lot of people would probably deny camera permissions to Instagram (and upload by sharing from gallery if they upload content), and their reputation would take a significant hit (currently they aren't known to covertly gather any personal data beyond generic OS-provided statistics).

Also Instagram isn't really essential to communicate and learn about events in the way the main Facebook service is, so stopping to use it is highly feasible.

robbintt• 6 years ago

Agreed. I just checked my setting and apparently did this "deny and post from camera roll" by default. I have no doubt I was just making a privacy conscious choice.

kennywinker3• 6 years ago

You can’t post instagram stories without giving both camera and microphone access. This is a significant leverage point for a lot of people.

reaperducer6• 6 years ago

would people stop using Instagram because of it?

Any responsible parent would make sure their young children didn't use it.

There is a minority of users who will feel rightfully violated in their privacy

So? Because they're in the minority their voices don't matter?

The worst that will happen is that FB will be sanctioned to pay a laughably low fine.

Sadly, you're spot-on with this one.

heimatau• 6 years ago

would people stop using Instagram because of it?

Honestly, what other people do with their data/privacy concerns doesn't affect my life. So, if they are cool with that, that's on them.

For me (my family), we are fairly anti-technology at the home. 'Anti' in the respect that we actually enjoy the simple life and retirement for us is on a farm, off the grid. So, this behavior, for me, is the last straw. I will be removing IG within the next 12 months. (I won't get a FB,Whatsapp, etc)

switch113• 6 years ago

Yes, actually people would

Many of the people who use Instagram are ones who stopped using Facebook due to privacy issues and their grandpa and grandma showing up

They didn't know Facebook owns Instagram

Facebook is stuck in this loop where it has to keep buying competitors because its own users lose faith and leave

If Instagram didn't sell to Facebook, Facebook would be screwed

Currently, FB has Instagram, Whatsapp and Messenger

By some special deal with the Government they are trying to nuke TikTok

If that doesn't work they are in trouble

Many of the newer companies that are growing won't sell to FB

(Tik Tok, Snapchat, Telegram, etc)

paxys2• 6 years ago

Of course people would stop using Instagram. A major app provably spying on you from your camera is an extremely big deal, and is something every non-tech user can easily understand.

The truth is though that as in ~100% of such sensationalist headlines there is nothing alarming in what the app is doing, which is why users don't care.

hkai2• 6 years ago

You are talking about repercussions, yet clearly there is no proof that Instagram was "spying" on anyone.

not_really• 6 years ago

Blame has been placed on a bug, meaning you can safely assume there is irrefutable proof of camera access. (Why else would the claim of a bug need to be made?)

Spying or not, it's completely unacceptable.

jjbinx007• 6 years ago

Even if this was true, which I doubt, what would Facebook actually gain by doing this? They'd see a person's face from an unflattering angle with an unflattering expression.

Or they'd see whatever the front camera sees at the time, which in my case right now is the back of my phone case or possibly the floor.

I don't see that as valuable data to mine.

drcongo• 6 years ago

Really? One of the largest facial recognition databases in the world has nothing to gain from pictures of people's faces?

Frost1x2• 6 years ago

I really don't know how people can continue to actively use their services, especially with an OS native app.

washadjeffmad3• 6 years ago

They'd be able to track what your eyes focused on and for how long, whether you wore glasses, were bald, your approximate age and ethnicity, whether you have facial hair, your reactions to content, and a lot of other behaviors and metrics that would never cross your mind.

Instagram already does all of the above, but so does a lot of digital signage in shopping districts, in addition to tracking your BT HWID, to monitor trends in real time. Then they sell this info to eg- financial companies that operate things like mutual funds.

That's what I was doing with mine in the mid-2000s, anyway.

srtjstjsj3• 6 years ago

You think instagram needs to spy on you to get a picture of your face? Because the 1000s of photos you already uploaded aren't enough?

skocznymroczny• 6 years ago

your reactions to content

do you actually "react" to content? Like chuckle or make any other facial expressions? I just scroll and scroll and scroll with a neutral expression.

_-___________-_• 6 years ago

One very useful thing would be running facial recognition on all the faces the camera incidentally sees, in order to infer new connections between people.

kovac• 6 years ago

For a fun demo of what they can do, check this out:

https://github.com/noahlevenson/stealing-ur-feelings

srtjstjsj3• 6 years ago

That conspiracy theory assumes people are mugging for their news feed, which no one does.

swiley• 6 years ago

Is the main reason the app store still has public support this belief that apple instruments the apps it reviews? Because it looks like they don't. If that's the case it's trivially easy to get malware on the iphone and the only thing the app store really does is give Apple power.

mantap• 6 years ago

This is well known among iOS developers. Apple's approval process is far too cursory to catch malware. Also a lot of crapware gets through. The best you can say about it is that it filters out the really obvious stuff.

kennywinker3• 6 years ago

And provides a mechanism for pulling bad apps when they’re later found to be bad.

_trampeltier• 6 years ago

Lately was also this thing, with App check always our clipboard. I wonder how many website does the same, and also check your clipboard all the time. And with more and more APIs in browsers, I wonder how many website start to listen and watch you.

rickyc091• 6 years ago

Not even websites. Desktop apps also have access to your clipboard without any permissions. Can't wait until it becomes more common practice to provide an audit trail of any apps snooping on the clipboard.

Hokusai• 6 years ago

Why physical sliding covers are not mandatory? This happens again and again. And, everybody has several cameras at home.

A part of that, Facebook still is responsible for their actions.

zupreme• 6 years ago

This is why iOS is badly in need of a “Task Manager” and of an “Event Viewer”, so that users may easily audit what resources each app is currently accessing, and which resources they have accessed in the past, including logging each instance of camera or microphone use by any app.

Apple has the power to easily mitigate these concerns - yet they do not.

Why?

loriverkutya2• 6 years ago

Because my mother is using an iphone and nothing you described would make sense for her.

She is pretty good with tech and understands how computers and phones work, but she just does not want to browse a process list to see which process is using the camera.

anhner• 6 years ago

then she can choose not to browse the list?

jariel2• 6 years ago

You make a good point with 'your mom' but this would be an extraneous feature, not necessary and therefore not in the 'regular case path' of behaviours.

So I think it's a valid thing.

Though iOS is getting out of hand with complexity these days.

Sometimes I want a dumb phone.

userbinator2• 6 years ago

but she just does not want to browse a process list to see which process is using the camera.

How do you know until you've tried?

At the risk of provoking a tangential discussion, I don't think keeping users "in the dark" about what's happening is ever a good idea. They don't have to learn if they really don't want to, but deliberate opaqueness is bad --- if anything, it only leads to more learned helplessness and ignorance. Of course, that's probably what companies want in general, since it means they can control users more easily...

effingwewt• 6 years ago

The more I see this excuse the more I realize Apple wants people lazy and dependent on them. They have all the trust, and that is bad.

bitxbit2• 6 years ago

Ok so we are going for the least common denominator based on your mother. Makes zero sense.

soamv• 6 years ago

The comment you're replying to does not describe a process list.

Users do understand the concept of apps, obviously. A log of "App X used the camera", "App Y accessed your location" is well within what non-tech-savvy smartphone users can understand.

qwertox2• 6 years ago

There could be an industry wide agreement to reserve the top two pixel rows for realtime visual feedback of sensor use. 1st quarter of the display refers to the microphone, 2nd to the camera, 3rd to GPS and so on, with standardized ways of notifying what is happening, ie blinking means it's currently active, red that it has been used at least once during the last 5 minutes or so, with more detailed information in the notification bar.

m00dy• 6 years ago

neat.

wil4212• 6 years ago

Or iOS shows an icon similar to location services. Full camera icon means it’s in use, hollow icon means it’s been used recently. Ideally it would have a list of apps just like the location services.

niek_pas• 6 years ago

There could be, but there won't, because that would be aesthetically unpleasant.

reaperducer6• 6 years ago

There could be an industry wide agreement to reserve the top two pixel rows for realtime visual feedback of sensor use.

Apple already has this. Little orange dot indicates audio. There's a blue arrow for location access. I don't know if there's something for video or not.

You can then go into the Settings app and see which apps were using those features.

quaa55• 6 years ago

iOS 14 shows a green or amber dot in the top right if the camera or microphone is active. But yes i generally agree that more robust monitor tools are still needed. iPad is "a computer", right apple?

dfinninger• 6 years ago

In the new iOS 14 there's a green (camera) or orange (microphone) dot in the upper right-hand corner of the phone. If you swipe down from the top right it'll show you what apps are using the input and which apps have used it recently.

So that's a step in the right direction.

pmlnr• 6 years ago

"oh, it's a bug" - so make them financially and legally responsible for bugs. Just like automotive is.

jml7c5• 6 years ago

You generally need to show damages for liability.

antpls• 6 years ago

I suspected for a long time that they are doing the same on Android.

There must be a very small mechanical part in my phone's camera (probably the lens when it focuses) that makes a subtle noise when activated. I noticed the noise was present every few minutes when I browsed on Instagram, but only when I forgot to turn off camera permission.

It is creepy, no matter what the reason behind this.

what_ever• 6 years ago

Wouldn't this be easy to verify on those phones where the front camera pops outside when being used? https://www.vivo.com/in/products/v15pro

rvz• 6 years ago

Call it for what it is. Complete Malware. Plain and simple fact.

numpad02• 6 years ago

Being lawful-evil person I am, I once imagined a “news” app such that display content or suggestion ever so unnoticeably slightly change depending on how user behaves judged by device camera.

A facial expression ML model would be trained beforehand so camera data would not have to be collected, but only pushed to users along app updates, and content would be analyzed and encoded at server side to determine what users are to feel, along with hints to aid learning and correlation between different stories, all subconsciously and automatically.

As for what to do with a system like that...I don’t know, make boatloads of cash by forcing in-app purchases? Push your favorite but little known novels and comics? Make group of people I like by my specifications? Promote good posture, regular exercises and force people to look up? I wouldn’t want to use it so specific elected officials pass or resign, or world’s atrocities to become accepted...

Then I got bored. But could it have been something like this?

SkyMarshal• 6 years ago

I wonder if people make distinct enough facial expressions while reading online content for this to work. For myself, I pretty much stare blankly at the screen the whole time without much change in my expression. The ML would have to be very good at detecting slight nuance.

AndrewThrowaway2• 6 years ago

While your face might seem still, e.g. your heartbeat, your eye movements can reveal a lot.

I remember how I was blown away by this video a few years ago:

https://youtu.be/3rWycBEHn3s?t=171

almyndz• 6 years ago

yeah, usually when I'm reading the news I'm only screaming on the inside

hairofadog• 6 years ago

To your point, one of the things I worry about with apple news, for example, is that the underlying ai won’t understand _why_ I dislike a particular news story. Generally I downvote hyperbole, clickbait, and paparazzi content, but I would guess it’s more common for people to downvote things based on the substance of a story, e.g. downvoting a well-written, truthful article because the truth in that case is inconvenient for their political stance, or because it’s about a loathsome-yet-newsworthy person. A facial recognition system would have to know the difference between my face being frustrated at a high-quality story about the fires in the western states vs my frustration that apple news seems to find Andy Borowitz to be hilarious and relevant. Maybe possible, but lots of nuance under the surface.

thrav2• 6 years ago

Wasn’t there a proof of concept for exactly this about how social media apps were probably already doing this? I believe I saw it on HackerNews. It was a site where you gave them camera access and then ran something like a 60 second experiment. Seemed academic.

rmrfstar2• 6 years ago

Being lawful-evil person

The word you are looking for is "sociopath". Oliver Wendell Holmes' "bad man" is an analytical tool, not a recommendation.

There's nothing inherently evil about the mood-detection feature you have described, provided it is deployed with continuing and informed consent from the user.

The feature is already deployed on billboards in public spaces, although this instantiation is evil as "users" are generally unaware of it, have not consented to participation, and cannot opt out.

Raphmedia• 6 years ago

Please don't throw mental health diagnosis willy-nilly around on the internet. Not only is it impossible for you to make such a diagnosis, it is rude to both the community you are using as a punch line and to the poster.

numpad02• 6 years ago

Existing implementations only detect moods and collect data for analysis, my idea is if you're just going to do open-loop brainwashing, you don't have to know users at all so it could be done without "invading privacy".

sociopath

ok, I mean no harm to humanity, but, um,

heartbeats2• 6 years ago

The real question is why nobody bothers. Why doesn't Facebook psychologically manipulate their users into being OK with tracking?

natch• 6 years ago

I wonder how unfettered Mark’s access is to all their data and systems. The answer to this question should be public in order to bolster trust, but as far as I know it is not.

More on topic, I doubt this particular feature is nefarious, but those who would spy often seem to rely on others’ doubt that it is happening.

tonywastaken• 6 years ago

I noticed this yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24505285

Facebook got caught on this one- but there are probably hundreds of Apple internal APIs that they are using to violate people's privacy.

mgoetzke• 6 years ago

did ios14 not add something like a monitoring for this ?

august125• 6 years ago

Mark Zuckerberg has completed his transformation into a real life Artie Ziff.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CU9X3tvTmIQ

jessaustin• 6 years ago

Your comparison is apt, but for a moment I confused this character with that of Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg. Villains with a "Z"!

jtjones• 6 years ago

I personally do not accept app camera permissions for any app that I don't fully trust. I stopped trusting the Facebook app years ago when it launched itself constantly in the background.

trident1000• 6 years ago

Kind of absurd there is not a physical camera close feature on phones at this point.

dangus• 6 years ago

This kind of thing makes me glad that we’ve got the mic/camera indicator dots in iOS 14, along with the clipboard paste notifications.

parliament32• 6 years ago

On a side note, IG works perfectly fine being denied the Camera permission. In fact, it doesn't even complain about it until you try to take a picture in-app... and most users' workflow is taking pics with their phone's camera app (which is almost always better than IG's) and uploading the actual files to IG (you can still apply filters and everything else this way).

angel_j2• 6 years ago

It doesn't need access to your photo library either. Imagine giving access to your whole roll!

kennywinker3• 6 years ago

If you want to post, it needs access to your photo library or the camera. If you want to post stories, it needs access to the camera and microphone.

paxys2• 6 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weasel_word

Facebook Accused of Watching Instagram Users Through Cameras

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