Has your online data been breached?

[Brent S]

I don't own a smart phone, mine is an old basic model no camera. tv is an older model.
I don't do technology, I only use a computer for forums, Amazon for books and Ebay for other stuff, there are no files to back up on my computer, I do have windows ten but only because wife's geek nephew put it on for me.

I don’t think there is any such thing as privacy anymore. Just accept it and move on....

 

[DrPrepper]

I know it sounds intrusive, but who exactly is listening.

DP,
I bet Trump thought the same thing when he said on that RV after the interview "grab girls by their *****". Yup, he said the same thing, who exactly is listening?

Do you think private conversations that you have had in your home can be twisted to prove a crime? Ask General Flynn when he was ambushed and interviewed unknowingly in his own office.

My answer: the swamp is listening. And it is being recorded and stored for the next 100 years in case they ever need leverage on you. Google. NSA. FBI. Chinese, Russians, take your pick.

Let me explain. Information is power. Leverage is taking a little bit of power and controlling a whole lot more power. So take a company like Google. They can store massive data for little cost. They write their licenses so they can store this data and you have no recourse. They record a 20 year old college kid get drunk and sleep with a prostitute, or him smacking his girlfriend. Do this for 10 million young men. In 30 years, some of them are going to be powerful politicians. Dig back, find those recordings. How much power will Google have over that politician if he knows they have that audio?

Think that's crazy? How many years between when NBC recorded that hot-mike with Trump and when it came out? A decade+? Who saves that for a decade? They kept that tape as leverage, and when it benefited them by helping Hillary only THEN was it released.

I see what you are saying. I thought about it the other day. Here is what I came up with that Alexa would have picked up on in my house.
Me- Loading the dishwasher and telling my dog how to load the dishwasher the correct way ( she isn't going to dishes, and I am not crazy...I promise. She is a Shih-poo and demands that I talk to her).
My husband-asking me what I had going on today.
Me- Telling him nothing other than school work and hanging out.
Me - Running the vacuum cleaner.
My husband - Making meatballs in the kitchen.
Me - in the kitchen making kale in the steamer.

That's about it. Are you asleep yet? Pretty boring.

I am not going to be a powerful politician..heck, I don't even want to be on the city counsel. I think it would be an insane amount of data to file and keep stored if they kept every conversation recorded on everyone that had an echo dot. I could see where the CIA might tap into it, if you were someone worth tapping into. I am just not that kind of person.

There is more tracking me on the computer through Google searches and on my Iphone. I never use Siri, but it is the same kind of thing as an Alexa. There is little escape from using a smart phone or computer nowadays. They can track you from cell tower pings, searches, GPS, satellite imagery, TX DOT cameras, health insurance claims etc. Even if you do incognito searches on the internet, they can still track you in other ways.

I am baking a cake tonight..using Alexa for a kitchen timer, and I did ask Alexa these questions:

Me- Alexa, are you dangerous?
Alexa- No, I am not dangerous.

Me- Alexa, are you spying on me?
Alexa- No, I only send audio information back to Amazon when I hear the wake word. For more on Amazon's privacy policy visit (blah blah blah)

I will say it was kind of creepy that she actually knew what I was talking about.

 

[DrPrepper]

I don’t think there is any such thing as privacy anymore. Just accept it and move on....

That's kind of how I feel. It's sad, but true.

 

[Maverick]

As long as one has an address drivers license automobile, automobile insurance use banks visit a doctor vote etc... it’s kindly hard to go off grid. Anonymity is almost impossible unless one disappears in the back country.

 

[TexasFreedom]

I don’t think there is any such thing as privacy anymore. Just accept it and move on....

This reminds me of something our previous president said. Obama said something like "Socialism is here, deal with it. The only question is how far into Socialism do we want to go."

Sounds exactly the same to me... and isn't too far from the "have you stopped beating your wife" question. If you think this way, you've already lost.

 

[SheilaT.]

I don't own a smart phone, mine is an old basic model no camera. tv is an older model.
I don't do technology, I only use a computer for forums, Amazon for books and Ebay for other stuff, there are no files to back up on my computer, I do have windows ten but only because wife's geek nephew put it on for me.

By default, Windows 10 gives itself the right to pass loads of your data to Microsoft’s servers, use your bandwidth for Microsoft’s own purposes, and profile your Windows usage. I got rid of Windows 10 some time ago and went back to Windows 7.

 

[TexasFreedom]

By default, Windows 10 gives itself the right to pass loads of your data to Microsoft’s servers, use your bandwidth for Microsoft’s own purposes, and profile your Windows usage. I got rid of Windows 10 some time ago and went back to Windows 7.

That is true. I did some searching to figure out how to disable most all of those snooping programs with Win 10. It doesn't run the same, but I'm much happier without the spyware.

 

[SheilaT.]

That is true. I did some searching to figure out how to disable most all of those snooping programs with Win 10. It doesn't run the same, but I'm much happier without the spyware.

I adjusted the settings to close down the snooping too. Somehow the changes affected shutdown and a couple of other programs and my laptop wouldn't completely turn off. It killed my laptop because I was having to force a close if I wanted completely turned off or put up with having the battery run down When I got the new one, the first thing I did was take out the hard drive and install an SSD that I had put Windows 7 on. I'm convinced there is a squirrely trojan or something somewhere in windows 10 that's activated when you start switching all the snooping features off that makes the programme misbehave.

 

[DrHenley]

FBI, CIA, NSA and the Director of National Intelligence are all saying don't use Chinese phones, specifically Huawei and ZTE.
https://www.fastcompany.com/40530898/six-u-s-intelligence-agencies-warn-against-using-huawei-phones

"We're deeply concerned about the risks of allowing any company or entity that is beholden to foreign governments that don't share our values to gain positions of power inside our telecommunications networks," FBI Director Chris Wray testified.

"That provides the capacity to exert pressure or control over our telecommunications infrastructure," Wray said. "It provides the capacity to maliciously modify or steal information. And it provides the capacity to conduct undetected espionage."

 

[Mundame]

I am thoroughly convinced that the web is a product of far more surveillance than we could ever imagine.

There will be times when I've only VERBALIZED something in conversation, just to see it pop up as an add while online. And I know damn well I never actually typed in anything similar to trigger this.

Snowden was right.

Yeah, I have a sneaking approval of Snowden. Absolutely everything is known about all of us. He sort of balanced that: now we know something about the people who know everything about us.

 

[Mundame]

I know it sounds intrusive, but who exactly is listening.

DP,
I bet Trump thought the same thing when he said on that RV after the interview "grab girls by their *****". Yup, he said the same thing, who exactly is listening?

My answer: the swamp is listening. And it is being recorded and stored for the next 100 years in case they ever need leverage on you. Google. NSA. FBI. Chinese, Russians, take your pick.

They record a 20 year old college kid get drunk and sleep with a prostitute, or him smacking his girlfriend. Do this for 10 million young men. In 30 years, some of them are going to be powerful politicians. Dig back, find those recordings. How much power will Google have over that politician if he knows they have that audio?

Very nice: well said. Have you all noticed that a lot of local small-city newpapers have a sort of ersatz paywall that says you have to answer questions by Google to read the article you clicked to? And they seem innocent, but I realized ---- after five years of these questions, they know EVERYTHING about you. I never do them. All the same, they get us, Big Data knows everything about each of us. It's too late.

 

[Mundame]

I really don’t know why anyone would want on of these devices in their home?

Well, I thought it could do alarms to wake up and also read books to me. I bought two! But the fact is, they react to the TV words and start talking in a creepy way, and EVERY time the power goes out, when it comes back on at 2:30 AM in the bedroom, Echo bellows a lot of turn-out verbalizations: so much for sleep for the next two hours. And we lose power a lot.

There was so much unwanted talkie-talkie from Echo that I unplugged both of them. Too bad. Himself didn't much care for the always-on listening business, either. Not that we say anything anyone would really care about, but what's to like, you know?

 

[Squirtgunsquirter]

The sound of me walking around the condo, the bolt closing CLACK on the AR, the magazines dropping on the floor, talking about taxes, talking about guns, talking about politics, talking about prepping....

To me its the same as having someone sitting right there with a notepad. HEY MAN! YOU NEED TO GTFO! Here, don't forget your notepad.

Imagine that, someone could literally know what time I typically do dry fire practice. Do they care? Of course not. Should they know? Of course not.

I will not pay to have a possible spy/snitch in my house, the thought freaked me out when I was a kid and read 1984. The wallbox that was always on...

 

[Mundame]

The sound of me walking around the condo, the bolt closing CLACK on the AR, the magazines dropping on the floor, talking about taxes, talking about guns, talking about politics, talking about prepping....

To me its the same as having someone sitting right there with a notepad. HEY MAN! YOU NEED TO GTFO! Here, don't forget your notepad.

Imagine that, someone could literally know what time I typically do dry fire practice. Do they care? Of course not. Should they know? Of course not.

I will not pay to have a possible spy/snitch in my house, the thought freaked me out when I was a kid and read 1984. The wallbox that was always on...

Apparently there was a murder a few months ago and the State subpoenaed the Echo --- the guy said he came home and found his wife dead. The Echo...............................told rather a different tale, of a quarrel, threats in hubby's voice, gunshots......Amazon was very unhappy about this unwelcome development. Yeah, could be a problem there. It records everything and overwrites to the last hour, as I read the article ---- and that was enough for this case.

I am probably not encouraging you to buy one.

 

[Squirtgunsquirter]

My wife bought two of them, for the exact same reason as you. I said no way. Very small fight, she figured out they kind of suck for what she wanted, and gave them to a friend.

I may choose to engage in criminal behavior at some point. Who knows?

 

[Mundame]

My wife bought two of them, for the exact same reason as you. I said no way. Very small fight, she figured out they kind of suck for what she wanted, and gave them to a friend.

I may choose to engage in criminal behavior at some point. Who knows?

Interesting! She also bought two, like me. Well, darn. I wish I liked them better, and I'm not as worried about eavesdropping as some, but the creepy talking at us at odd moments, too often! Not good. And not as responsive as they should be to verbal commands. I can yell and yell at it to turn off the wakeup alarm, but does it do it? Not reliably. \

Waste of money, I think now. We'll see: maybe later it will command all sorts of things. I tried that device that lets it turn on lights and such, but I can't say it worked plausibly. I could turn on the desk lamp but it took an extra two-three seconds and I was sitting right by the switch, so ---- why. Not a fan, really, as of now.

I got it to read books to me, loudly. But it really won't answer the voice commands well, and so I have to go over and hit its switch. It IS louder than the iPad, so I'll keep them "in case." But I'm back to the iPad for books while cooking.

 

[Squirtgunsquirter]

Mundame, I'm no Luddite, but I really feel like this stuff is getting out of hand. And my friends, one special forces/ninja/international spy and man of action, one former Wall Street Quant (and former New York Philharmonic cellist!), and a few rural gun owning "good old boys" really do feed my paranoia. The Military friend is SO over-the-top about secrecy as part of daily life, the ex wall street algorithm writer is 100% convinced that the economy is going to crash, so much so that he moved here and bought a rural farmette to drop off the grid on, and my friends from Illinois, well, they are from Illinois. Enough said. We are all pretty much paranoid whack jobs.

I also realize I'm getting on in years. But it just seems like too much. Your smartphone may or may not be tracking your every movement. Every phone conversion can be plucked out of the air easily. Your car snitches on you when you get in an accident. Everything is connected to... something. The internet?

I just don't buy into it. That's my future? My privacy is gone, move on? No way. I use a tracphone, I change it every few months. I move a lot. A lot. I drive a 1972 Ranchero, it doesn't even have an automatic choke, let alone a computer in it. My wife and I are planning on moving into an Airstream, and basically sort of... skirting the edge of dropping off the grid. Not out of fear or paranoia, but because we just don't like how all this is going. This condo? We will never own it. Don't pay taxes, or the association fee for a while? Out.

I don't think things were "better back then" I don't believe in a golden age, but I DO believe things were simpler, and more private. And, nothing is forcing me to buy into the "concessions" of modern day technology.

I have never bumped into anything while looking at my phone. I feel good about that.

I have no feelings either way for anyone who loves tech, 800$ phones, whatever, I get it. I don't look down on it, that's their choice, no problem whatsoever.

It's just not my choice. I want to live an unremarkable life. Facebook wouldn't help with that goal.

Facebook, Ha!

 

[Brent S]

Glad to hear there’s at least one other person left that’s not on Facebook! This site is enough of an addiction for me!
I too am not worried about anyone spying on me since I’m not into illegal activities. I do find it disturbing though. I don’t like the idea of every word recorded and then used out of context by someone with less than honorable intentions.

 

[WGregMiller]

Very nice: well said. Have you all noticed that a lot of local small-city newpapers have a sort of ersatz paywall that says you have to answer questions by Google to read the article you clicked to? And they seem innocent, but I realized ---- after five years of these questions, they know EVERYTHING about you. I never do them. All the same, they get us, Big Data knows everything about each of us. It's too late.

They’re doing that here. It amazes me that people answer these questions which leads to you having to put in your email address so you get tons of spam.

If they’d just scroll down to where it says ‘skip survey’.....

 

[Mundame]

I don’t think there is any such thing as privacy anymore. Just accept it and move on....

Yeah --- that was the Sun Microsystems guy, right? He said, "There is no privacy. Get over it."