Opt-out telemetry

Posted Jul 28, 2024 12:18 UTC (Sun) by pizza (subscriber, #46)
In reply to: Opt-out telemetry by DanilaBerezin
Parent article: Lessons from the death and rebirth of Thunderbird

> 2. That distros should stop circumventing that policy by packaging the software with telemetry disabled by default, which mind you is 100% the right thing for them to do in this case.

Nope, it is not "100% the right thing for them to do in this case."

Maybe it is 99%, maybe it's 20%. But it's not 100% because there are clear benefits to doing so. That you disagree about the relative importance of those benefits does not mean those benefits do not exist.

> Mozilla =/= the developers of their open source software and it's entirely reasonable to not trust them.

Uh, WTF? Who do you think adds/commits code into "their open source software" if not "developers"?

Meanwhile. I have yet to read any specific objections to what Thunderbird claims to collect or if any PII is part of it. Whether or not you "trust" anyone involved, the source code of Thunderbird is F/OSS in every sense, and can be inspected to confirm that it does what its developers claim it does.

> User's should have 100% control of their machines and opt-out telemetry is in direct violation of that principle.

You can "should" all you want, but the harsh reality is that "100% control" hasn't been true since the WIPO copyright treaties of 1996 (making DRM legally enforceable) were ratified and subsequently enacted by nearly every nation on this planet. But even before that treaty made it effectively illegal to break the flimsiest of digital locks, nearly every computing device on the planet already had some degree of proprietary software embedded into it that the "user" has no meaningful control over.

Meanwhile, when you use a computing device you do not own, or use that device to connect to any external service (ie "someone else's computer") by definition you do not have "100% control" of anything. I can promise you that far, far, far more data (and personally identifiable at that!) is leaked (if not outright collected by every intermediary) with every email you send or receive than Thunderbird's documented telemetry can possibly gather.

Opt-out telemetry

Posted Jul 28, 2024 14:07 UTC (Sun) by DanilaBerezin (guest, #168271) [Link] (7 responses)

> But it's not 100% because there are clear benefits to doing so. That you disagree about the relative importance of those benefits does not mean those benefits do not exist.

It's 100% because it's unethical to do so. Not because there are no benefits.

> Uh, WTF? Who do you think adds/commits code into "their open source software" if not "developers"?

Read again: Mozilla =/= developers

> You can "should" all you want, but the harsh reality is that "100% control" hasn't been true since the WIPO copyright treaties of 1996 (making DRM legally enforceable) were ratified and subsequently enacted by nearly every nation on this planet. But even before that treaty made it effectively illegal to break the flimsiest of digital locks, nearly every computing device on the planet already had some degree of proprietary software embedded into it that the "user" has no meaningful control over.

Yes and all those things are unethical too. The fact that there are already a lot of evil things in the world doesn't mean we should just be okay with other evil things being introduced.

Opt-out telemetry

Posted Jul 28, 2024 15:22 UTC (Sun) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link] (6 responses)

> It's 100% because it's unethical to do so. Not because there are no benefits.

And who defines "ethical"? In this case, it's clearly you, which is in itself unethical. You are defining the scenario to your benefit.

> Yes and all those things are unethical too. The fact that there are already a lot of evil things in the world doesn't mean we should just be okay with other evil things being introduced.

And again, who is defining "evil" here? You are!

The fact is, "ethical" and "evil" are social constructs defined by the requirement for us to be able to live together with each other. I'm sure you would disagree with the fact I would define "Freedom of Speech" and "The right to seek happiness and wealth" as unethical, but it's an objective fact that both of these (as practiced by America today) are actively harmful to the majority!

And - in almost all cases - you fall foul of the "pick two, pick any two" dilemma. Is it unethical for other people to pick a different two to you?

You're effectively saying "I'm the most important guy in the world - nobody else deserves any say". That may be ethical and morally correct for you, but I bet everybody else in the world would beg to differ!

Cheers,
Wol

Opt-out telemetry

Posted Jul 28, 2024 17:43 UTC (Sun) by DanilaBerezin (guest, #168271) [Link] (3 responses)

I'm not going to debate the philosophical foundation of ethics here. I think in a modern, civilized society, respecting user consent and autonomy is a basic moral principle most people have already accepted in the same way that most people have accepted apriori that things like murder are evil and unethical. Of course developers, corporations, foundations etc are free to be spineless and unethical in their behavior, that is entirely their prerogative. That's not the point of my statement. The point of my statement is to point out their evil and unethical behavior, protest it, and hope that others will join me in doing so with the goal that maybe that will stop them from being evil and doing unethical things, like pushing opt-in telemetry.

Opt-out telemetry

Posted Jul 28, 2024 19:07 UTC (Sun) by DanilaBerezin (guest, #168271) [Link]

Correction:

*like pushing opt-out telemetry

Opt-out telemetry

Posted Jul 28, 2024 22:26 UTC (Sun) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link] (1 responses)

> I think in a modern, civilized society, respecting user consent and autonomy is a basic moral principle most people have already accepted

So you consider it evil and unethical to break into a hijacked computer, in order to stop it being used in ransomware attacks? Because without the consent of the owner you can do nothing?

Life is not black and white. The Synnovis ransomware attack has had a massive - and seriously damaging - impact on my family ...

Cheers,
Wol

Opt-out telemetry

Posted Jul 28, 2024 23:00 UTC (Sun) by DanilaBerezin (guest, #168271) [Link]

Once again, not interested in debating the specifics of moral philosophy here since it's largely off topic. But I'm not sure how you believe that the situation you described is comparable to the situation here, where some external organization is insisting on pushing software that sends them data without your consent just so that they can have better statistics.

Opt-out telemetry

Posted Jul 30, 2024 6:51 UTC (Tue) by LtWorf (subscriber, #124958) [Link] (1 responses)

> You're effectively saying "I'm the most important guy in the world - nobody else deserves any say". That may be ethical and morally correct for you, but I bet everybody else in the world would beg to differ!

Uh?

Saying "I don't want this to be done to me" and saying "I want this thing to be forbidden for everyone" are not the same.

I don't think there's any request to completely remove telemetry from everyone's computers here.

There is a request to ask for consent before doing things that clearly many people don't want done to them. And of course you can't give consent if you're not informed.

Opt-out telemetry

Posted Jul 30, 2024 7:22 UTC (Tue) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

> Saying "I don't want this to be done to me" and saying "I want this thing to be forbidden for everyone" are not the same.

The GP says "this is 100% wrong". Given that ethics and morals are inherently a grey area, saying something is "100% wrong" IS forbidding it for everyone (which is, itself, wrong!!!)

Cheers,
Wol