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hekkle | 2 months ago

If you want to find which apps are the worst at this use GrapheneOS. Amazon flat out REFUSES to work unless it has unfettered access to everything.

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bri3d|2 months ago

This isn’t likely to be a good indicator. Essentially only the network permission and any fingerprint is necessary for the tracking in this accusation; the idea is not that TikTok were spying on Grindr on the device, but that a device fingerprinting firm who broker both TikTok and Grindr data were able to correlate the user.

gerdesj|2 months ago

I (UK based) have pfblocker-ng running at the perimeter with quite a lot of blocking. My browser FF has uBlock Origin and Privacy Badger too.

Amazon works fine.

I suspect they work along the rather practical lines of: if we can snag your data we will but if you want to block our efforts at predation but want to spend out, we are fine with that too.

Amazon absolutely will not refuse your money and they are jolly good at extracting it.

hekkle|2 months ago

Fair enough, it does make sense that they will maximise their profits where they can, I'm just saying that it (the app not the website) refuses to work unless you provide it a full scope of literally every permission available. Maybe it has more to do with attestation, and verifying that you are not a scammer, than stealing and selling data?

Aurornis|2 months ago

The headline is misleading. The TikTok app isn’t doing the tracking. The dating app providers are selling their user’s data. TikTok is one of the companies buying it.

Technical protections on your phone aren’t going to stop anything if you’re using apps that sell your data from their servers out the back door.

gruez|2 months ago

Doesn't grapheneos have the same permission model as stock android? The only thing it adds is internet access and sensors (eg. gyroscope) access. What extra stuff is amazon asking for?

hekkle|2 months ago

No, the permissions are very granular compared to Stock Android. I can't remember all of them from scratch, but by way of example Graphene allows for 'contact scopes', which sets permissions for which contacts you will share with each app, rather than a blanket "you can access all of my contacts" that Android has. I know when I tried it last (this was more than a year ago mind you so it might have changed), if you didn't give Amazon access to all contacts it somehow knew and refused to work.

vjvjvjvjghv|2 months ago

The whole permission thing is broken. They are too broad and nobody understands what they really mean. I would also like to see a log of when and how an app uses granted permissions.

asdff|2 months ago

Ironically amazon.com works perfectly with javascript disabled. One of the few major sites that still do in my experience.

mr_toad|2 months ago

Call me an old fashion capitalist but I have a certain respect for businesses still willing to engage in a simple exchange of money for goods and services.

quesera|2 months ago

The only websites that are allowed to run apps on my phone are financial institutions.

All other websites are just websites.

august125|2 months ago

This was Steve Jobs' original vision for the iPhone, before he relented and launched the App Store. Maybe it was the correct one.