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Monday, December 3. 2018

Metadata: We know where you are

Unlike all normal people, I never have my phone with me unless I am traveling and might need to phone AAA. Not paranoid, just no need for it. Mrs. BD says I am a Luddite.

h/t, reader

Posted by Bird Dog at 17:00 | Comments (11) | Trackbacks (0)

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It took me a long while to realize that the phone is for my use. I don't have to answer it or take it with me if I don't want to. A lot of people don't think that way. More probably should.

The google stuff is very interesting. It is not as accurate as they would like. I can tell from the ads targeted at me that Google often thinks I'm elsewhere when I'm sitting right here at home in Dallas.

#1 Mike (Link) on 2018-12-03 18:56 (Reply)

I am trying to divorce myself from Google. I don't use their search, I use duckduckgo.com instead and I don't use Chrome, I use Vivaldi instead. Since I have an android phone, I'm still in their clutches. I considered spending more on an iPhone to get away from Google but I couldn't justify the difference in price. Maybe one day...

#2 mudbug on 2018-12-03 20:02 (Reply)

I generally have divorced myself from Google, but for searches where you are looking for a specific word or phrase from a particular website, Google has no match. For easy searches, I don't use Google, but for advanced searches like the above, I use Advanced Google search.

#2.1 Gringo on 2018-12-04 16:19 (Reply)

Call me dumb, but I don't have a smartphone.

#3 Gringo on 2018-12-03 20:46 (Reply)

It's not a phone - it's a camera.

#3.1 BD on 2018-12-04 06:37 (Reply)

Wow. There are two of us. Who knew?

#3.2 Hawk1776 on 2018-12-04 07:14 (Reply)

Make that three of us. I have an older flip phone that allows me to disable GPS tracking (except for 911 calls). That doesn't stop the multilateralization tracking, though. I leave the phone off for days at a time.

#3.2.1 snopercod on 2018-12-04 08:01 (Reply)

#4; me too.

#3.2.1.1 Sam L. on 2018-12-04 12:38 (Reply)

I rarely leave the house anyway. Home or away I rarely make or receive calls, but I take the phone with me all the time, because I listen to Audiobooks constantly. If I'm on the road I sometimes use GPS or check the weather radar. I'll rarely surf unless I'm desperate to find a Schlotsky's--my little town doesn't run to Schlotsky's, Whataburger being more our speed.

#4 Texan99 on 2018-12-04 10:21 (Reply)

If you use several devices, say a work PC, laptop at home, and an iPhone, you look like three different users to a website (at least until you log in from each of those devices. However, there are companies (Adobe being one I know of) that offer user aggregation services, so that they can share data with online providers and stitch together all these interactions, so if you go to LLBean.com on your home computer, and then sat WilliamsSonoma from you work computer, both companies know it's the same person and where you've been.

Most interesting occurrence I've had was discussing a software product I had never heard of in a meeting at work, with my personal iPhone with the screen off (I guess that's not really a sleep mode after all), and for the next few days, every website I visited from my home computer displayed adds to the application.

#5 MikeL on 2018-12-04 12:36 (Reply)

One of my daughters gave me a little cell phone tied to her account about 15 years ago, and upgraded it to, I guess, a flip phone with a little lcd about 5 years ago. I know how to dial 911 and speed dial the daughter and wifey. Carry it it constantly, but have yet to use it. In 2010 my trusty '89 Tacoma caught fire and burned to a crisp. After getting a full propane tank and gas can out of the bed and away from the fire, I took the phone out and started to dial 911, but a nice lady who had stopped to help said she already had dialed 911 and the fire trucks were on the way. Oh well.

#6 BillH on 2018-12-04 15:33 (Reply)

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Monday, December 3. 2018

Metadata: We know where you are