1582
submitted 1 week ago by Charger8232@lemmy.ml to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

The Privacy Iceberg

This is original content. AI was not used anywhere except for the bottom right image, simply because I could not find one similar enough to what I needed. This took around 6 hours to make.

Transcription (for the visually impaired)

(I tried my best)

The background is an iceberg with 6 levels, denoting 6 different levels of privacy.

The tip of the iceberg is titled "The Brainwashed" with a quote beside it that says "I have nothing to hide". The logos depicted in this section are:

The surface section of the iceberg is titled "As seen on TV" with a quote beside it that says "This video is sponsored by...". The logos depicted in this section are:

An underwater section of the iceberg is titled "The Beginner" with a quote beside it that says "I don't like hackers and spying". The logos depicted in this section are:

A lower section of the iceberg is titled "The Privacy Enthusiast" with a quote beside it that says "I have nothing I want to show". The logos depicted in this section are:

An even lower section of the iceberg is titled "The Privacy Activist" with a quote beside it that says "Privacy is a human right". The logos depicted in this section are:

The lowest portion of the iceberg is titled "The Ghost". There is a quote beside it that has been intentionally redacted. The images depicted in this section are:

  • A cancel sign over a mobile phone, symbolizing "no electronics"
  • An illustration of a log cabin, symbolizing "living in a log cabin in the woods"
  • A picture of gold bars, symbolizing "paying only in gold"
  • A picture of a death certificate, symbolizing "faking your own death"
  • An AI generated picture of a person wearing a black hoodie, a baseball cap, a face mask, and reflective sunglasses, symbolizing "hiding ones identity in public"

End of transcription.

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[-] ISOmorph@feddit.org 63 points 1 week ago

Can you explain why you would think Steam is so bad? I would argue they're pretty fair, especially with the option to buy steam cards for cash to not disclose your personal data. Does the client do some unsavory shit?

[-] lazynooblet@lazysoci.al 52 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Seeing steam at the top makes me question the list. Likely a hate of DRM rather than privacy

[-] lb_o@lemmy.world 66 points 1 week ago

Yeap, and Brave in the middle. They only pretend they are for privacy, but they are the very opposite.

[-] EngineerGaming@feddit.nl 2 points 6 days ago

Yeah. All the issues, even small and quickly-resolved ones, paint a picture - that they are eager to disrespect users' consent.

[-] dogs0n@sh.itjust.works 21 points 1 week ago

Yeah i hate when I see people using Brave, because they have been brainwashed.

Does anyone remember when they were injecting their own referral links into links for online stores (99% certain they did this pls prove wrong if you know better)? This alone leaves them with 0 trust in my books.

[-] const_void@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 week ago

Brave is and always has been gross. Never understood how they’ve been so successful at tricking people into installing it.

[-] SirPea@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

OP replied in another comment its because "firefox is not secure" https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/43710170/18564861 :

[...] Chromium-based browsers aren’t all bad, such as Vanadium or Trivalent, so people sometimes feel more comfortable sticking with what seems familiar (coming from Chrome).

In another reply parents to this one:

LibreWolf is far from secure, as it is based on Firefox and so comes with the same security issues. If you meant to say privacy and not security, the reason nobody makes high threat model browsers for Windows is because Windows itself is not private and it would be a losing battle.

So OP is saying it's not private nor safe? I get what some people are saying of Firefox constantly changing Terms of Services but that'd be in regard to privacy not security and OP tries to argue not being safe which his iceberg also implies in terms of privacy not being good too. Yeah, LibreFox's ToS isn't the same as Firefox's ToS and his counterarguments to Firefox and Firefox-based on replies is Chrome-based browsers exclusive to niche OSes (also OP don't even try arguing Brave on comments so probably just trying to rage-bait with every opportunity). I'd love OP to argue using the examples he used in the iceberg. So many discourse incosistencies along with the iceberg. Also OP FYI while privacy does not mean secure, lack of privacy could mean security risks in some cases.

[-] slaneesh_is_right@lemmy.org 3 points 1 week ago

No epic store and brave is not on the top...

[-] MajesticElevator@lemmy.zip 3 points 1 week ago

They're not the very opposite. They have done wrong things, just like Mozilla. Doesn't make them Google though.

[-] Prathas@lemmy.zip 2 points 5 days ago

They are not "just like" Mozilla.

[-] MajesticElevator@lemmy.zip 1 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

That’s not what I wrote

Also, please stop with the Mozilla praise

You seem unaware of the bullshit they do. They’re not clean at all.

[-] shneancy@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

and then Tor so high up, unless you're hell bent on leaving 0 traces that thing is a pain to use, can't have it maximalised, pages load sometimes minutes at a time, no addons, just suffering. nobody sane uses that thing for more than the occasional trip to whatever deep web market is not yet exit scamming

[-] Nalivai@lemmy.world 10 points 1 week ago

Their bottom line is gold, this should tell you everything you need to know about the creator of the meme.

[-] antbricks@lemmy.today 4 points 1 week ago

it also has a log cabin... and Log Cabin is a maple syrup brand... and maple syrup is from maple trees... and maple leaves are on Canadian flags... so... a snowman?

[-] onion_trial@europe.pub 21 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

It might be there because there is a lot of data associated with the steam account, especially the community part of it, e.g.:

  • Recorded playtimes
  • Times and dates when you are regularly logged in
  • Possession of games which are precisely tagged by genre/interests/etc.
  • On which time and date you spent how much money (participation in sales in the steam store)
  • Timestamped posts and comments in groups based on various interests etc.
  • Curators/devs/publishers you follow
  • Your game wishlist
  • Connection and interaction with other steam accounts (friends list, chat, trades, gifts)

All this can be used to create a very detailed behaviour profile and accurately deduce the social status of the real person who uses the account. Maybe the data isn't misused and it's just there so the features can actually exist.

Personally, I doubt Valve actually does this as expansive and invasive as other big tech companies. I'm pretty sure they at least aggregate anonymised data to measure how e.g. their sales perform, which game to promote on the store front page etc.

But we can't be sure because it's not public.

[-] shneancy@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago

i don't think valve does much with the data even internally. if they did at least the game recommending queue would be slightly accurate. instead i have to manually blacklist tags for it to stop showing me things i'm just deeply uninterested in. like yes Mr. Valve my steam library of RPGs, puzzle games, and open world sandboxes clearly profiles me as someone who'd be interested in the newest Fifa game every year, sure buddy

[-] Ziglin@lemmy.world 2 points 5 days ago

I think they changed the name in the newer versions so surely you'll be interested now!

[-] shneancy@lemmy.world 2 points 5 days ago

now you say it, maybe it's my clicker games that make Valve think i'd like to buy a game where the point seems to be that the number in the title goes up by one every year

[-] Ziglin@lemmy.world 2 points 5 days ago

Yes but my point was that I believe they changed the name from FIFAYY to FCYY (and I think raised the price).

[-] shneancy@lemmy.world 1 points 5 days ago

woah! the innovation!

[-] lb_o@lemmy.world 17 points 1 week ago

Agree. Steam doesn't even save your birthday, and asks for it every time

[-] PrinzKasper@feddit.org 5 points 1 week ago

They legally have to.

[-] 9bananas@feddit.org 17 points 1 week ago

afaik the client does collect a bunch if data, most (all, i think? but not a 100% on that) of which is opt-in.

they do need stuff like IPs for internet related features.

telemetry wise there's the steam hardware survey, which is opt-in, and it asks every single time it attempts to collect your systems hardware and OS information. this could technically be identifying information, but since it's opt-in it's not a privacy violation and it's entirely optional. (plus it's super useful for all involved: users, devs, and steam. it's kind of a win-win and straight up necessary info for devs to know which hardware they should optimize for)

they might be putting it at the top because steam has native support for DRM?

but that's also weird, because DRM isn't a privacy violation. it's a shitty practice, barely does anything, barely works, and keeps breaking or hobbling otherwise perfectly good games, all of which is shitty, but it's little to do with privacy. and the dev has to specifically opt-in and integrate it as a feature...unless they're thinking of 3rd party DRM that can be waaay more intrusive, like Vanguard... THAT'S a privacy and security nightmare just waiting to blow up in people's faces.

otherwise...i haven't really heard anything bad about steam privacy wise?

doesn't mean that there's nothing to be concerned about, but i feel like there'd been some news about it if there was...

this post was submitted on 07 May 2025
1582 points (100.0% liked)

Privacy

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