1075
Spyware
(lemmy.world)
This is fucking hilarious :D
Do you remember the term "adware", like it's a kind of virus? Now even your operating system shows ads XDDD.
Not every OS, none of the ones I use do.
But I get your point.
say it, say it!
??
GrapheneOS for my phone, Linux for everything else, if that's what you mean.
Enterprise? .... The only one you pay for?
My job wanted everyone to install Teams on our personal devices. I really didn't want to but reluctantly agreed until I found Teams wouldn't work without some other Microsoft app whose purpose was to reformat my system files into two sections which were personal and work. I said I would not allow that on my personal device and if they needed me to have teams they could provide a work phone. They looked as though it was the most unreasonable thing they've ever heard. I feel like 20 years ago this was the exact thing people were warning us about when installing programs from the internet, now no one bats an eye.
If the company is sued and your personal device is also your work device, everything in it can be part of the discovery process. If it's a criminal affair, such devices can be confiscated as evidence for an indeteremined amount of time.
This shit goes way beyond "mere" privacy concerns.
If the incompetent idiots keep on pushing for you to run company stuff on your devices, simply point out that it would legally expose you to the company's legal affairs.
In a security audit the personal device also probably becomes "in scope".
Honestly, you are supposed to keep personal and work devices separate. Not only does it provide work life balance, but it also avoids lawsuits.
Yes, people have sued workplaces for infrigement of privacy
There is a fine line between work and personal life that should never be crossed!!!
I went through this exact same thing at a previous job, and they also reacted like I was speaking another language. These weren't dumb people either, but they were very much the types who had never spared a thought to anything about technology, much less privacy.
They eventually offered to pay me a monthly stipend and put it back on me to use that to buy a work phone or just pocket the $. I didn't feel like going through that hassle, so I caved and just kept the money.
People can grow completely desensitized to the negative meaning of a word.
In programming, programmers rely more and more on other software: Libraries, built tools, testing environments etc. These were being called dependencies by people who thought we relied to much on them. dependency is a word with a negative meaning, but today programmers happily add a new dependency to their project to save 3 lines of code.
A lot of modern hacks happen through these dependencies. Programmers are looking at kinds of solutions to make dependencies more reliable, rather than trying to reduce their number of dependencies.
People can grow completely desensitized to the negative meaning of a word.
Something that the modem conservative movement has discovered, and glommed onto. Unfortunately, very successfully.
It's not always as stupid as you make it sound. Sometimes there are many subtly different ways to achieve a basic result and using a common component rather than rolling your own can be the difference between familiar and surprising behaviour. Although obvs if it's 3 lines just c+p that, but it's unlikely to really be that
The blank stares and annoyed if not downright condescending dismissal I get from normies when I express a preference for avoiding spyware, adware, and other socially acceptable (read: profitable for those who make the rules and own the politicians) malware is some of the worst gaslighting I've ever been subjected to!
But, like, do you have something to hide?
Of course I do and so do you.
Only the 3,425 avant-garde photos I've taken of my penis
See, now I think the government needs to see that!
The hyper-normalization and gaslighting continues, and evolves.
2010: I'm getting commercial ads relevant to my interests.
- Yeah, right. As if you were so important that anyone would follow you through the entire internet.
2018: I'm getting commercial ads relevant to my interests.
- It's your own fault for not installing an ad blocker.
2026: I'm getting right-wing political videos in my feed.
- It's your own fault for taking an interest in rage porn.
The trick is to avoid normies
I generally do, but unfortunately, I'm related to some..
So they do the avoiding for you perfect
If only! 😄
now it's only spyware if it's made in Russia or China
—NPR, literally yesterday
Like I know this is hyperbole for comedic effect, but it's also completely wrong.
Maybe I’ve always misunderstood the term but it seemed to me that spyware was a category of malware that would secretly and excessively harvest user data whatever the purpose or the actor behind it. I’d guess this was more likely to be done for commercial or criminal purposes than state surveillance or espionnage.
Indeed, this quote seems a gross misrepresentation but is it not that harvesting of user data for commercial purposes has become so ubiquitous that the term has shifted to only designate malware used by actual spies?
Yeah, now they call it "telemetry" and pretend it's somehow normal and acceptable. But no, it's fucking not -- it's still spyware!
There's nothing wrong with telemetry, it's not supposed to contain identifying or private data. It's information about feature usage, crashes etc. and it's very useful for developers. Especially with open-source software, the devs are generally not your enemies, they just want to improve their products. If some apps spy on you under the guise of telemetry, that's a different issue.
Right, but most of the time it's for things that do not need to know where I am or any of my private data.
And then all of that conveniently gathered and stored information is just waiting for a bad actors (including corporations) to scoop it up.
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not if the only thing I watch on YT is Mental Outlaw
What do you call a virus that doesn't damage your system? An "app"
By that definition, many paid apps are also viruses! Have you ever tried practically any anti-virus software, for example?
I might suggest that security suites like McAfee themselves becoming synonymous with Malware undermined the core concept of system protection ages ago.
Modern Windows based security protocols offer significant bloat with only marginal improvements in safety.
The bigger issue is that having your third-party "security" software betray you while using Windows is like pissing in an ocean of piss. The OS itself is spyware!
McAfee and other antivirus went full-on malware a long time ago. Sure, Microsoft was still collecting data from users, but it was a drop in the bucket compared to what they do in Windows 11 these days.
I sure hope nobody in this thread is using Windows, Android, Edge, or Chrome...
Implying that apple is fine?
Maybe, maybe not. I'm not sure about them. Probably not, I suppose.
RUSSIA BAD CHINA DOUBLE BAD WHERE MY GADGETS!!!!?!?!?!?
We don’t tolerate any of that foreign shit 'round 'ere
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this post was submitted on 24 May 2026
1075 points (100.0% liked)
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