App Privacy Study Looks at Most 'Invasive' Apps Collecting User Data

[hot-gril]

eBay don't use Paypal for payment processing anymore, they've got their own backend supplied by Adyen.

Wonder how many larger devs will start working around the "3rd party" classification by forming closer relationships with things they use.

 

[hot-gril]

Switching from Google search to DuckDuckGo simply transfers the tracking from the search engine to the site that you visit as a result of a search. Every website tracks their visitors. Sometimes they do it directly on the server itself, but often it is by the use of "tracking pixels" (a 1 pixel image embedded on a page that is hosted on a server for the sole purpose of tracking who is requesting the image when that page is loaded).

The information gathered is fed to Google, Facebook, and others. If a person is online, their behavior is being tracked and aggregated. I'll leave the issue of using a VPN for another time.

Yeah, it's almost hopeless. I have a PiHole set up to kill some ads, which also kills the tracking cause why not, plus my local ad blocker which does both if I'm on my Mac, but I don't expect that to be totally effective.

 

[MacBH928]

"Instagram and Facebook share the most data with third-party advertisers"

but..but...they all said they respect my privacy and do not sell my info to 3rd parties!?/s

i really would want to know what does Instagram collect. Like what is there more than people i am following, my comments, likes, and pictures I look at which is mostly public info. The only thing they have is my chats which there isn't much and I disable access to location. They--used--to have access to my pictures but since then Apple limited the access to photos only I choose. Thank you Apple! This should have been the way from the start.

And why is eBay collecting data on me, they don't even sell anything.

 

[dannys1]

Wonder how many larger devs will start working around the "3rd party" classification by forming closer relationships with things they use.

Not sure really as I guess they'd still have to state they use the data themselves. Technically eBay owned Paypal for a while, then they split up and now they've ditched them all together - though you can still pay with Paypal but it's processed by Adyen on eBays own system - the end user probably doesn't see that much difference but it's a massive change to the back end and for how sellers see it (and deal with less people when issues arise)

But yes whilst it's their own custom native front end, the actual transactions are processed by Adyen. Similar I suppose to the way that JP Morgan process Apple Card transactions.

 

[DaPizzaMan]

Pointless study. These app labels are based on developer self-disclosure, and most are flat out lying.

For example, eBay does share financial info with third-parties (such as PayPal), otherwise it would be impossible to pay for a specific transaction. And does anyone seriously believe that FaceBook doesn't share browsing, search, or usage data with third-parties?

I'm not sure if anyone said this yet but eBay transactions are no longer tied to PayPal. They've been emailing me for the last few months to tell me to add my bank information directly to eBay instead so I can continue selling.

 

[Rastapopoulos]

Does "browsing history" mean browsing within that app or browsing history of your chosen Internet browser?
Same question for "search history" is that only search history within that app?

I have the same questions.

 

[O.N.Y.X]

Good. Of all the apps on that list i have NONE on my devices.

 

[O.N.Y.X]

i really would want to know what does Instagram collect. Like what is there more than people i am following, my comments, likes, and pictures I look at which is mostly public info. The only thing they have is my chats which there isn't much and I disable access to location. They--used--to have access to my pictures but since then Apple limited the access to photos only I choose. Thank you Apple! This should have been the way from the start.

And why is eBay collecting data on me, they don't even sell anything.

They both could potentially collect EVERYTHING that happens on your device including the location of the device. Of course ebay sells usage data for ad placement. Whatever you watch, buy or sell on ebay is of great interest to ebay and will be used for profiling.

 

[Tech198]

Social network apps don't surprise to be higher than others, but am surprised of Twitter... Only 21% really?

Good. Of all the apps on that list i have NONE on my devices.

Same here