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Swarm Mobile's Offer: Free Wi-Fi In Exchange For Some Privacy
cagraham writes "Startup Swarm Mobile intends to help physical retailers counter online shopping habits by collecting data on their customer's actions. Swarm's platform integrates with store's Wifi networks in order to monitor what exactly customers are doing while shopping. In exchange for collecting analytics, shoppers get access to free internet. Swarm then send reports to the store owners, detailing how many customers checked prices online, or compared rival products on their phones. Their platform also allows stores to directly send discount codes or coupons to shopper's phones."
Your stupid mind control techniques don't need more information from spying on us, they need to go away forever.
Whose who would exchange privacy for a little internet access deserve neither.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Just a thought.
If I'm using a phone, what the heck do I need free Wi-Fi for? The darn phone already has an internet connection.
I don't have any privacy to give up. Every last site on the internet already connects to Facebook and Google and every other "social" service already. There's nothing for me to trade them. I'm tracked 24-7 already. To late. I have nothing more to offer you.
It's like they're asking for the soul I already sold.
That said, I'll take your WiFi access, as long as I can get my auto-fill app on 'droid to fill out your EULA page automatically.
These days most of these services give the vibe of "watch what your pets are up to" like some sort of kitty cam but for squeezing every last cent out of the shopping cattle.
In other words all this crap is just a giant cattle monitoring system for retailers and other corporations.
*just make it shiny and they will use it*
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
So I can use this to connect to a VPN and get free internet access without any invasion of my privacy? I like it.
This is another reason to have a VPN ready. I don't think this technology is really new... just a repackage of looking at HTTP streams for marketing reasons.
I tend to use a VPN on any public Wi-Fi, and this just adds even more reason to. If the local place blocks it, that is their perogative and their store.
You can analyze my VPN as much as you like.
It's things like this why the wifi on my phone is disabled when I'm not using it, and why I don't have a data plan.
Measure that bitches. Because I'm sure as hell not providing you with the information.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Whenever I connect to a free wifi hot spot at a major retailer, I do so fully accepting that they are sniffing the traffic. This is why I only use it to price check online. Let's them know that their customers are keeping track of them in that way.
Has anyone asked a store with free wifi for a copy of their privacy policy?
This could prove rather entertaining. Or scary.
then what fuckos?
When your cell phone carrier can have it phone home with the GPS coordinates, tell which store you're in, and sell the same information to the merchant without needing your permission or you to actually connect to some random WiFi network?
... to not go to physical retailers.
Don't these places realize they really shouldn't be trying to make it easier for me to not give them my money?
Sure you can use my wifi for free, but how are you going to enhance my privacy?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
I love to use my OpenVPN server on port 443 at home, or http tunnel. Any people complaining here about loss of privacy and so on: are you really surfing on any public AP, be it McD, library, etc without the protection of a VPN/tunnel of some sort? If so then you are not allowed to complain about privacy loss. And if you do: why do you care, you just got another free AP in the city, saving your preciousss MBs on the mobile plan! Yay!
Privacy extensions like Ghostery and NoScript are your friend.
I've got Google and Facebook blocked wherever I can. I'm not here to provide them with information about what I do on the internet. Some things are blocked at the firewall, and simply can't be resolved in my house.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I have 4g on my phone; if i need to compare prices on something in a store I am not going to fuck around with getting on the local wifi just to save 500kb of transfers on my plan. Anyone else feel the same way? You can put up free wifi all you want but even if i did use it, i would be HTTPS'ing everything anyway, good luck knowing what I was looking at on Amazon.com. And if you try some stupid shit like blocking 4g (offering a microcell that conveniently omits data traffic, i have seen it done in the strangest of places) i probably will stop shopping there. No 4g=ghetto.
I used to be into free WiFi but over the last few years it has become a chore, with more and more places (even smaller stores) replacing unprotected WiFi routers with these annoying systems that make you login with an email address or force you to accept their terms and conditions.
With mobile data plans veering towards truly unlimited (at least in the UK) and mobile data speeds even surpassing that of home broadband, there is less of a need for these free WiFi solutions. And whilst there are some places, like pubs in the countryside where there is no mobile coverage, where free WiFi would be useful, its usefulness is almost always outweighed by the scenarios where I'm passing a shop or coffee place and my mobile internet stops working because my phone has decided to latch onto a WiFi hotspot that wants me to login.
Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic
Try Ghostery. Some of the bages I visit have as many as 37 trackers that get blocked; I think they are blocking like 1600-1700 trackers at the moment. They do keep their own stats, but it's better than the individual trackers, IMO. Also, there are plugins to block Google and Facebook. Of course, you have to trust that they are doing what they say, but hey, you're gonna surf anyway, why not try to keep some shred of privacy? Just my opinion.
because I know they can have dd-wrt style scripts to raise the prices of their online competition. Or outright block them.
Privacy extensions like Ghostery and NoScript are your friend.
I've got Google and Facebook blocked wherever I can. I'm not here to provide them with information about what I do on the internet. Some things are blocked at the firewall, and simply can't be resolved in my house.
They're not my friend. I'm not losing one second of sleep about being tracked. I went all-in a couple of years ago, and the thought police haven't descended from their black helicopters yet. I'm content to be the product that Google offers it's customers. I get a pretty good return on these services. I'm happy to be able to comment on some forum random forum quickly with my Facebook account. I'm happy to have Google give me a preemptive traffic update because it knows my schedule. I'm pleased that my games keep my scores and friends cross-platform and through device upgrades.
When my ISP started serving up ads when I mistyped a URL, I even switched to 8.8.8.8 for my DNS.
Screw it. Google can have my data. I wasn't using it anyway.
Don't use FB / Google / Twitter to sign in to anything, and it'll already help with the constant collection. Browser extensions can help more.
I personally don't use social media at all, and so I've blacklisted Google and FBs entire IP ranges on my mobile devices, and on my home firewall. Those two are the worst with the data collection tools they provide to webiste owners. The other major players are easy enough to avoid if you aren't using their services.
Are the store customers informed about what they are giving up in return for free Internet access (which many already have via their cellular provider)? Do they understand it? (Also, is it personally identifiable information?)
One issue that makes me doubt the 'nobody cares about privacy' argument is that the organizations collecting information, including governments and businesses, are so secretive about it. Some disclose in long agreements that they know nobody reads, but very rarely do they really inform their targets about what they are doing. I wonder why?
requestpolicy isn't too shabby either.
I don't have any privacy to give up ... as long as I can get my auto-fill app on 'droid to fill out your EULA page automatically.
If you agree to EULAs without at least skimming them for privacy-infringing conditions, I hope you aren't seriously surprised when your privacy is thereby infringed.
The harm for this fall on those not spied on by Swarm Mobile. You will get worse deal, because retailers think that can tell if you are about to find a better one.
So if you don't visibly check competitors for prices, you will be harmed.
If you don't check competitors prices, you will be harmed.
If you don't want to have to check competitors prices and use coupons, you will be harmed.
Privacy doesn't work like people think. For retailers it is about money, and the harm is about money.
More and more websites are moving to HTTPS. That means snooping only goes down the to IP address level. They'll have no idea what people are looking at on ebay.com or amazon.com
for 20 years now the internet has been increasingly about 'free $X for some privacy" and its a model we've all gladly accepted and the concerned hackers among us protested. the cost of hosting and the cost of engineering are oft cited reasons to employ this deep-dive marketing horseshit but for some of us, the salary alone seems to suggest hosting and marketing online are trivially inexpensive. So sure, if you want me to use your service how about I attach a condition. You can have some of my privacy, if your C-levels and marketing nutjobs enjoy a little social engineering. And once some money grubbing bentley driving suit's license plate or back yard or in home conversation courtesy of a laser microphone turn up in a tumblr feed, then we're fucking even.
Good people go to bed earlier.
I don't think that one is compatible with the mobile version of Firefox yet, unfortunately. (Neither is NoScript, for that matter, although Ghostery apparently is.)
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Why would I be surprised?
I ever-so-boldly don't give a crap that I'm being tracked.
Neither is NoScript
There's a beta product that I use; it seems a little buggy when I have to change permissions.
http://noscript.net/nsa/
>>> the thought police haven't descended from their black helicopters yet.
What about *-ism Internet lynch mob that would make you unemployable by disproportionally and retroactively applying arbitrary social standards? Make sure to never make any jokes that could be misunderstood, especially about forking builds and dongles. What about political views? I am sure you agree with every political creed, from tree-hugging hippies to anarcho-libertarian conservatives and nobody would ever take an offense. What about your asshole boss that would use a picture of you legally and responsibly consuming legal substances as an evidence of substance abuse and discriminate against you at your workplace? What about deranged stalkers?
Yes, because keeping safe from black helicopters is why people value their privacy.
Doesn't work. If they are using deep packet inspection, they will know exactly what you are looking. The only option is to only use ssl.
I avoid non-professional use of social media, and I am sure as a result I am on some-or-another list of deranged killers to be watched full time.
This does create superficial social problems, but people that want to get instantly in touch with me can still use their always-connected smartphones to place ISDN call.
never make any jokes that could be misunderstood, especially about forking builds and dongles.
That incident was in meatspace, by two toolbags. Plenty of us know how to compose ourselves online _and_ offline. And when we don't? That's what anonymous coward (with a touch of a quasi-anonymous gmail account) is for. It would take a subpoena to figure out who I am, and if I broke the law (or was accused of it with sufficient evidence) then they can come get the data about how I troll slashdot. See if my lawyer cares.
Wait, you voluntarily connected to Facebook and Google already?
I still disagree. The fact that "that incident" initiated outside of social media and only progressed via it changes nothing. Fundamentally, you have to deal with a) lack of control over your audience b) "internet never forgets" c) disproportionate response with arbitrary social standards.
For example - you have different standards of acceptable behavior - a) in a sports bar with your friend b) at the funereal of your friend's mother. While in a) jokes about your friend's mother are entirely acceptable, if someone were to bring them up during b) it would cause you major social embarrassment regardless of acceptability in initial context/settings.
I'll make sure to use the store's wifi to check the price of stuff I'm interested in (and nothing else).
After putting way more effort into it than I normally do for such things I ended up with iVPN. Very happy with them. (no it's not a commercial and I have no interest blah blah blah, but there are dozens of companies and most of them are total crap. So this is my a public service advice).
So question to AC - what social standard to follow? Is there one that guaranteed to never offend arbitrary large number of people of diverse cultural backgrounds and random levels of unreasonableness?
Yes, chances of lynch mob happening to you are rather slim. So are chances of getting run over while crossing the street, yet we still look both ways.
How do you send text messages that are not associated with a telephone number? (confused)
If you read the EULA on free wifi portals, many of them already collect info on you. Even if you don't connect to any, many stores will track your movement by your adapter's MAC address. This is why I disable my phone's wifi adapter entirely when I'm not using it now. Saves a lot of battery too.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Haha. Wait until you get blacklisted from employment for your political views.
What about *-ism Internet lynch mob that would make you unemployable by disproportionally [sic] and retroactively applying arbitrary social standards?
What about them?
Welcome to the internet. Everything here is forever.
I'm not going to live in fear of having ideas and thoughts of my own. I regularly speak my mind and regularly express unpopular opinions. I live with the consequences of my actions -- you know, like an adult.
Since I don't live in fear of the internet boogeyman, I don't mind letting someone see my browsing history in exchange for (more) free WiFi.
If I want privacy, I know how to get it.
If ever you have a future need to step out from the herd and speak against the elite in favour of justice or truth (or anything at all that said future elite don't like), that tracking provides myraid opportunities for your voice to be discredited if you show signs of getting any significant traction.
The thought police don't have to send helicopters. You have given them the remote controls for your suicide belt.
If opportunity came disguised as temptation, one knock would be enough.
3^2 * 67^1 * 977^1
I couldn't have said it better myself.
Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. -Carl Sagan
The sort of person who goes "all in" on letting others totally monitor his behavior for their own profit likely isn't the sort of person who would step out of the herd. I doubt he would find that a compelling argument.
I think the appropriate term here is "useful idiot".
That way only the carrier knows what you're doing. Hey, they're no different from the ISP you use at home, who also knows what you're doing, right?
This is actually not new and currently implemented at several chain stores across the US and I would also assume the world. My current employer already has a system in place that works like that. The customer is offered free wifi, and in exchange their location, time spent in a zone, searches, ect are all collected and if you enroll in the company's phone number based parks program, you can get offers to accept coupons and other things on your phone for use at checkout.
Lets just say as an employee, I either dont bring my phone, or make sure my wifi is off because that thing will track me while I crap. To be honest, im not cool with this, but I am also the type to see something like this as a challenge and not a problem beyond my own circumvention of these practices. I still get to poop and read slashdot just fine on my 4g connection.