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AT&T Stops Using 'Super Cookies' To Track Cellphone Data

Posted by timothy on from the turns-out-people-hate-that dept.

jriding (1076733) writes AT&T Mobility, the nation's second-largest cellular provider, says it's no longer attaching hidden Internet tracking codes to data transmitted from its users' smartphones. The practice made it nearly impossible to shield its subscribers' identities online. Would be nice to hear something similar from Verizon.

6 of 60 comments (clear)

  1. Correction by sunderland56 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    AT&T *claims* to have stopped using internal tracking codes.

    Whether or not you believe one of the top 3 most evil corporations on the planet is up to you.

  2. Evenhanded Responses by Tokolosh · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Six comments so far, and all very nice to AT&T. I would have expected more hating.

    I'll try: fuck 'em.

    --
    Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
  3. before giving ATT kudos.. by rogoshen1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The pattern more than likely will be something like this:
    1. get called out for bullshit, anti-consumer practice
    2. Throw out PR spin about how they care about their customers, and don't do said practice
    3. Finally admit to the practice, promise to stop
    4. Wait a length of time until the practice becomes more 'industry standard', and the furor has died down
    5. re implement under a new name

    This tracking garbage is probably far too lucrative -- both to law enforcement (well they see themselves as law enforcement) and advertisers to ever really pass up.

    Now that the genie is out of the bottle, it's not going back in.

  4. Putting ourselves in such awkward position ... by Taco+Cowboy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Reading the TFA

    AT&T Mobility, the nation's second-largest cellular provider, says it's no longer attaching hidden Internet tracking codes to data transmitted from its users' smartphones. The practice made it nearly impossible to shield its subscribers' identities online
     
     
    Would be nice to hear something similar from Verizon

    really makes me cringe!

    First of all, why on earth we, the users, putting ourselves at the mercy of companies such as Verizon or AT&T?

    I mean, WE PAID THEM to do the "data carrier job" for us, or in other words, they are not our boss

    Why are we letting them having the power to inserting "super cookies" (or whatever fuck else they can come up with) inside the datastreams that we paid them to carry?

    So many people making so much noise about FREE SERVICES search engines / social sites such as Google or FB for "tracking" them, where the hell are those people when PAID SERVICES such as AT&T and/or Verizon doing the same thing to them??

    Why are we giving away so much of our own rights??

    --
    Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
    1. Re:Putting ourselves in such awkward position ... by Shakrai · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Really? You "highly doubt" that the same telco's who are practically bending over backwards to track their own users and sell that shit to the NSA would be "stupid" enough for an MITM attack?

      Spare me the NSA paranoia; this is all about dollars and cents. That's what it all comes down to with any for-profit corporation. Do you seriously think that a Fortune 100 company is stupid enough to mess with encrypted sessions that will contain credentials for financial accounts? HIPAA protected medical information? Communications between attorneys and their clients? Secured sessions for defense contractors and Government employees working with Top Secret data?

      Take the tin-foil hat off long enough to contemplate the fact that Google is being spanked for the incidental capture of plaintext wi-fi packets. What do you suppose happens to the telco company that captures any of the data I've mentioned and subsequently loses it to black hats or a disgruntled employee? They'd be on the hook for millions of dollars worth of civil damages and whatever fines the alphabet soup of regulatory agencies decided to impose upon them. Do you seriously think they'd run that risk for the sake of some incidental ad revenue?

      Moreover, the only way they could even do it would be to install trusted certificates on the phones that they sell. How long do you suppose that would fly under the radar before being discovered? Do you really think Google or Apple would go along with it? Use some common sense man....

      --
      I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
      We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
  5. TFA misses the point by real+gumby · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The way to end this is not to say, "Would be nice to hear something similar from Verizon" like it's some sort of game.

    TFA (and the summary) are silent on the real question is which is, "What right do they have to fuck with my traffic?"

    It's like they are asking to be reclassified as a Title II common carrier.