Beginning to think the reason security is so difficult is because ostensibly "good" companies do everything an attacker does and worse, but under the guise of EULAs.
Here's a thought experiement: If Facebook were malware, could you get rid of it?
Here's a thought experiement: If Facebook were malware, could you get rid of it?
Malware is any software intentionally designed to cause damage to a computer, server, client, or computer network. A wide variety of malware types exist, including computer viruses, worms, Trojan horses, ransomware, spyware, adware, rogue software, wiper and scareware.
Most advertising behaves like spyware for targeting purposes. It would be fine if it was consensual, but it's basically never the case.
> scareware
This is more about the ad's content than the concept of advertising itself, but online advertising is essentially the wild west and advertising platforms happen to get away with serving misleading ads that use scare tactics to get the user to do something against their best interests (sometimes even downloading actual malware).
As for me, I would use an alternative platform in a heartbeat, but all the privacy focused ones so far have not gained any traction.
In this case, they could very well be transparent about it, and comply with local laws/regulations (such as the GDPR).
When companies comply (or Apple forces them to - like with App Tracking Transparency), it's clear that the majority of people do not consider this a fair deal and opt-out.
Clearly most people aren't aware of that (nor are they happy with it) given that some people even have the impression that Facebook is literally listening to conversations.
"Facebook invades privacy" is still a minority opinion among their user base (whether we like it or not).
Apple has been aiming to become that product, because I've said before that Apple is primarily a privacy company with a bunch of entertainment features. It also means that competing with Apple isn't about design, it's also mainly about providing privacy. Their whole recipe is the complementary packaging of the two orthogonal concepts of entertainment and privacy.
I should start the next Apple.