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Comment by dfield | Hacker News Reader

Am I the only one that doesn't think this is wrong? Metadata seems like fair game to me and I hardly think that Path is deliberately trying to steal data. They are probably just trying to make their user experience better.

(That's not to say we shouldn't have a discussion about data ownership and privacy. Just that we should wait to be outraged at things that actually deserve our outrage.)

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I agree about the outrage part. There may not be malicious intent from Path, but I do think that there's a better way of allowing users to control their data. A simple extra option of "include location data from photos" would mitigate this entire scenario.

I think you'll see an update shortly that will fix this issue; which is clearly just an overlooked bug. I think you'll also see iOS patching the issue soon too.

That was a quick response from them and they've submitted an update that fixes the issue (which was unknown to them). https://eeqj.com/20130201/path-privacy/#comment-786209180

> There may not be malicious intent from Path

Malicious implies they're trying to do harm, which I don't think is the case. But geotagging posts when the user clearly didn't authorize you to access that information is dubious and underhanded at a minimum.

After last year's incident, they've lost all benefit of doubt.

I agree based on a dictionary definition of malicious, but I think people are using it here to mean "things that they know users explicitly don't want and are doing anyway". Having privacy settings and then completely ignoring them might not be malicious - you don't intend to harm your customers, only to increase your profits in some way - but I think that common usage of the word "malicious" would include that case.

If this was a normal app, I'd be much more likely to agree with you.

Coming from the people caused Apple to issue an OS update to prevent them from stealing contacts... it deserves outrage. But 90% of that should be pointed at Path.

I don't agree with the article's stance that Path found a way to be jerks again, so clearly Apple screwed up. Phonebook access should have been restricted, but for this one the user has to select the photo, Path can't just read every photo and steal that information, so it's not nearly as serious as last year.

Again, they didn't "cause" Apple to issue an update alone. The same method for building Find Friends features was used by thousands of social apps, and Path was just a hot target for the media at the time. It was certainly a privacy concern, but obviously not malicious intent.

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