# Google is watching - and sees our private account.



## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

My wife is taking over my Motorola (android) cell phone. I have been setting it up for her. It is now her phone and uses her Gmail address. As a result, it syncs with her desktop mail, calendar and contacts. That is all good, I thought.

This morning, a Notification appeared titled *Your Bills*. A heading said - _Only you can see these results._ Then it listed our Hydro One Bills - Amounts were correct. So we knew this came from either Hydro One or someone who had access to our account. Right below the Notification, there was a link to a "music" video called Pay my Bills by K. Michelle followed by the song lyrics. This is a VERY crude song. I won't post the link, but you can look it up if you want to confirm. The notification disappeared soon after I first looked at it.

We called Hydro One, but they had no idea where that notification could have come from . It was not an email or a text message. So where did it come from? After some digging, I found a way on Androids to look at a notification log. There I found that this was from Google! On Google, there is a Recent button, and the message could be found there. 

My wife uses Chrome (like Android, owned by Google) to access our account on the Hydro One site. From what we see here, Google also can see what we see in our private account. They can even read off the amounts that we have to pay. Then they send us that bill payment reminder along with the dirty song.

I do realize that Google watches our shopping and browsing habits. But surely Google should not be able to see our private accounts? Maybe they also see our bank and investment accounts? Or is this just a security weakness of the Hydro One site?

Just wanted to let others know about this and interested in any such experiences others may have had.

So far, I have turned off all notifications on the phone from Google. But that does not stop them actually getting our private information. Chrome is a great browser, but it looks like we will be moving to Firefox. Maybe use a VPN? Any ideas on how to make our internet use more private?


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## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

There's no such thing as a secure phone. All your information is open to some, open to anyone who takes the trouble to hack it. The only secure phone system was Blackberry which is why the White House uses them exclusively, and why the big boys put them out of business.


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## Just a Guy (Mar 27, 2012)

Read your terms of service. It’s well known google looks at every piece of email in the gmail accounts. It looks at everything you do on it.


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## Prairie Guy (Oct 30, 2018)

Google works closely with the communist China government to spy on their citizens and they also censor political opinions they don't agree with.

Why would anyone trust them?


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## Just a Guy (Mar 27, 2012)

Cause they said they’d do no evil.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

Prairie Guy said:


> Google works closely with the communist China government to spy on their citizens and they also censor political opinions they don't agree with.
> 
> Why would anyone trust them?


Google exited China and is blocked by the Great Firewall?


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

OP: it sounds like this is a Chrome Notification. When you visit a website in Chrome, the website can ask for permission to send you notifications even when you are not on the site. This is like a new kind of popup, I find it rather annoying and always decline. But maybe you at one point gave permission to send notifications. Doesn't explain the racey content. Google nor Hydro One are too likely to be sending racey content.


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

Just a Guy said:


> Read your terms of service. It’s well known google looks at every piece of email in the gmail accounts. It looks at everything you do on it.


This had nothing to do with emails.


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

Rusty O'Toole said:


> There's no such thing as a secure phone. All your information is open to some, open to anyone who takes the trouble to hack it. The only secure phone system was Blackberry which is why the White House uses them exclusively, and why the big boys put them out of business.


This only showed up on the phone. Problem was created when using Chrome on laptop to access a website. We have to log in securely to Hydro account. But Google was still able to see what we could see withing our secure account. 

Some here seems to accept this. So it is OK if Google can take a look at your Bank account details? Or your Investment account details? If they can see our secure Hydro account, they can probably see those accounts too.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

agent99 said:


> So far, I have turned off all notifications on the phone from Google. But that does not stop them actually getting our private information. Chrome is a great browser, but it looks like we will be moving to Firefox. Maybe use a VPN? Any ideas on how to make our internet use more private?


Google provides many free services in exchange for the data. A VPN service would not change this, rather the VPN protects your data from someone intercepting data between your device and your VPN server. You could pay for a secure email server.



Rusty O'Toole said:


> There's no such thing as a secure phone. All your information is open to some, open to anyone who takes the trouble to hack it. The only secure phone system was Blackberry which is why the White House uses them exclusively, and why the big boys put them out of business.


US govt dropped Blackberry for iPhone eons ago. It has hardware and software dedicated to security today that Blackberry never dreamed of. All tech have vulnerability exploits often due to the careless user, for example agreeing to terms of service of a free app


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

andrewf said:


> OP: it sounds like this is a Chrome Notification. When you visit a website in Chrome, the website can ask for permission to send you notifications even when you are not on the site. This is like a new kind of popup, I find it rather annoying and always decline. But maybe you at one point gave permission to send notifications. Doesn't explain the racey content. Google nor Hydro One are too likely to be sending racey content.


Notifications can be turned off. I have now done that. But my concern is not getting notifications - It is that Google can see inside our password protected Hydro account when we access it using Chrome on laptop. It read the amounts to be paid for the past few months and listed them in the notification.

As mentioned above, if it can do that with Hydro, it can likely see everything in other password protected sites too?


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

m3s said:


> Google provides many free services in exchange for the data. A VPN service would not change this, rather the VPN protects your data from someone intercepting data between your device and your VPN server. You could pay for a *secure email server.
> *


Again, this had nothing to do with emails. Just use of browser to access password protected site - just like your bank or brokerage. Would you be happy having them access those in exchange for free services?


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## Eder (Feb 16, 2011)

You might want to start using the Tor browser as well as DuckDuckGo search engine....like Firefox without all the background data scraping. 



Anonymity. Individual data packets bounce through multiple nodes, making surveillance impractical. IP addresses are also impossible to track or trace.
Security. Because it’s open source software, it’s difficult to hide malware in Tor. There’s protection against malicious code, but few criminals bother targeting this niche browser.
It’s free and universally accessible. Downloading Tor costs nothing, and it works on PCs, Macs and Linux computers. There’s no intrusive advertising or cookies, either.
It accesses the deep web. Any site with a .onion suffix (most of the deep web) is visible through Tor, but not through other mainstream web browsers.
It has a privacy-conscious search engine. The absurdly-named DuckDuckGo is to search engines what Tor is to web browsers – the most secure and anonymous choice.
It aids democracy. Tor was a leading communication tool in the Arab  Spring uprising a few years ago, since it allows citizens of repressive regimes to communicate safely.


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## Just a Guy (Mar 27, 2012)

agent99 said:


> This had nothing to do with emails.


You think the terms of service will be different for their other products?


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

agent99 said:


> Notifications can be turned off. I have now done that. But my concern is not getting notifications - It is that Google can see inside our password protected Hydro account when we access it using Chrome on laptop. It read the amounts to be paid for the past few months and listed them in the notification.
> 
> As mentioned above, if it can do that with Hydro, it can likely see everything in other password protected sites too?


Not seeing the actual notification, it sounds like you opted into Chrome notifications from Hydro One. I doubt that Google is logging into accounts on your behalf, and I've seen no evidence they are doing this myself. I think this is more a user understanding gap, than a Google nefariousness issue. Not to say that Google isn't nefarious--some of the stuff they can do will make your skin crawl. Like Google knowing that you bought something at a store after seeing an ad.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

Eder said:


> You might want to start using the Tor browser as well as DuckDuckGo search engine....like Firefox without all the background data scraping.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Latency is an issue. And perfect privacy is not assured, much to the chagrin of some criminals etc. Not to say it is not an improvement. I just wouldn't be using it to arrange drug deals with abandon.


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

andrewf said:


> Not seeing the actual notification, it sounds like you opted into Chrome notifications from Hydro One.


On Android, unless you know to turn notifications off (how many users would know?), they will be turned on for all sites. But that is not the point. 

My concern is that when we go to a web site and log in using a password, Google is able to read the personal account that we are accessing once logged in. This is one step further than knowing which public sites we access. 

Seeing our Hydro account may not be much of a security risk, but if they can do this, then presumably they can also read our bank and investment accounts


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

Eder said:


> You might want to start using the Tor browser as well as DuckDuckGo search engine....like Firefox without all the background data scraping.


Thanks. I will have a look at TOR. Have already switched to DDG on my own computer. However, it was already on my wife's computer, and she is the one who accessed the Hydro site. So it seems that DDG won't prevent Google from seeing our accounts. As I understand it, DDG is just a search engine that works in conjunction with Google's Chrome.


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## Userkare (Nov 17, 2014)

agent99 said:


> This morning, a Notification appeared titled *Your Bills*. A heading said - _Only you can see these results._ Then it listed our Hydro One Bills - Amounts were correct. So we knew this came from either Hydro One or someone who had access to our account. Right below the Notification, there was a link to a "music" video called Pay my Bills by K. Michelle followed by the song lyrics. This is a VERY crude song. I won't post the link, but you can look it up if you want to confirm. The notification disappeared soon after I first looked at it.


We get an e-mail from Canada Post ePost that says "you have a new message from Hydro One", that's all, no $$$ amounts. Using a Chrome browser, we go to the ePost website where we see a history of Hydro One bills. I don't know how Google would have access to that billing history, but it wouldn't surprise me.

If I browse for some item to buy, I would then get ads about that exact same thing for a few weeks afterwards... Duh, I already bought it; why send me ads to buy something I already just bought? Artificial Stupidity, I guess. OTOH, In the real world, I buy a 2018 car, and within a few months I'm getting postal mail to buy a 2019 model, so I guess it's not necessarily the technology's to blame.

If you go through all the Google 'privacy and security' settings, you can find options for permissions that you should turn off if you're not 100% sure you want Google computers following you.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

agent99 said:


> On Android, unless you know to turn notifications off (how many users would know?), they will be turned on for all sites. But that is not the point.
> 
> My concern is that when we go to a web site and log in using a password, Google is able to read the personal account that we are accessing once logged in. This is one step further than knowing which public sites we access.
> 
> Seeing our Hydro account may not be much of a security risk, but if they can do this, then presumably they can also read our bank and investment accounts


No, you have to opt in to chrome website notifications (app notifications are different). I guess in theory Google can read your account as you are logged in if using Chrome, but I don't think they are (that would be a lot of data for them to 'phone home' with). I don't think they are capturing this data in the way you think. If what you think is happening really was, people would be aware and commenting on it.


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## Retired Peasant (Apr 22, 2013)

You should go to https://myactivity.google.com/
and log in to see it all.

It could be that you went to the hydro site _while still logged in_ to gmail. I've seen people close their gmail window/tab without logging out.


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

The smartphones are basically tracking/spy devices where the data mostly goes to Google and maybe the phone vendor as well. You shouldn't be surprised by any intrusions into your privacy when you've basically agreed to carry a tracking device that records everything you do.

One reason I hate smart phones is just how big a privacy violation they are, by design.

I try to keep my actual google/gmail account off my smartphone. When I set up a smartphone, I use a fake/dummy google account that has a blank history and which I don't use for anything else. This helps most of the data collection center around a fictitious profile, so that it's more or less useless.

Similarly, I don't sync contacts, and I disable all sync. I just import/export contacts between phones the regular way. Once I'm done with a phone (or if it breaks) I simply abandon or close down that google account.

Later, when I add perhaps a gmail account on the phone (my real account), this does end up leaking some of my private information out. But at least it's not the primary account on the phone. And I can log out of it as well. For example, just this moment I "removed" a Google account from my phone because I figure I won't need Gmail on the phone, until I travel again.

Even on a desktop computer, if you have logged into Gmail, then everything you do in that browser session -- including searches and visits to other sites -- can be tracked. For this reason, on a desktop computer, I always use a totally separate web browser to log into Gmail. Then in the other browser, _I never log into Google_, and that's where I do everything else.

This is something most people don't know about Google. Let's say in Chrome, you sign into Gmail. Now when you visit other web sites, including CMF, each of these web sites communicates with Google for the purpose of advertising or analytics. By correlating the two (which is trivial to do) Google now knows you visited CMF. In fact, all web browsing you do *while signed into Gmail or another Google service* even outside of Google's site can generally be tracked.

This is used to build a big profile about you, your lifestyle, personal tastes, sexual habits, your politics, etc.

Additionally, I recommend not signing into Chrome with a Google account, ever. Chrome has a long history of keeping persistent information about your Google account and it's not clear if it's possible to completely sign out. We actually researched this at my last company, and to many of our surprise/horror, found that (at least for some versions of Chrome) it was _impossible_ to actually sign out!

My advice, and what I do myself:

* use *Firefox or Safari* to sign into Gmail and only do google stuff in that browser [tainted]
* using a fresh, "untainted" Chrome browser, never sign into Google, and use it for everything else
* try to minimize using smartpones. At least disable all sync, disable location history tracking.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

Retired Peasant said:


> You should go to https://myactivity.google.com/
> and log in to see it all.
> 
> It could be that you went to the hydro site _while still logged in_ to gmail. I've seen people close their gmail window/tab without logging out.


Why log out of gmail on your own device? The intended use case is the stay logged in.


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

Retired Peasant said:


> You should go to https://myactivity.google.com/
> and log in to see it all.
> 
> It could be that you went to the hydro site _while still logged in_ to gmail. I've seen people close their gmail window/tab without logging out.


Myactivity just shows which sites we accessed. We of course know we accessed Hydro One. We do it all the time. (using desktop, not cell) It's Google gaining access to our private data from site, while we are doing that, that concerns me. The info in their Android Notification could only be obtained by accessing our account or copying it while we had site open. Here is a screenshot of the Notification from my phone;


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## Userkare (Nov 17, 2014)

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/28/...how-google-knows-when-your-bills-are-due.html

https://support.google.com/assistant/thread/521306?hl=en


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## Eder (Feb 16, 2011)

agent99 said:


> Thanks. I will have a look at TOR. Have already switched to DDG on my own computer. However, it was already on my wife's computer, and she is the one who accessed the Hydro site. So it seems that DDG won't prevent Google from seeing our accounts. As I understand it, DDG is just a search engine that works in conjunction with Google's Chrome.


TOR will solve the google thing....DDG is for browsing privacy...heres a quick read to see if its worth using to you...

https://gadgets.ndtv.com/internet/features/12-things-duckduckgo-can-do-that-google-cant-596526


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

andrewf said:


> OP: it sounds like this is a Chrome Notification. When you visit a website in Chrome, the website can ask for permission to send you notifications even when you are not on the site. This is like a new kind of popup, I find it rather annoying and always decline. But maybe you at one point gave permission to send notifications. Doesn't explain the racey content. Google nor Hydro One are too likely to be sending racey content.



thankx for helpful info. i'm one who keeps receiving those google popups that ask if i wish to receive notifications in the future. Routinely i block em all.

yes the google practice is "rather annoying." But far better to manually block than to risk whatever slippage produced racey content from an outfit that appears to have been able to intercept at least a fragment of a hydro utility account (agree that racey content is not something that either ontario hydro or google itself would send)


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

andrewf said:


> Why log out of gmail on your own device? The intended use case is the stay logged in.


Because I don't like their intended use case. I don't think it's in my best interest.

If they compensated me for my data -- by buying me a free device and giving me some cash payments -- then I would cooperate with their intended use case.


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## Retired Peasant (Apr 22, 2013)

andrewf said:


> Why log out of gmail on your own device? The intended use case is the stay logged in.


MyActivity will only show websites you've visited while logged in.


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## like_to_retire (Oct 9, 2016)

james4beach said:


> Because I don't like their intended use case. I don't think it's in my best interest.
> 
> If they compensated me for my data -- by buying me a free device and giving me some cash payments -- then I would cooperate with their intended use case.


James, I'm not trying to start a fight, but I find the convenience that Google offers me with my phone worth the supposed loss of privacy. 

Myself, I'm just not that interesting that any data they may gather would be a problem to me. I guess if I visited porn sites, or was involved in some nefarious situation, I would be cautious. But, I'm just a regular schmuck along with millions of other anonymous schmucks that enable ever checkbox I can so that my smartphone is really, really convenient for me. 

I suppose they gather all sorts of information on me, but I don't really care. To be candid, all the measures you suggest make we feel the same as I do about the guys that wear tin-foil hats. I know you're into it, but most of us aren't.

I do know they have a record of everywhere I've been every second of every day for years and years when I click on Google Timeline. But actually, I find that feature a convenience. Others may be horrified.

This is the world we live in. If you aren't doing anything wrong, it can be quite convenient.....

ltr


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## cainvest (May 1, 2013)

like_to_retire said:


> This is the world we live in. If you aren't doing anything wrong, it can be quite convenient.....


And you can actually make money from it!


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## Userkare (Nov 17, 2014)

like_to_retire said:


> James, I'm not trying to start a fight, but I find the convenience that Google offers me with my phone worth the supposed loss of privacy.
> 
> ...
> 
> ...


Then you may be happy to know that if you leave your Bluetooth enabled and discoverable, your movements through a store may be monitored. As you approach the menswear section, you can get notifications on your phone about unadvertised sales. If you spend too much time in the ladies undergarment section, that might be noted too with a special pop-up alert.

https://startups.microsoft.com/en-u...-an-interview-with-the-founder-of-sensorberg/


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## like_to_retire (Oct 9, 2016)

Userkare said:


> Then you may be happy to know that if you leave your Bluetooth enabled and discoverable, your movements through a store may be monitored. As you approach the menswear section, you can get notifications on your phone about unadvertised sales. If you spend too much time in the ladies undergarment section, that might be noted too with a special pop-up alert.
> 
> https://startups.microsoft.com/en-u...-an-interview-with-the-founder-of-sensorberg/


Yeah, I don't leave my Bluetooth enabled as it eats up my battery. Most people are the same. I don't spend any time in the ladies undergarment section, as is the case with normal guys, so it's not a worry. I think it's great that Google may sus out creeps that spend time in the ladies undergarment section, but for the regular schmucks like myself, I don't care.

ltr


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

like_to_retire said:


> If you aren't doing anything wrong, it can be quite convenient.....


This has been proved incorrect time and again.

The Chinese government is using smartphone tracking & monitoring to repress ethnic populations, even rounding people up into concentration camps.

Other authoritarian regimes around the world have used smartphones as a tool against their populations. These devices can become real threats to personal freedom. Not in a properly functioning country, but when something goes wrong with leadership -- and it does happen.

The other angle to this that you're not considering is the ability for criminals or bad guys to get their hands on the same data. This also happens; it leads to identity theft, financial theft, or other mischief. There are many cases of jealous men spying on their (ex) girlfriends or wives using smartphones, using these as monitoring devices to track them or pry into their private lives.

Ultimately this data cannot be kept safe from bad guys, and that's the biggest problem I have with all of this. For example, even the US government's database of secret data on all their military people and spies was hacked by foreign criminals (look up OPM breach). *If spies can't protect their own files, do you think your files at Google have any hope of remaining confidential?*

"If you're not doing anything wrong, it's fine" is a flawed argument, that I only hear from people who are either (a) unaware of how unsafe the data storage is, ir (b) have a lot of trust that government or police cannot ever turn corrupt or bad.

Unfortunately, there sometimes are bad actors. Even in Canada. And if you're in a country that goes the way of China or Nazi Germany, then these things like smartphones become nothing short of a threat to your life.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

agent99 said:


> Notifications can be turned off. I have now done that. But my concern is not getting notifications - It is that Google can see inside our password protected Hydro account when we access it using Chrome on laptop. It read the amounts to be paid for the past few months and listed them in the notification.


Sounds like it was a notification from Hydro One. I have them on for Questrade and chrome displays desktop notifications about my orders and holdings. These are just push notifications same as the push notifications on phones

That is, rather than Google "logging in" and pulling private information from Questrade, Questrade is pushing information that I have permitted out to chrome.

I tried to get away from all the free Google services but for example I find the GMail interface better than Apple's email. Now if Apple would only encrypt their email server (storage) like they encrypt email transit and everything else already


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

m3s, a bit off topic, but have you ever been informed that your data was stolen during the OPM breach? I was working in those circles at the time and know it impacted some Canadians as well as Americans. If so you might want to look into credit monitoring services or maybe freeze your credit.

I'm about to freeze my US credit profile.

The relevance to the thread is that tracking & collection of personal data can result in theft and big problems down the road, even if it just looks like all fun & games because Google is doing it. The criminals don't care that "you weren't doing anything wrong"... they will still get your data, and abuse it.

How many disgruntled Google, Amazon, and Microsoft employees are walking away with confidential data? It's already happened, by the way.

My advice to everyone is: to the extent you can, try to prevent handing over tons of personal data to Google & friends.


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## like_to_retire (Oct 9, 2016)

james4beach said:


> This has been proved incorrect time and again.
> 
> The Chinese government is using smartphone tracking & monitoring to repress ethnic populations, even rounding people up into concentration camps.


OK, sucks for them, but I don't live in China.



james4beach said:


> Other authoritarian regimes around the world have used smartphones as a tool against their populations. These devices can become real threats to personal freedom. Not in a properly functioning country, but when something goes wrong with leadership -- and it does happen.


I consider Canada a properly functioning country, unless you think Trudeau might turn our system communist?



james4beach said:


> There are many cases of jealous men spying on their (ex) girlfriends or wives using smartphones, using these as monitoring devices to track them or pry into their private lives.


Not a problem for me.



james4beach said:


> For example, even the US government's database of secret data on all their military people and spies was hacked by foreign criminals (look up OPM breach). *If spies can't protect their own files, do you think your files at Google have any hope of remaining confidential?*


Yes, and when they look at my files they'll say, this guy is dull, we're not interested, but let's look at this guy with the nom-de-plume "james4beach". He seems suspicious.

ltr


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

I just try to monitor my US and Cdn credit monthly from as many free services as possible. I froze my Cdn credit about 10 years ago and it was a bit of a hassle so I haven't frozen it again

SSN and SIN numbers are notoriously insecure. I think we are overdo for an eID card. It could become the physical key to access online banking and government services and might as well throw the driver licence and health on there at the same time. US govt has the CAC that basically combines as much as possible to a smart card

I managed to open a US Chase card now and they were quite thorough - required utility bills, passport, work visa etc. I use these ID Guard roller things on all my mail


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

By the way, I'm thankful every day that we don't live in China or the USSR or something.

Trudeau is a moderate. But don't you think there is a *possibility* that more hard line left wingers or communists could get into power? It's very difficult to predict what kind of social forces can come into play. Perhaps some far left PC people start passing crazy laws, like criminal consequences for racism, bigotry, and anti-feminist behaviour. Or a witch hunt for asset owners and investors. Would you not be concerned in the least, that they could leverage all that data you've been accumulating to track you down?

I would be concerned about that. Just because our government is normal and sane today, doesn't mean it always will.

And regarding you being dull... I doubt that criminals will think that an active member of an investor forum (who probably has some money) is that dull. Most of us on here are likely targets for theft and fraud. I wouldn't assume that criminals have no interest in someone like you.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

Apparently corporations already track all our data through all those rewards cards to assign us a consumer score

Kind of reminded me of China's social score. You do something seemingly innocuous and become a lower tier citizen


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## fireseeker (Jul 24, 2017)

agent99 said:


> Myactivity just shows which sites we accessed. We of course know we accessed Hydro One. We do it all the time. (using desktop, not cell) It's Google gaining access to our private data from site, while we are doing that, that concerns me. The info in their Android Notification could only be obtained by accessing our account or copying it while we had site open. Here is a screenshot of the Notification from my phone;
> 
> View attachment 19780


Agent, do you get emailed notices from Hydro One when each new bill is ready?
I do, and the email notice includes the amount owing. (Additional information requires logging into the HyOne account.)

If that's the case, it could be that Google is simply scanning your email, recognizing the bills and alerting you about the amounts owing.
IOW, Google is looking at your email (which you already knew) and not looking over your shoulder when you're logged into the HOne website.


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

m3s said:


> Apparently corporations already track all our data through all those rewards cards to assign us a consumer score
> 
> Kind of reminded me of China's social score. You do something seemingly innocuous and become a lower tier citizen


Yes and I think we'll get more of this in Canada/US. They will start using smartphone and social media activity too.

It already happens for "reputation" in the job market -- a clear example of how social media participation can hurt you. With the high sensitivity about sexual harassment and racism, HR departments will sometimes now look at social media history to assess what kind of person they are dealing with. If the person comes off as racist or sexist, they may not be hired as a result.

Remember that a lot of people are openly posting their racist/sexist behaviour on Facebook.

This will become more automated. We're going to see people (some examples here at CMF) who post disagreeable content having more difficulty landing employment, because they are going to get flagged by these automated systems. It's a combination of social media and their smartphones working against them, hurting them.

Doesn't it concern people that what their smartphone tracks about them can hurt their job? _You_ might not think you're doing anything wrong, but that's not what matters. What matters is what others (given the mood of the day) think is right and wrong.

We're already at a point where this kind of thing is feasible. I guarantee you that some genius is already working on this technology and will start selling it to HR firms for reputation analysis.

Here's a good example I think. Some young man working in the oil patch, who makes a routine of joking about socially inappropriate things. The occasional racist joke. Off-the-cuff threats about Trudeau and other politicians. To him, this is normal because many people in the oil patch do it.

However... he's being tracked. First, he's logging all that with Google & friends. The data is all sitting there, waiting to bite him. Then some day in the future, a new silicon valley upstart shows off their brand new Employee Reputation technology which uses mined data to assess employability and workplace compatibility.

Get ready for it. It's coming.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

agent99 said:


> Myactivity just shows which sites we accessed. We of course know we accessed Hydro One. We do it all the time. (using desktop, not cell) It's Google gaining access to our private data from site, while we are doing that, that concerns me. The info in their Android Notification could only be obtained by accessing our account or copying it while we had site open. Here is a screenshot of the Notification from my phone;
> 
> View attachment 19780


Do you by any chance get an email copy of the statement with the amounts owing? If you click the downward pointing arrow/chevron beside the notification, it says which email it got the info from. I tried this myself.

This is the same as when google assistant shows you package tracking information or your flight status/hotel reservations. I am quite comfortable with this myself, but if you don't like it you can turn the assistant off. If you don't want google to view your emails, you need a different email provider. That is part of the EULA for GMail. I don't worry about other humans seeing this, it is algorithmic.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

james4beach said:


> Because I don't like their intended use case. I don't think it's in my best interest.
> 
> If they compensated me for my data -- by buying me a free device and giving me some cash payments -- then I would cooperate with their intended use case.


That's your prerogative. You can flash a non-google Android fork onto your device if you want. I am comfortable with the trade-off I am getting with Google in terms of convenience in exchange for data. I have much more mistrust for governments. Google just wants to make money, governments want to use this info to control/persecute.


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

Userkare said:


> https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/28/...how-google-knows-when-your-bills-are-due.html
> 
> https://support.google.com/assistant/thread/521306?hl=en


NYT article still talking about emails as being cause. That I could understand, but in our case, we get no communications from Hydro. Just access their site, note amount and pay it via on-line banking. They would have to have got the details while we were accessing a password protected site.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

If you search chrome settings for notifications you should see a list of blocked/allowed sites. Is Hydro allowed?


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

m3s said:


> Sounds like it was a notification from Hydro One. I have them on for Questrade and chrome displays desktop notifications about my orders and holdings. These are just push notifications same as the push notifications on phones


The only notifications Hydro say they use, is to alert customer if usage is abnormally high. For this, they send an email. We are not signed up for even that. We are on paper billing, so they don't communicate account info other than by snail mail. They do have my wife's email address, but are not even aware that she now has a smartphone. 

They do apparently have a smartphone app. But we have never used it or even seen it. It apparently provides alerts for outages and high usage. 

Anyway, we have communicated with Hydro One and asked for an explanation. We first did this by phone, and the agents were as puzzled as we were. Said they would move it up a level. I also sent them the screenshots. Maybe they can explain how Google is able to do this.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

I mean the chrome setting - Top right of chrome - settings - notifications

When you visit a site for the first time on chrome you get a pop up to allow/block notifications from the site. They are like app notifications but on desktop


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

m3s said:


> If you search chrome settings for notifications you should see a list of blocked/allowed sites. Is Hydro allowed?


In Chrome, it is set to Ask before Sending" for all notifications. Hydro don't send notifications or any electronic communication anyway and is not in the list of blocked or allowed sites. Only ones allowed (hopefully after Asking!) are Google sites.

In Google, you can type in "Show Me My bills" in the address bar. It will bring up a list of your current bills. (In our case, just the Hydro bill) Everything I have read, says the source for these is email or electronic billing. Neither of which apply to us.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

agent99 said:


> In Chrome, it is set to Ask before Sending" for all notifications. Hydro don't send notifications or any electronic communication anyway and is not in the list of blocked or allowed sites. Only ones allowed (hopefully after Asking!) are Google sites.
> 
> In Google, you can type in "Show Me My bills" in the address bar. It will bring up a list of your current bills. (In our case, just the Hydro bill) Everything I have read, says the source for these is email or electronic billing. Neither of which apply to us.


When you enter "show me my bills", besides each bill is a chevron to expand the bill which will show the place google identified the bill. When I did this it says "Show me email for this bill".


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

andrewf said:


> When you enter "show me my bills", besides each bill is a chevron to expand the bill which will show the place google identified the bill. When I did this it says "Show me email for this bill".


Thanks Andrew for pointing that out! I checked the date, then had my wife search her incoming emails and trash at the time. She had actually received emails for the past two months!! Must be something new Hydro are doing. She ignored the emails as the amounts had already been paid and she had forgotten that they had actually been received. 

Sorry for questioning those of you who said it was likely an email thing. That IS what it was. I have turned off notifications on her phone, so we hopefully won't get double notification! Not sure why anyone would need that!


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## Longtimeago (Aug 8, 2018)

I've said it before and will say it again. I use a phone for phone calls and that's all I use it for. I do not enable it for internet access at all.

The reality is that privacy in the digital world simply does not exist. Whether it is Google or some other entity, access to any information about you is available to those who really want it for whatever reason. The ONLY way to avoid that is to simply not put information online. If for example, you do not want access to your Hydro bill available, just don't deal with it online. Have Hydro send you a paper bill and send them a cheque in return each month. If that is just too inconvenient for you (as it is for me) then just accept that you are going to put your Hydro info out there for those who want to see it. You don't get to have your cake and eat it too. That is what every complaint about data access is all about and the more devices you use, the more doors you leave open.

Does it make any sense to you that we have to put a piece of sticky Post It over the webcam on your laptops, etc. if we want to insure someone cannot watch us through the camera? Yet that is what we must do and we ACCEPT having to do so because there is no real alternative if we want to use our device online. Try to imagine accepting someone knocking at your door and saying, 'hi, I would like to install a camera in your house so that I can watch you doing whatever you are doing at any time'. Yet that is in effect what we do if we want to have online access using any device with a camera. 

https://www.digitalspy.com/tech/a795242/can-people-spy-on-me-through-my-laptop-or-smartphone-camera/

We give up privacy when we choose to have online access. Complaining about it after the fact is kinda foolish, we made our choice.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

Even a dumb offline phone is a microphone and tracking device (triangulation) unless the battery is removed

I never encountered this in Canada but in the States some of my bills are encrypted PDF and required a password to read

I've moved all my document records to an encrypted cloud storage at $.99/month


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## Userkare (Nov 17, 2014)

Just got an email from Hydro One...

_Recently, you may have received an email from Canada Post as they 
__investigate an external data breach. This affects Hydro One 
customers who receive their bills via Canada Post’s epost system. At
__this time they do not believe customer account information was
__compromised, but have proactively reset all passwords for online 
__epost accounts.
_
The message goes on to tell of different ways to receive Hydro bills, and a contest for 1 year of free electricity if I switch from ePost.

I don't recall any notice from ePost, but since the only bill I get from them is Hydro, I might as well switch to email directly from Hydro One.


But after reading this thread, maybe I should use the email provided by my ISP? They don't data-mine my emails.

Edit... clicking on the link in the email brings me to "surveygizmo.com" website. Nope, not gonna fill it in; will go directly to Hydro One sign-in.


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## Userkare (Nov 17, 2014)

Longtimeago said:


> If for example, you do not want access to your Hydro bill available, just don't deal with it online. Have Hydro send you a paper bill and send them a cheque in return each month. If that is just too inconvenient for you (as it is for me) then just accept that you are going to put your Hydro info out there for those who want to see it. You don't get to have your cake and eat it too. That is what every complaint about data access is all about and the more devices you use, the more doors you leave open.


This leaves me with the choice of some mindless computer, not a human, scanning my emails to try to generate instant notifications of bill payments.
-or- 
a mindless human, not a computer, that seems to have difficulty understanding numbers, and frequently puts my mail in the wrong box - causing me to not get a bill at all.


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## Longtimeago (Aug 8, 2018)

Userkare said:


> This leaves me with the choice of some mindless computer, not a human, scanning my emails to try to generate instant notifications of bill payments.
> -or-
> a mindless human, not a computer, that seems to have difficulty understanding numbers, and frequently puts my mail in the wrong box - causing me to not get a bill at all.


Yeah, so? Do you expect a perfect world? You have a choice, you make it and then you accept the consequences of your choice. Complaining about the mindless computer or mindless human after you chose one over the other is a waste of time. 

Anyone who uses any kind of digital device should know by now that they are subject to all kinds of potential problems like hacking or data mining. That's the price we pay for using the devices. Surely we should be used to it by now and past wasting time complaining about it. You might as well complain about the cost of gasoline, it is what it is. That's all I am saying.


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