Google has been stealth downloading audio listeners onto every computer that runs Chrome

I bought my mum an android tablet last year and noticed this 'ok google'thing on it aswell with the built in mic.
All of the apps that get installed seem to want your location,to monitor your camera,mic etc.
I wonder just how much personal data we are giving away to these big corps and who they sell that data on to?
If we end up in some sort of Orwelian New World Order in the future I wonder how much we are going to regret giving all of this data away thinking its's harmless and the "I am not doing anything criminal so I have nothing to fear" attitude will maybe be proved wrong.

a reply to: defcon25

If we end up in some sort of Orwelian New World Order in the future

We are already living in such world here and now.

a reply to: kitzik

I think we are here already aswell but everyone says I'm just paranoid.

Have you folks ever been having a private physical convo with a person, mention a subject, and have that be the only inexplicable hit on google?

a reply to: defcon25

On topic.

I'm particularly enraged that Google sneaked their evil code into Debian Linux. It is a war and we are losing it.

www.theregister.co.uk...

Also from the mailing list of Debian devs

bugs.debian.org...

But basically secretly downloading it leads to the question of possible
malicious intent (and everyone knows that Google&Co. do voluntarily
and/or forcibly cooperate with NSA and friends).
And I guess no one can prove that this blob didn't contain any rootkit,
and even if - the rootkit'ed version may have been just distributed to
certain people.
The downloading makes it more or less impossible for the admin/user and
especially for our maintainers to notice what's happening here
(otherwise they'd need audit every line of code for any such
occasions).


And even if the blob wasn't evil: while I haven't looked at the code, I
wouldn't even be surprised if the downloading itself is done
insecurely.


Worse, chromium isn't the only such rootkit-downloader,... this happens
- to my taste - far to often in recent times,.. e.g. FF which secretly
downloaded the OpenH264 blob.

Those actions are definitely malicious attacks on the last islands of more or less "free" software.

A few years ago I read a book by Dean Koontz titled "Night Chills". It was about a corp. that poisoned a small town in Maine. They sent a man in to watch progress on the chemical. Anyway, he spied on the town with an apparatus called the "Lido Device". With it the user could dial a number,(this was in an era of rotary phones, remember them?) without the called number ringing, it would connect the mouthpiece to open the circuit so he can listen without the handset being picked up. In the back of the book he states this was not fiction and that it was a real device and could be purchased in Belgium. This was quite a few years ago...you know it's way more techy now. Good Luck to us all!

Who had guessed that... hmm?

By day 1 when Chrome did exist, I had always had an additional "GoogleService" or "GoogleUpdater" task running in my TaskManager (which was not the browser itself). This additional task couldn't be deactivated either. It remained active even when closing the web browser. This suspicious thing was the reason I never ever used Chrome. And thanks now for reminding me, that I will never ever use it in future.

So is that why Chrome is such a resource hog? I thought they always played it off as part of the rendering for websites.

Loving Linux more and more.

And this is why I like Cortana... it works with text input and without voice input.

originally posted by: SLAYER69
Loving Linux more and more.

Linux isn't immune from Google's shenanigans. Did you see the links posted above by kitzik saying they snuck it into Debian Linux too?

Linux may still be better though, because they actually noticed it, and care, and managed to get it taken out.

originally posted by: Liquesence once that technology is there—and activated— it could be used by a third party, say the government/NSA

no 'could' about it - it will be. the state snooping machinery needs little encouragement to snoop some more.

Its gonna be alot of moans from my comp

Nothing a piece of tape over the camera and mike can't fix.

two thoughts here. one is that a digitized audio stream from your cell phone or pc to google, nsa, etc will show up overloading bandwidth as more devices are added...and will show up in your cell or isp bill.
second, i just found that some cell phones has the built in service of converting voice messages to text, then sending them to you as text..and the one i saw was precise.
SO . if google etc captures your microphone and converts the audio to text, then sends it to google etc. not much bandwidth is involved. antidote: recite nonesense verse, like the jabberwock. on occasion.

One of the things that bugs me about downloading any type of software is that they give you a contract and terms to read that is full of legal BS that the average joe won't understand anyway.
I personally gave up on computer privacy years ago....I think you really need to have a coding background to know how to keep your PC secure online.

All of the worlds Security Agencies are always coming up with new code to spy on us,they are just as malicious as cyber criminals that are out to steal bank details imo.
Kaspersky Finds New Nation-State Attack—In Its Own Network

good one defcon.....as soon as we had computers....it was game on.....come on people....Samsung said they listen on all tv sets....but not to worry....only third party people use the info....

originally posted by: semperfortis
a reply to: Thorneblood

Not on my Android... I use the "Okay Google" so much I leave it on..

On all my PCs? ... Yes

I disabled mine as soon as I discovered it. Not for privacy necessarily, but because I couldn't use my phone for anything. Apparently everything from wind noise to the radio sounds like "OK Google." #e tech.

I couldn't help myself when I saw people commenting about reading terms and EULAs

a reply to: Thorneblood

It does seem to be an option to the user whether he or she wishes to accept the connection like allowing a webcam to activate. However knowing that this could easily be switched giving the ability to listen is very real, not paranoid or conspiracy. Regarding voice recording, it actually turns voice into text and has the ability to scan the text very fast and find key words that their computers will pick up and stamp you a terrorist if their key words deem it.

When such stories like the one below come forward you could say your privacy comes first but clearly, it has never been the case.

According to Kaspersky, American cyber-surveillance agency, the NSA, is taking advantage of the centralization of hard-drive manufacturing to the US, by making WD and Seagate embed its spying back-doors straight into the hard-drive firmware, which lets the agency directly access raw data

NSA Backdoor

An added note would be that privacy is the last important tool for the simple fact that its obvious government do not want any kind of uprising, change or challenging of data they feed us. Considering most intellectuals gather in forums and online conferences those are the places such agencies could shut down. This is the real aim, to control all data so that if the day came where such groups needing shutting down then this would be the best way to do so. Our countries are becoming Prisons.