So apperantly an article was posted about how the AXS app takes your private information and shares it with third parties. Here’s a quote from an article regarding this matter:
Here’s a brief overview of all of the information that can be collected from just the mobile app alone, nearly all of which is shared with third parties without being anonymized or aggregated: first and last name, precise location (as determined by GPS, WiFi, and other means), how often the app is used, what content is viewed using the app, which ads are clicked, what purchases are made (and not made), a user’s personal advertising identifier, IP address, operating system, device make and model, billing address, credit card number, security code, mailing address, phone number, and email address, among many others.
Be careful bois
EDIT: Here’s an old reddit post talking about the situation
but lets be honest - average joe doesnt care about privacy because he/she has nothing to hide due to how boring lives of average people are .
i mean do you think for a moment agencies really care which kind of legal po.rn do you watch ? -_-
only ones scared are those who have something to hide /shrug
ye ye ye i know all those evil corporations who feed on metadata and spam you with ads of products you last watched - guess what most normal people dont mind because they are to lazy to do extensive search when they buy new stuff.
There is a huge and profitable market behind the security/quality of life given reasons. Large amounts of personal data are valuable for corporations and in some cases for governments. If as the op referred, info will be shared with third parties, is almost certain that data is being paid by some entity(ies), in other words they are using personal data for profit.
And for those more conspiracy like minded, with the advent of AI, more important will be the quantity of personal data stored to prevent/foretell social and personal outcomes and this type of certainty could be a game changer in the wrong hands, we are not talking about teras of personal behavior/information, we are talking about inimaginable amounts of data stored along decades, being processed by AI for wathever reason.
What are they going to steal? Pics of me after shower? My very precious 657.51$ a month? oh, the whatsup group chat with friends that I’m certain if anybody reads is probably going to end up brain dead.
Now, for a more serious response, I’m pretty sure most of these " tracking " are agreements you do to provide better service for you and gather data, a lot of phone apps already do this when they ask for location, camera access, etc etc.
Functionally abolished in the early aughts as a function of economic power and the price of doing business. It’s not legally considered spying if it’s for advertising.
For me, it is just like letting refrigerator-service man to know anything what I do and have in my home and sell that information, but if you agree with it, it’s up to you. It’s not about “only bad people fell bad about it”. If someone needs information to service my refrigerator, this information should be limited to necessary stuff. I’m WoW player, have 10000 achiv points, so my life really is boring, but I don’t see what good purpose has selling information about my life. The more so, you paid for it
Many phone apps request access to information on your phone they don’t need access to.
Providing a better service, doesn’t require access to my emails, messages,pictures,credit card information and so on.
Lets take a look at one many are probably using, Facebook messenger. Requests access to emails…why? and other things it simply doesn’t need access too.
It’s been widely reported that it’s a problem and it’s being looked into because they keep requesting information they simply don’t need nor should they have access too.
Some seem to forget this is your personal information and you have no idea how it’s being used who is using it how they got it and how much money people are making from it. It’s your information not theirs not anyone else’s it’s yours.
i know for a fact there is a company out there (one of the credit reference companies) that sell 1 persons information for thousands of pounds. If that is my information for example, why do I not get some kick back…it’s mine not there’s.
Data gathering is a massive issue affecting billions at this point, for me it’s not just the data they gather but also how they store that information, and in just the last 2 years we have seen how utterly woeful the security and procedures are in keeping it secure.
There is good reason to be wary, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the reason given was security. After all, tragedies inflicted by very bad people have occurred very recently, more often than usual at large gatherings. If they used this app to identify bad people and keep BlizzCon attendees safe, it would justify its use. Of course, I am sure there are other, more trustworthy apps to do so.
How exactly would a phone app prevent some major tragedy of some deranged lunatic? It’s not like they’ll be able to instantly identify the guy via that anyway…
How is it a security measure cus I don’t get it.
First, Security doesn’t need information about what advertisement you click or not. Second, this data is send to “third party” not a “security company”.
On the US thread, Bluspacecow made two good informational posts that might explain the apparently excessive permissions required by the AXS app. I do not know if these are right, but I find them plausible and worth considering. Personally, I still wouldn’t trust anyone who marketed this app without more information, but this allows for the possibility that requirements are not malicious.
I believe the AXS app is being used because of the type of AXS ticket Blizzard is using for this event.
AXS offers two types of tickets - e-ticket and Flash Mobile. E-ticket tickets come with a PDF attached to the ticket email that you can use to get in to the event it is a ticket for. Flash mobile tickets requires the app to use.
I believe it is the Flash Mobile style of ticket that Blizzard are using here. A mate of mine has advised me that the ticket uses a dynamic QR code that changes every few seconds so has to be scanned from the phone when entering an event.
If it’s a randomly changing QR code that would explains the need for network access - they would need access to maintain a connection with the AXS servers in order to validate the QR code on your ticket at the exact time of it being scanned.
It also explains the need for the camera permissions - from the scant google research I’ve done it seems QR readers on Android require it (don’t quote me on that as I’m not an Android dev … also actual android programmers feel free to correct me!)
As for the spyware claims , while the app does ask for a scary amount of permissions I have yet to see any concrete proof that it is spyware.
Which to me would be looking at the files it saves and changes on the phone to see if personal data is being saved on the phone and then from there proving that personal data is being transmitted.
What we really need is someone to take one for the team. Get a burner phone. Fill it with fake personal information. Install the usual apps and load fake social media profiles on them. Fill the phone with public domain clip art images.
Then install say Lineage OS then it’s Privacy Guard. Install Wireshark for Android. And install the AXS ticketing app.
Then go to the AXS site and pay for tickets to a local sports game in your area. This should set you back $8 or so. Then use the AXS app to go to that event.
Throughout the process use Privacy Guard so you can see the number of times each permission was requested. Use Wireshark to confirm what data is going out and to which IP addresses.
What would be interesting to me is to see what happens if you deny access to a particular permission - does the app not allow you to scan your ticket to get into the event ?
Even without looking to possibilities that your data can be used now and in future, just in current everyday life NOW your comment makes no sense.
If you have nothing to hide, you are not trustworthy person. From milder end your friends cannot tell their secrets to you and from more serious end you are not trustworthy as emploee and cannot work in any position where any confediantial information is handled (trade secrets, customer data, medical data, other data protected by privacy laws, goverment secrets etc…). This covers nowadays almost all professions minus some trench digging.
I am sure there is some people who are going on “oh i don’t care if they see my whatsapp data and my funny pics” and that makes me wonder are they honestly just not understanding or are they really not responsible of anything important in life.
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