Just deleted AccuWeather. I am 100% convinced by the blog post -- but the DarkSky App is unfortunately not available outside USA.
I really wish that the user could selectively switch on or off what permissions an app receives -- Instead of a blanket list of permissions at the install. For instance -- "lie to the App and give location obly within 100m".
The problem was actually wifi information (which can be used to infer location) not location. What OS are you using that you can't choose permissions individually for an app? I forget which version of Android got that but it's at least a couple years old at this point. The other benefit being that it installs updates without having to ask for you permission, then when the app needs a permission, it asks you if you want to grant that permission. And you can go to Settings->Apps->[The App]->Permissions to enable/disable them individually later.
I'm not sure where you are, but the Dark Sky Weather app is available in the UK. I believe many other app use the Dark Sky api too, like Carrot Weather, which is quirky but quite good.
Unless you are outside the US or UK or don't want to create a new iTunes account tied to those places (if you happen to have a valid card or an iTunes gift card for these countries)
As someone in Canada who wasn't able to download DarkSky for iOS, I've found Weather Line provides many of the same features (including up-to-the-minute precipitation forecasts). It uses the DarkSky's API for its data.
Yesterday, I uninstalled AccuWeather. This morning, I happily connected a game to Facebook to play with friends. Then I read this article. I'm such a hypocrite.
Being a hypocrite dosent make you wrong, or your actions meaningless. After all everyone is responsible in at least a tiny way for most of societies systematic ills, but that dosent mean that speaking out, and acting out against them is stupid, pointless or self defeating.
"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds"[1]
Emphasis on the foolish: There's nothing inconsistent about selectively choosing which are "worth it". To go all one way or the other would be a foolish consistency.
Uninstalling the horeshit is easy, trusting the replacement app is the next problem.
Anyway, there is an easy fix. Both Android and IOS allows you to disable GPS permissions for specific apps. Just disable it and add your home town as favorite. 1. Weather reports aren't that local. 2. You rarely travel frequent enough that this becomes an inconvenience, and if you are traveling that frequent, you are more likely interested in the weather at your next destination rather than current location.
I recently started dating a chinese gal and she insists we communicate through wechat.
At this point, I must have at least 10 chat services on my phone, what's one more ?
Unfortunately, it asks for many permissions at the first startup and checks them everytime.
Also, it displays an annoying popup over the mic icon in order to make me give it that permission too ..
I have just stopped using that app. Unfortunately this kind of issue never gets a lot of attention and I feel like I sound like a tinfoil conspirationist when I explain that I don't want to give my location and contact list to random companies.
I have not checked on iOS but I guess the app has the same behavior there since the 2 platforms privacy models are now pretty similar :
At each startup (and also maybe at each screen display, I have not checked that far) the app checks its permissions.
It first displays a full screen splash (already a big nono for a messaging app, these must load quickly) during that time. If it misses either contacts or localization it will ask for these.
Since it checks each time, even if you accept at first and revoke afterward, it will still ask again the next time you use the app (and revoking permissions understandably restarts the app).
Of course you can refuse them permanently but then the app will be stuck on that screen with a popup asking you to activate these permissions.
So far, it is the only messaging app I have seen with such an aggressive approach to critical permissions.
It can also be argued that the app does not need any of these to offer its core feature.
The scandal comes from the fact that the location info is transmitted when GPS permissions are already disabled, and at a level much more precise than the weather location you chose.
Or, you might as well start paying for the apps you use (like more than $1) :)
The vast majority of FREE 3rd party apps have tracking SDK, that is an important distinction.
I mean really, what did you expect, the developers of those apps giving them for free in exchange for nothing?
(the fact that they hide this is another discussion)
Serious question... Is there any data on usage of tracking for paid vs free apps?
There are plenty of cookie onboarding vendors who will pay a monthly recurring CPM rate for mobile logins that they can match against and they do not require you to show ads.
So if the majority of users are not privacy aware and would just accept whatever permissions are requested, what is the disincentive for a paid app to include these trackers and add a recurring revenue stream?
I know, but do you happen to have any data to reference that actually breaks down the % who do vs. those who don't? Obviously that would be messy data, but I'm genuinely curious as to what the adoption rate is for those sorts of things.
I actually don't know much about mobile app traffic analysis, so I'm not sure how easy that is to sniff.
Then you might as well stop using your smartphone and all 3rd party apps on it.
...Is probably the right answer.
Unfortunately, if you want a phone that actually works these days, you're basically stuck with iOS or Android devices, and all the junk that implies.
If I could buy a modern dumbphone that just works as a phone, with decent components so it has good reception and reliability, and ignore the whole smartphone fiasco altogether, I'd do it in a heartbeat.
I do cyagenomod(lineageos) with all the Google stripped out. A terminal, ssh, Firefox mobile, and a YouTube apk with ads stripped. This is why privacy respecting Foss and the four freedoms are important. Eventually people will wake up as the surveillance state becomes more abrasively obvious to even the lay-user.
I'd love to, but as someone who has spent a lot of time looking recently, it's certainly not easy to find anything suitable here in the UK. You can get dumbphones, but getting a good dumbphone, with reliable reception and decent battery life, is a different question altogether.
If you want anything at all beyond basic features, like say a dual SIM option for use when travelling, you're straight into high-end smartphone territory, even if you actually have no interest in the so-called smart parts of the device.
Dual (or even triple, and I've seen 4 and 5 too) SIMs is pretty much standard on phones, dumb or smart, intended for the Asia market, mostly produced by various small companies based on the standard Mediatek platform, but you can buy those online.
Would love a source for the "vast majority" part. I doubt hardly any of the apps I use on a regular basis do this, assuming I even give them those permissions.
It is a cynical opinion often repeated, but is not true. Many apps use analytics but limit it to data such as crash information and device hardware / OS version.
There are absolutely other apps which perform tracking similar to AccuWeather, but not many (on iOS anyway).
Although, I like their service - just uninstalled. Peace.
Didn't even realize this was happening until this article. But seriously, we should consider enacting laws against this. For advertising purposes they shouldn't need anything more than a city location. Even then, there should be an option to turn it off.
theweathernetwork.ca has always had better results for me. On mobile you can save a bookmark to it on your home screen so it works just like an app. Open in Ghostery to block the ads and you're on your way.
No one ever needed the location feature of weather apps in the first place, we can't even travel fast enough for it to be worth the extra battery consumption. Put a link on your home screen to search "Weather <zip>" in a search engine you're not logged into and make sure your browser isn't sharing it's location. Go someplace new, type in the new zip or, if you don't know the zip, city. Staying for a while? Make a new link on your home screen.
What I'm curious about is the best way to test this in other apps - the stock weather app on my phone pulls data from AccuWeather, but do they also have the problem features?
Pretty sure I can monitor what IPs my phone is connecting to with some of the routers I have access to, monitoring the actual packet data itself is a bit more troublesome - and may not be useful if it's encrypted.
This might be a good time to share what is (in my opinion) the absolute best weather app for iOS: Hello Weather. It's minimal, functional, and beautifully designed.
Alternatively, the OS could allow you to set your city (or region/state/county perhaps) and just return this as the GPS location for certain apps. i.e. choosing London could return a fixed 51.5073509, -0.1277583 for all users who chose London.
Happy customer of Dark Sky here.