I think you’ve missed the point. It’s not the data they are collecting but the fact they say they don’t collect data.
Comment on noplace, a mashup of Twitter and Myspace for Gen Z, hits No. 1 on the App Store
AstridWipenaugh@lemmy.world 2 months ago- Your Device’s Internet Protocol address (e.g. IP address), - absolutely necessary for anti-ddos techniques
- browser type, browser version, - necessary for UX to build a functional website for the browsers that customers actually use
- the pages of our Service that You visit, the time and date of Your visit, the time spent on those pages, - critical for determining what is popular and what isn’t to improve how the interface is designed and what parts are pulled forward and what parts are hidden in menus
- unique device identifiers and other diagnostic data. - useful for determining how often you switch devices and the performance and other experience metrics to drive making the app more user friendly
I work on web software professionally and this is a pretty minimal list that is completely justifiable for maintaining operations. If you can’t answer basic questions like “what are users doing with the app?”, you can’t make intelligent decisions about how to improve it.
There’s a lot of the same stuff here: legal.lemmy.world/privacy-policy/
I don’t know anything about this app or company so I’m not going to defend them, but there aren’t any real red flags here. If this amount of data collection bothers you, you really should stop using the internet in general.
FelipeFelop@discuss.online 2 months ago
AstridWipenaugh@lemmy.world 2 months ago
It’s pedantic, but you are not your computer. They don’t collect (according to them) PII other than phone numbers.
FelipeFelop@discuss.online 2 months ago
Not sure I agree entirely. The actions I take are definitely data about me.
Also, in many jurisdictions data that could be combined (even in the future) with other data to identify you or something about you, is considered personal data.
For example, Device ID is AstridWipenaugh’s device and they use the app in the morning.
Ghoelian@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 months ago
(I don’t like this kind of data collection either fwiw, not trying to defend them or anything)
On Android at least, device id’s are unique per app, and reset when you reset your phone to factory. In theory they can’t use this data to cross-track you personally, since every service that uses a device id has a different one for the same user.
They can probably still build up a pretty accurate profile of you based on other data they collect though.
Knossos@lemmy.world 2 months ago
And just to piggyback on this comment, I’m an Android developer and we this information is critical for determining similarities for bug solving.
You would not believe how often there is a bug caused by a specific model of phone. That connection you can only know if you log that for every crash you get.
ayaya@lemdro.id 2 months ago
Yeah as someone who has worked in web development for over 20 years everything in here is completely standard. Almost every major website in existence collects this kind of analytical data.
Cryophilia@lemmy.world 2 months ago
…and that’s a bad thing.
ayaya@lemdro.id 2 months ago
Like the comment I replied to already explained, this information is necessary to make informed development decisions. If you don’t know who is using what feature you might be wasting resources on something barely anyone uses while neglecting something everyone needs.
You also need some of that data for security purposes. You can’t implement rate limiting or prevent abuse if you can’t log and track how your servers are being interacted with.
Cryophilia@lemmy.world 2 months ago
It should all be opt in. Aggregate data can be used to personally identify, and even when it’s not, it has its own negative effects.
Cryophilia@lemmy.world 2 months ago
If this amount of data collection bothers you, you really should stop using the internet in general.
I’d prefer we not surrender to mass surveillance. If we support alternatives, they remain viable.
Chozo@fedia.io 2 months ago
Sorry, I kinda got lost in the sauce on my original comment, lol. My issue isn't so much with the data collection, itself. My problem is that their FAQs say things that appear to be outright lies. Not even just embellishing the truth or something, but complete falsehoods.
I don't care so much that they collect a bit of data. But if they're wiling to lie to a potential user about their data collection, I can't help but wonder what else they might be willing to be dishonest about. I already have doubts about their crypto claim in the FAQ based on their founder's history with crypto, so I worry that this might also be something they're not being truthful about.