All right.

It was a slow news week,

so we are leaning into it.

This week,

we're going to focus on lots of listener

questions and comments,

but we do still have a few interesting

stories about Mozilla, AMD,

and some sketchy smart TVs on This Week

in Privacy number fifty nine.

So stick around.

Welcome back to This Week in Privacy,

our weekly series where we discuss the

latest updates with what we've been

working on within the Privacy Guides

community,

and this week's top stories in data

privacy and cybersecurity.

I'm Jordan,

and with me this week is Nate.

How are you, Nate?

I'm good.

Felt like it was both a fast and

short week.

How have you been?

Yeah,

definitely feels like this week has been a

lot slower than one of the slowest weeks

we've had in a very long time.

Let's just say that.

So yeah,

we can dive right into some listener

questions here.

Why don't you take the first one?

Yeah, sure thing.

So like I said,

we're doing things a little bit

differently this week,

just trying something new.

Let us know what you guys think.

But we're going to start off this week,

since this is kind of a Q&A episode,

with some of our listener questions.

We'll kind of intersperse those as we go.

But first up,

we're going to pull from the forum.

And one of the questions we got this

week was,

are there any privacy advantages to using

a desktop operating system, such as Linux,

Mac, or Windows,

over Graphene OS.

And they said the only thing they can

think of is that the Tor browser seems

to be better at anti-fingerprinting on

desktop,

but I don't have conclusive evidence of

that.

Just a few tests I've run myself.

So yeah, in my opinion,

the way that I always explain these things

to people is that phones are more secure

from what I understand, just in general,

especially Graphene for sure.

But phones are more secure,

whereas computers are a lot more flexible.

I think it was...

I don't know if it was Kerry Parker

or one of his guests one time,

but basically they were talking about cell

phones,

and they said that from a security

perspective,

we kind of took all the mistakes that

we learned from computers and applied them

to phones when we started making

smartphones.

So smartphones have really good

sandboxing.

They're really good.

I think they're technically immutable.

You know, personally,

I've never seen a smartphone update fail

and then like the whole phone bricks.

It just knows how to kind of like

roll back stuff like that.

So phones are really good at that.

The drawback is you don't really have as

much

uh, flexibility in terms of being able to,

um, you know,

things like for the most part, uh,

installing alternate operating systems,

that's kind of something that only a few

Androids can do.

Or like you said, like certain, um,

like I know with, with iOS,

you're stuck using the, uh, like all the,

the,

the browsers are based on WebKit except in

Europe.

So, um,

it's definitely harder to get privacy on a

phone.

And then of course there's,

I forgot to mention,

there's the SIM card tracking you

everywhere, cell towers.

So it's definitely harder to do privacy on

a phone, but they are more secure.

So it's definitely a trade-off there.

Yeah, but privacy advantages specifically,

I think most desktops will have that,

especially with some tweaking,

maybe not Windows.

But yeah,

those are kind of my thoughts on that

one.

Did I miss anything?

Yeah, no, all good thoughts.

I think I agree with everything you said.

But also, I think sometimes it's...

you need to think about the specific

situation for what you need, right?

Like maybe you need, you know,

like the Tor browser, for example,

you did mention that like it does offer

better fingerprinting protection on

desktop, right?

Compared to the Android app,

that is one like small increase, I think.

It depends like, you know,

if you need that level of protection,

then maybe you should be using a desktop

or like Tails OS or something like that.

But I think as well,

we think about like,

Privacy on macOS and Windows is definitely

nowhere near what it is on Graphene OS

because everything is, you know,

there's not any telemetry basically.

So I think you kind of got to

weigh up what you want, right?

Like you can have...

some level of security and privacy with

graphene os whereas you know if you're

using a windows computer or mac os

computer you can have some level of

security but you're not going to have any

privacy like well not any privacy but

you're going to have less privacy than

than using a graphene os phone um

And I think one thing that also kind

of limits you is because Google kind of

has a lot of control over Android.

Like it's hard to get apps outside the

Google Play Store,

which kind of funnels you into using

Google.

It's also becoming like a lot harder to

actually make a Google account without

providing like personally identifiable

information.

So, you know,

you've got to think about it like that

as well.

I think...

Desktop operating systems have that

benefit, right?

Like, they are more decentralized.

Like, with macOS,

you just download a DMG file.

With Windows, you download an EXE.

And then, you know,

Linux is kind of a different situation.

But it's... Yeah,

there's definitely a funnel of...

of things like if you're using Google Play

services on GrapheneOS,

I think you're definitely going to be

taking a hit from a privacy perspective

because you are having to log in.

Well, you don't have to log in,

but you probably are going to want to

if you want to download apps, right?

So, yeah,

that's kind of my thought on it.

It kind of depends on what you want

and what you need.

Like you can't use a Graphene OS phone

to like edit videos or play video games.

So I think you might need to just

tailor your devices to what you actually

need.

Yeah, for sure.

And yeah,

that's a really good point about a desktop

OS,

especially from a telemetry perspective.

There are certain things that desktop can

do better.

We keep talking about the Tor

fingerprinting thing, but to be fair,

that was a really good point.

I left out a lot of telemetry,

for example,

which things like graphene reduce by

default or proxy through the graphene

servers first.

So it really depends specifically what

kind of privacy you're looking for,

for sure.

But yeah.

Yeah.

Hello to our first two people who have

hopped in and welcome to the chat.

But we did actually have a few stories

this week.

Unless you had anything else you wanted to

add to that question,

I think we can jump into our first

story.

Yeah, sounds good.

Let's jump into the first story here.

I guess this is a

Update, I suppose,

because we've talked about Mozilla quite a

bit here.

And to say we are critical might be

an understatement.

But here's kind of like what's going on

at Mozilla at the moment.

Announcing Mozilla.org.

The web is evolving.

So are we.

Earlier this month,

we stood up Mozilla.org,

a new Fiverr one C three nonprofit created

to steward the long term success of the

Mozilla project.

Over the last year or so,

I guess this is from Mark Sermon,

who I think is pretty high up at

Mozilla.

Over the last year or so,

I've said a lot about how AI is

reshaping the web and how we need to

simultaneously stand up for the open

internet Mozilla helped to build and shape

what the internet is becoming in the AI

era.

This is a huge and urgent challenge.

So I think a lot of people here

will be kind of

confused by this i think mozilla's

corporate structure is kind of confusing

like they have the mozilla foundation

which is like a non-profit and then the

mozilla foundation owns um

the Mozilla Corporation,

and it's like all this sort of complicated

stuff.

So I guess we can scroll down here.

We have created Mozilla.org to pull all of

the different pieces of Mozilla together.

It will act like a strategic endowment,

allocating funding, managing our brands,

and shaping long-term strategy to ensure

every part of Mozilla is well set up

to advance the vision outlined in the

Mozilla manifesto.

And if we're successful,

it will help all the pieces of Mozilla

add up to more than the sum of

their parts.

This is an important milestone for

Mozilla.

The challenge of fusing the values of the

Mozilla manifesto into this next era of

the internet is huge.

This updated structure will make it easier

to nimbly direct our resources and

orchestrate our actions to step up to this

challenge.

So this is kind of confusing, right?

So they explain it more here.

All of Mozilla's organization remains

under the umbrella of the five Oh one

C three Mozilla foundation with a new

nonprofit operating the Mozilla portfolio

of organizations on its behalf.

So yeah,

I guess throwing it back to Nate here,

because I don't really feel like I have

a huge amount to add more to this.

This is just like a corporate

restructuring, I guess.

And I'm not really sure.

I think Mozilla has been making weird

decisions recently as well.

So I'm not really sure how I feel

about this, to be honest.

Yeah,

I was really confused by this because

Jonah did a little bit more digging when

we shared this in the group chat.

And it seems like this isn't really...

Because my first thought was like, okay,

they're doing the proton thing, right?

Where there's a foundation that holds the

overall organization.

And that way it's like...

It ensures that the for-profit arm always

has to act ethically within accordance to

the wider mission.

But apparently that is not what's going on

here.

And...

So, yeah,

Mozilla is really weird because there's

like you said,

there's the Mozilla Foundation that

technically owns everything else,

including this Mozilla.org thing.

And then there's the Mozilla Corporation

that is the for profit arm.

And I think they're also the ones that

are in charge of Firefox,

if I'm not mistaken.

But then there's also like what else is

there?

There's a let me see here.

I think there's something else that

controls Thunderbird.

Yeah, let's see here.

There's MZLA, which makes Thunderbird.

There's Mozilla Ventures,

which is probably one of our,

me personally at least,

is one of my biggest targets of criticism.

It's their venture capital arm,

which invests in startups,

which usually invests in things that to a

lot of us seem very counter to Mozilla's

mission,

like an ad company that they claim is

privacy preserving and all kinds of crap.

And then there's Mozilla.ai,

which is what it sounds like.

And of course,

none of us are super crazy about that,

I think.

I don't know.

Yeah, Mozilla.

I need you all to understand I'm very

critical of Mozilla.

And it's because I want them to be

better.

It's one of those things where I don't

take joy in watching Mozilla.

be stupid for lack of a better way

to put it.

It's one of those things where it's like,

I'm mad because I want them to be

better.

I want Firefox to have wider adoption.

Like my first browser,

Um, growing up as a teenager, I was,

I was relatively tech savvy,

but not compared to a lot of people.

And so I think I used internet Explorer

up until high school when of course it

was a girl,

a girl got me using Firefox.

And then I used Firefox for years until

I eventually switched over to Chrome.

And then that's when I got into privacy

and I started using other browsers,

but like,

so I have a soft spot for Firefox.

It was like my first non-mainstream

browser.

And it was like really cool.

And at the time,

It did things that other browsers couldn't

up until Chrome came along.

And it's just,

it's so frustrating to see them.

They had this amazing project that used to

be trailblazing and now it's like falling

behind everybody.

And it's just, it's so frustrating.

And so, yeah,

it's really confusing that like,

like I said,

Mozilla keeps making all these really

questionable decisions.

Like,

Um, they're, they're, they're, they're,

they're, they're, they're, they're,

they're, they're, they're,

What was it called?

It was an extension called Fake Spotter,

which was supposed to spot fake product

reviews,

which is one of those things that it's

like, okay,

I'm sure this is a good product,

but why is that a Mozilla thing?

Why is this something Mozilla is investing

in?

Whereas at least the advertising thing,

which was horribly handled,

but the overall idea, it's like, okay,

I see why this would be relevant to

Mozilla.

And now they're getting into AI,

but the whole AI thing to me feels

like a day late and a dollar short.

Now that everybody else is so far into

the bubble that they're starting to pop,

it now is when Mozilla decides to jump

on the train.

And they did it... Once again,

the execution was terrible because if you

look into the privacy policy, by default,

Firefox has little chatbots in the

sidebar.

It's just a proxy, quote-unquote proxy,

for the main chatbots.

And the reason I say quote-unquote proxy

is because it's not even a good proxy.

It's like...

you open it and it's like okay you

can start a conversation with chat gpt and

there's no privacy protections at all like

at least with things like duckduckgo and

leo it's like you're still using those

those main models but they host the models

or they're proxying all your requests so

like there's a layer of privacy there

But with Mozilla, it's like, no,

it just mainlines you straight to chat

GPT.

There's no privacy whatsoever.

They signed a deal with Perplexity,

which is like an AI search engine.

And it's the same thing.

Like if you read the announcement,

it's like, oh,

Perplexity's privacy policy applies.

And it's like,

what is the point of you?

Like,

what are you doing that's innovating or

protecting my privacy in any way,

shape or form?

And I'm fairly critical of DuckDuckGo,

but even DuckDuckGo is doing more than you

guys.

And so, sorry,

I know that was kind of a rant,

but yeah,

like this is just another thing where it's

like,

What was the point of this?

And what is the point of, like,

why this whole mission here?

What is it?

It's going to, like,

it will act like a strategic endowment,

allocating funding, managing our brands,

and shaping our long-term strategy.

Then what is the Mozilla Foundation doing?

Like,

isn't that the Mozilla Foundation's job?

Like, okay,

you've offloaded this responsibility to

them.

Now what are you guys doing instead?

Like, it's just...

Yeah, it's really confusing,

and I don't understand where they're

going.

And again,

I hate to criticize because I want them

to do better,

but I feel like Mozilla just...

I feel like they have no idea what

they're doing.

I feel like they're just blindly flailing

around and hoping that they find

something.

And it doesn't feel like they have a

strategy.

It doesn't feel like they have a vision.

It doesn't feel like they actually know

what they're doing or where they're going.

And yeah, I mean, again,

I want to make it very clear.

Pains me to say that.

I want them to do better, but...

they keep doing crap like this.

There was a brief moment.

What was it last year where I was

like, they,

I thought there was actually hope.

Cause I thought they were doing some

really cool things.

Like they added translations to Android.

They added a couple of privacy features.

Like they added some stuff late last year

that I'm like, okay, okay.

We're moving in a good direction.

I like this.

And now we're right back to this crap.

So.

Um, a little bit ranty, but yeah,

this is, this is really, to me,

I don't know, maybe,

maybe somebody at Firefox can,

or Mozilla can like write in and tell

me why I'm wrong.

Cause I'm open to it.

But to me,

this just feels like more like, like,

I don't know what if we changed our

name, you know, that'll fix anything.

So it just feels like a waste of

resources to me.

I think the thing that kind of frustrates

people the most about, like, Mozilla is,

like,

they have the money to actually do

something good.

Like,

they get all this money from Google and,

like, all this money from, you know,

people donating and stuff.

And, like, they spend it on, like,

the most silly stuff,

like you were saying,

like the Mozilla AI stuff.

Like, I think...

it kind of is a bit indicative, right?

Like they added all these AI features and

then they added an AI kill switch.

Like, so what was the point?

Like if you think people aren't going to

want it,

like why are you adding it in the

first place?

Well, to be fair,

they only added the AI kill switch after

everybody vehemently said they don't want

this crap.

And actually that is one of the few

things I'll give them is I feel like

their kill switch was very well done

because there's a single button at the top

to just disable AI everything.

or you can go through and pick very

specific like the ai translations i'm like

okay that i'm down for that i don't

mind because i think that's all done on

device and stuff but then like you can

disable the ai chat bot in the sidebar

that i was talking about so it's like

that's the one thing they've done recently

that i'm like i i like that that

was very well done although i also accept

the argument that the ai probably

shouldn't have been in there in the first

place so

Yeah,

I think – but I think the main

thing that I think, like,

is kind of frustrating with that is, like,

I think Mozilla is trying to be, like,

a big tech company when, like,

they're not – that's, like,

the opposite of – that's why people are

using Firefox.

They're using Firefox because they don't

want to use Google Chrome because they

don't want to use, like,

some other big tech browser, right?

Like, it's like they're so unaware of,

like, the reason people are using them.

Like, it's just –

It's bizarre.

And I think that if they actually did

put money into improving things and

actually making... Well,

maybe it's paying off.

Maybe all this AI stuff that they're

adding is actually paying off for them.

I don't know.

But I personally am not interested in that

at all.

Yeah, I agree.

And to me, it's also the implementation.

At least...

DuckDuckGo and Leo,

they do all these things where it's like

there's a layer of privacy there.

Even if it's not enough,

I'll accept that argument too.

But it's like Firefox's AI implementation

is just like, hey,

here's a shortcut to chat GPT.

And?

So yeah, it's crazy.

I don't know what's going on there,

but I really hope they get it together

because I do like Firefox.

I...

I don't know.

I like it.

I would not be opposed to using it

more often.

I just really need them to figure it

out.

LeVar, the tech guy here, said,

Firefox now has AI tabs or smart tabs

or whatever they're calling it.

Yeah, that's another example.

I don't know.

Maybe it's me.

But they have this feature where you can

group tabs together,

and then the AI will automatically name

the tabs based on whatever they are.

And it's like, why?

Why?

Why?

Do I really need the AI to like,

and also do you really need,

maybe this is one of those things where

it's like marketing is everything's AI

now, even when it's not AI,

but it's like,

do you need AI to do that?

But it's weird, man.

It's weird.

So I don't know.

I think that's all I got on that

story.

Yeah, me too.

Not much to,

not much more to add there.

Alrighty.

Well then in that case,

we'll move on to another story from AMD.

Yeah.

And this one's pretty crazy.

So this one started last week.

And at the time,

we didn't really talk about it because

there wasn't too much to say.

But now that the story has evolved a

little more, it's definitely interesting.

So AMD...

For any audio listeners, it says,

following user outcry,

AMD reinstates memory encryption in

consumer CPUs.

So AMD has this thing called TSME,

which is Transparent Secure Memory

Encryption,

and it encrypts the entire content stored

in memory,

making the data useless to adversaries,

performing cold boot attacks and similar

intrusions requiring physical access.

And I want to come back to that

in a little bit.

But...

So they say this was added about a

decade ago and it was specifically added

to the high end CPUs.

Um,

but over time they kind of started rolling

it out to the lower end of processors

as well,

including the consumer version of the

Ryzen chips.

And, um,

basically I want to say it was last

week or, uh, yeah,

sometime within the last couple of weeks,

um,

people noticed that suddenly this

protection was missing from the chips.

Um, I think there's basically, uh,

like a setting in the BIOS where you

can go turn it on or off or

whatever.

And, uh, you know, to people's credit,

the way that I first heard this story

is like, at first, um,

people didn't jump to conclusions.

Uh, they were, uh,

they were rightfully asking like,

you know, hey, where'd this go?

And they reached out to some AMD employees

on social media and they were like, hmm,

that's a good question.

I'll see if I can find out.

And eventually they kind of clammed up

just like, yeah, I can't really say,

which if I remember correctly,

that's actually what one of them said is

like, I can't say.

So is it like you don't know or

like you're not allowed?

But people, you know,

kind of raised hell and AMD basically was

like, oh, okay, well, we'll bring it back.

Which is great, for the record.

They said it'll roll out in a firmware

update scheduled for July, so that's good.

The interesting things to note here are

there's really no explanation why it went

away in the first place.

I think you could make a very valid

argument for the fact that,

from what I understand,

this was never promised.

to lower-end CPU users.

It was just kind of one of those

things that it's like, oh, here,

you can have it too.

But when you have it for the better

part of a decade,

people kind of come to expect it.

And this Ars Technica article noted that

this has been a real problem with big

tech companies lately.

They say, once upon a time,

big tech and corporations in general were

willing to try to acknowledge service and

product changes to ensure customers had a

predictable experience.

They also showed a willingness to admit

mistakes and say how they plan to do

better.

Now there's only silence.

As the company's power and dominance has

mushroomed,

their sense of accountability has

diminished proportionally.

AMD did not respond to questions sent for

this story, which is really disappointing.

I have a very high opinion of AMD.

And if anybody from AMD is listening,

please do better in the future because I

know you can.

But it's...

The article kind of speculates.

I mean, that's all we can do, right?

They didn't really say why.

They did say that it's possible that this

was just like a...

What's the word I'm looking for?

As their product line continues to grow,

maybe...

I'm struggling for the right words here.

Um,

like basically maybe it became a hassle to

support so many chips and that's why they

kind of dropped it.

Um, which is entirely possible.

But again, they never said, we don't know.

They also said that, uh, cause I mean,

it's definitely an intentional thing.

It's like,

there was a whole setting in the firmware

menu that disappeared.

So it's not like, Oh,

this toggle stopped working.

It's like, this toggle is gone.

Like somebody went in there and knowingly

removed it.

Um,

They also noted that you can make the

argument that maybe this was like a

performance thing because a lot of gamers

will use,

I think they said like the Ryzen nine

thousand was the one they cited

specifically.

And, you know,

since encrypting and decrypting does

require performance hit,

a lot of people disable it.

But I don't know, in my opinion,

like this is kind of my main thought

that that I have to share.

I mean, just in general,

not like this is like the big thought,

but, you know, it's to me, it's like.

The more tech savvy people,

like the high-end pro gamers,

they know how to tweak their PCs.

They know how to go in.

They know how to change the settings.

They know how to overclock it.

They know how to do all this stuff.

So the fact that you could go in

and disable this, in my opinion, is fine.

Like they know how to do it and

they can do it.

But defaults matter.

You know, a vast number of people

Do not know what this thing is.

Do not know how to go in and

enable it or disable it.

I didn't know this was a thing until

I read this story.

And so they're just going to leave the

defaults.

And for the vast majority of people who,

because, you know,

tech is constantly advancing, right?

Like we're at a point now where I

will probably never buy anything below

like an iNine or a Ryzen nine or,

you know,

nothing below sixteen gigs of RAM,

probably more than that now that I do

video editing.

And so, you know,

but back in the day you used to

get away with eight gigs of Ram and

maybe like an I five or whatever.

And so my point being is like,

it's not hard to see a world where

even just the casual person is buying a

computer that has one of these better

chips in it just because it's on sale

for black Friday or whatever.

And so they do it.

And now the default is like,

this encryption is enabled.

And, um,

the last thing I kind of wanted to

point out is like,

This protects against physical attacks,

which again is one of those things that

it's like, yeah,

I don't think that's a huge threat for

ninety percent of people watching this,

maybe even more than that.

However, comma.

When the barrier to entry is so low,

why wouldn't you?

Right.

So it's one of those things where it's

like,

why wouldn't you give good defaults and

just turn it on and make sure it's

there?

And then if people want to turn it

off, presumably they know what it is.

They know how to do it.

They know why it's causing issues and they

can go in and turn it off.

Like,

I don't see what was wrong with that

system and why they got rid of it.

But

You know,

I'll end by echoing what Ars Technica said

here,

which is despite AMD's continued opacity

about the incident,

the company deserves credit for restoring

TSME.

Customers complained, some bitterly,

and AMD heard and granted their demands.

So yeah, I mean,

good on them for reversing course and

fixing that.

But yeah, I don't know.

I think that kind of sums up all

my thoughts on that one.

Did you have any additional things that

jumped out at you?

I definitely think I disagree with...

giving the company credit for restoring

it.

Like, they're... Okay, so... Fair enough,

fair enough.

They got caught,

they removed a feature that, like,

was offering protection from people,

and then they restored the feature.

It's like...

good job for fixing a fixing a problem

that you created like it's not it's not

i'm not sure if they deserve credit for

that i think it's good that they actually

responded and like and they restored it

right obviously that's that's positive

because like you said it's like this is

like a feature that has been present on

their consumer cpus for quite a while and

it's, you know,

an extra security feature that does offer

some protection to people.

But I think, you know, it's,

it's just like one of those things where

it feels like every company now is trying

to like squeeze as much money out of

you as possible,

remove as many features as they can get

away with.

Like, you know, it's, it's,

It's not great for people.

And especially with the prices of things

at the moment, it's like, really?

AMD,

you're trying to pull a fast one on

people?

You're trying to remove a feature and hope

that nobody would notice?

It does feel a bit sneaky.

And the fact that AMD didn't really come

out and say, you know, this is...

Something that we accidentally did, right?

Or like, you know,

we didn't mean to do this or offer

an explanation.

So it doesn't really seem like there was

any...

public discussion about it uh really

outside of like like them giving an actual

reason for why this happened um and and

like this said in this article by Dan

Gooden AMD did not respond to questions

sent for this story so like I think

number one is it's good that they restored

it but also they didn't really respond and

like explain why they did it in the

first place so uh that's not great um

But you don't really get that many choices

when it comes to consumer hardware.

What are you going to do?

Are you going to go with Intel?

There's not many options, right?

I think we get in these situations where

we basically have almost a monopoly,

right?

It's almost a monopoly.

It's a duopoly, I guess.

It's an extremely hard industry to break

into because

maybe we'll see Nvidia do something,

but then Nvidia has also got the same

problem.

They're like the only company that makes

super powerful, like data center GPUs.

Um, so, you know, it's, it's,

I do think it is kind of a

problem when all these markets get so like

homogenized that, you know,

AMD could just do that and not restore

it.

They could just remove the feature.

Like no one could do anything about it.

So,

Yeah, it's kind of frustrating.

I'm not really sure how important TSME is,

actually.

I've never seen it be a particularly

sought-after security feature,

so I'm not really sure if this would

even be that impactful from a security

perspective.

I think it's more about the principle of

it than the actual security benefits.

No, I agree,

and that's why I pointed out that it

protects against physical attacks like

cold boot, which, I mean,

maybe this is a me thing,

but I'm a real big believer in rubber

hose attacks, which is the...

It's the joking colloquialism for

basically like...

if the cops want me okay maybe not

the local cops i'd stand up to the

local cops but you know the cia the

nsa the fbi if they kidnap me and

they bring me to a dark basement and

they're like what are your passwords i'm

gonna start listing them off immediately

because i don't have a very high pain

tolerance and like it's just gonna take

them slapping me around a few times more

or less before i'm just like nope i'm

out i'm done i don't have anything that

sensitive so it's it's one of those things

where it's like you know if it was

a remote exploitable thing it'd be like

okay this is probably more important

But it's I feel like that's just in

general,

like a really important thing with a lot

of especially when I was on surveillance

support, you know,

we had a whole section dedicated to like

research and like people would always come

up with these crazy proofs of concept,

like, oh,

they can use your phone as a speaker

or as a microphone to capture like the

sound of your hard drive disk spinning.

And they can use that to like decrypt

your encryption keys.

And it's like, OK,

but step one in this research was put

malware on the phone.

And it's like, well, yeah, at that point,

and sometimes it was even like,

and this required them to have your phone

for like three hours uninterrupted.

And it's like, well, yeah, of course,

at that point, like all bets are off,

man.

So it's,

it's just really important to like keep

that kind of perspective with this stuff.

So yeah, I don't, I don't,

I can't imagine this was like a huge

security feature that saved a lot of

people's data and like protected

journalists in foreign countries,

but yeah.

I still think, like you said,

it's the principle of the matter.

If it was already there and there's

already a way to turn it off if

you don't want it,

I don't really see what good it would

have done to have gotten rid of it

personally.

But yeah,

you make a really good point about they

probably shouldn't have gotten rid of it

in the first place.

That was probably not a great look.

Yeah.

Yeah, maybe check it out.

If you've got a Ryzen CPU,

maybe check it out and see if it's

enabled or not for you.

Maybe it's a feature that you might want

to enable.

I don't really know.

It does say here it's a feature that's

OS dependent,

so I do wonder if this is not

something that works with Linux,

but I could be surprised that it's not.

I thought it said it was OS independent.

Did I misread that?

Yeah.

Here it is.

Unlike secure memory encryption,

TSME is OS independent,

a condition that makes it much easier to

enable.

Oh, OS independent.

Okay.

I thought it said OS dependent.

Okay.

My bad.

Unless you're reading a different section,

in which case that's just really confusing

now and I don't know who's right.

No,

I think you read the part that I

was thinking.

Yeah, no, that is good to hear then.

Maybe go enable that if you haven't got

it enabled.

Yeah, I mean,

hopefully it's enabled by default, right?

But I think I have a Ryzen in

my other computer.

I'll have to take a look at that.

One can hope.

I guess we can dive into some site

updates here.

But we do have some more stories we

want to talk about later today.

We want to dive into some interesting

stuff about smart TVs and botnets.

But first,

I guess we'll give a little bit of

an update of what we've been working on

this week.

Well,

I guess what's been going on at Privacy

Guides.

So basically last week,

if you didn't see it,

we launched a video for members only.

Members first, sorry.

And it's now out this week.

So on Wednesday, Wednesday?

Tuesday.

Yeah, on Tuesday,

sometimes times those can be tricky.

On Tuesday,

we released the Plex Media Server video,

which basically,

if you haven't heard already,

basically there were...

charging seven hundred and fifty dollars

for a lifetime license in july so you

only have a bit of time left if

you did want to get the lifetime license

for i think it was two hundred and

fifty dollars um so if you do want

that you should probably buy it soon

because

Yeah,

it's going to be it's going to be

seven hundred and fifty dollars,

but we kind of offered a separate solution

to that.

You don't need to pay money.

You can use Jellyfin instead.

So it's kind of like a tutorial on

how to get that set up.

It's not really that different to Plex,

to be honest.

Like the whole setup process is pretty

similar.

And they kind of went through and

explained a lot of the basics,

I would say.

It's definitely, it's definitely,

we got some interesting comments on that

video.

We got some feedback saying, you know,

we should have included stuff about remote

access, stuff like that.

And that was,

that was good to hear feedback from the

community.

But I think at the end of the

day,

the video was getting kind of long and

complex.

Like I already had to cut sections that

were in there already.

And it wasn't really super necessary.

I think a lot of people will be

using this, you know,

in their own home to stream to their

television and stuff like that.

We did mention like boarding if you want

access outside your home as well.

So definitely give that a watch if that

sounds interesting to you.

But yeah,

definitely was an interesting video to

work on.

Not really much more going on this week.

As we said at the start,

this week has been extremely quiet.

Like we've had almost no news stories and

like we were like struggling at the last

minute to try and find a story to

put as the headline for this week.

So yeah, kind of the vibe this week.

Yeah.

I'll just add, um,

Jellyfin is by far the easiest thing I've

ever self-hosted.

So, uh,

even if you're new to self-hosting and

you're like,

I just want to kind of dip my

toes in it.

I would say spin up a server, uh,

just as practice,

like even if you never use it,

because like it literally, in my opinion,

does not get any easier than that.

Um,

so it would make for a great Guinea

pig, but yeah,

I've been using Jellyfin for years.

I'm super happy with it.

And, um, uh, yeah,

just to what you were saying about some

of the feedback to kind of give you

guys a tiny little peek behind the

curtain.

We, uh,

I try to keep videos under ten minutes

if I can, just because I've kind of,

watching the analytics,

I've noticed that people kind of stop

watching after about ten minutes.

So yeah, that video was already,

I think it said,

I've already closed the tab,

but I think it was like,

eleven minutes and forty-five seconds or

something,

so it was already kind of getting long,

and you know, if we talked about, like,

now here's how you open it up to

the internet,

then we have to talk about there's

different ways to open it up.

You can use something like Tailscale,

or you can just go straight to the

internet if you're insane.

You know,

but then there's also these concerns that,

like, it was just, you know,

that's definitely,

I think we mentioned a couple times,

we do want to do a general tutorial

for, like,

general self-hosting tips that would

probably include that kind of stuff,

but

Um, this one was specifically like, yeah,

when I,

when I saw the news about like,

they're doing this price hike and it's

like an insane price hike.

I'm like, Ooh,

people are going to be looking on how

to switch.

This would be a good time to like,

try to push people towards something else.

So,

Yeah,

that's kind of what went into that video,

but it was a lot of fun.

On that note,

just to let you guys know,

I did wrap up a script yesterday for

another video that I think Jordan is

leaving some notes on,

and I will check those out this weekend,

but I'm excited for you guys to see

that because that's going to be a history

video going over some important privacy

history and cybersecurity history,

and I'm excited.

I think it's going to come out really

good, but...

Um, yeah,

the only other kind of thing was just

our news briefs.

Uh,

don't forget we have privacyguides.org

slash news, um,

which is also available on, uh,

activity pubs.

So like Mastodon, uh, pixel fed,

whatever your thing of choice is, uh,

at privacy news at mastodon.plus.

There's also an RSS feed, but yeah,

there's the weekly data breach roundup.

I think, no,

we did not cover the story,

but there's a, you know, Meta's,

Meta's little internal AI training key

logger backfired.

Kansas city is pushing for facial

recognition on public transit.

So yeah,

some good stories there from Fria this

week, but I think, yeah, like,

like Jordan said is a,

is a really slow week,

which is kind of why we're leaning into

it and doing this more

relaxed episode.

But that's,

that's all we had going on this week.

But all this is made possible as well

as upcoming stuff that we're working on is

made possible by supporters.

So if you want,

you can sign up for a membership or

donate at privacy guides.org.

You can go to privacyguides.org slash

donate, and it'll take you right there.

You can also pick up some swag at

shop.privacyguides.org.

And Privacy Guides is a nonprofit which

researches and shares privacy-related

information and facilitates a community on

our forum and matrix where people can ask

questions and get advice about staying

private online and preserving their

digital rights.

And on that note,

I think we're going to hop over to

the forum and take another question.

Yeah,

so I got this other question here from

Anonymous.

How are things tracking regarding Keep

Android Open?

So I guess kind of a recap in

case anyone hasn't seen this.

I feel like everyone in our community

might have seen this at this point, but...

Let me just kind of read what the

website says.

Your phone is about to stop being yours.

Ninety six days until lockdown beginning

September twenty twenty six and a silent

update non-consensually pushed by Google

will block every Android app whose

developer hasn't registered with Google,

sign their contract,

paid up and handed over their government

ID.

So this has kind of been an ongoing

thing.

I feel like we talked about this

originally when it came out,

like probably around a year ago,

I would say.

It's kind of been brewing since then.

There hasn't really been too much of an

update as far as I'm aware,

which is kind of frustrating actually,

because I feel like a lot of people

have been opposing this, which is good,

right?

We're suddenly in support of Keep Android

Open.

I believe we might even be listed on

this website, possibly.

I think we are.

I think we signed the open letter.

I'll look for it.

Yeah,

so we definitely are in support of this

whole measure here.

I think it's super important to stop this

sort of stuff.

This kind of ties back a little bit

to what I was saying before about

companies having too much control.

When there's an organization like

Google that basically controls AI.

I mean, sorry, controls Android.

I don't know why I said AI.

I think you've got AI on the mind

a little bit.

So Android, yeah,

they basically can do these sort of

shifts, right?

They can basically create an ecosystem

where only the apps that Google wants to

be allowed access, right?

So this is kind of a problem because

individual developers and small teams

won't be able to publish apps because it

costs money.

There's also financial restrictions

because some people sometimes forget that

like,

the U S dollar is actually quite a

strong currency.

Like if you go to other countries in

the global South, you know, that,

that money might not be worth the same

amount.

It might be like two,

two years of pay.

Like it could be a ridiculous amount of

money for some people.

Um,

and also just like restricting people's

access to,

to using whatever app they want on their

device.

And as far as I know,

there hasn't really been too much of an

update on this unless you've got anything

to add on it.

No, I was going to say that I,

I haven't really heard anything either.

I know.

Yeah.

Some websites like my website,

the new oil,

I've got the little banner up top just

real quick, not to like self promo,

but just real quick,

I'll show you guys what it looks like.

But,

Um, yeah,

I've got this little banner up top that

says Android will be coming with lock

platform and there's a countdown.

So, um, you know,

just trying to do my best part to

spread the word as best I can.

But yeah,

I weirdly have not heard much either,

which is weird.

Cause this is one of those things that

is just like wildly, wildly unpopular.

Um,

I don't know a single person other than

Google who's been like, you know,

this is pretty.

And the closest I've heard is me saying

that, um,

Side loading is a serious problem in some

parts of the world,

specifically like Southeast Asia,

I know is a really big problem where

like that's how a lot of scammers will

like, oh,

go download this like side loaded.

And for the record, yes,

I know we shouldn't be using the term

side loaded.

You know, it should be installing,

but like go download this third party APK

and install this this Bitcoin wallet or

whatever and.

Or it's like, oh,

this is like a premium version of

WhatsApp.

I don't know.

There's a bunch of different ways they do

it.

But my point being is like,

I know that it is a problem in

some parts of the world,

but even then it's like, man,

this is a really heavy handed way to

deal with this.

That it's almost like,

I don't want to say they are being

malicious because we've definitely seen

companies do dumber things and not realize

they were being dumb.

But it's one of those things where it's

like,

how can you not realize what a slippery

slope this is and how much of a

detrimental impact this will have?

And it's such a shame because Android

is...

like notorious for being an open

ecosystem, right?

Like that's what drew a lot of people

to Android is like,

you can tinker with it.

You can put different launchers on it.

It's easier to be a developer.

Like I, back in the day,

like these days, it's really weird.

It's kind of flipped.

Like these days,

there are some apps that are like iPhone

only, but they're not on Android.

They're either like iPhone only or they're

both.

Usually, not always.

But back in the early days of smartphones,

it was the exact opposite.

Like everybody was on Android because it

was like free and open and it was

easier to code for Android.

And the iPhone restrictions were so high

that it's like, yeah,

it's not worth iPhone,

but I guess the market share is switched

so much.

But my point being is like, you know,

Android was always this like super open,

super tinker friendly, developer friendly.

And I've even seen some people like,

I don't know how serious they are,

but I've seen some comments.

It's like, man, if this goes through,

I'm just like, I'm switching to iPhone.

Cause what's the point?

Like the only thing I liked about Android

was that it was open.

And if they're just going to turn into

iPhone, why would I not go with iPhone?

So yeah.

Um, yeah, I mean, I don't,

I don't necessarily agree with that,

but it's just, it's definitely, it's like,

what are they doing?

Like, this is such a weird,

I don't know.

Yeah.

But I haven't heard any updates.

Yeah, I think people are saying like, oh,

it's just what Apple does.

Like, we can just, you know, it's fine.

This is what Apple does.

We can just let it happen.

It's like,

they even like talk about this on the

website.

It says like,

Apple has been a walled garden from day

one.

People choose Android because it's

different.

Apple does it too,

is a race to the bottom.

Like, you know, we don't want...

if we can have one platform that's usable,

it's better than having no platform that's

usable.

Yeah, it's interesting.

I kind of wonder how this is going

to play with the EU's Digital Markets Act

because Apple is kind of being forced in

the EU to allow for installing apps from

third-party app stores and open a lot of

stuff up.

It seems like the pressure hasn't been

quite enough, though,

to force this in the entire world.

It's just kind of only applying to the

EU,

which I guess kind of makes sense because

Apple is like a trillion-dollar company.

They can afford to

screw around with like making multiple

versions of their operating system.

But yeah, so it's, it's, it's not great.

We're definitely opposed to this whole

situation, but it's unfortunate.

We haven't really heard too much of an

update on this from Google,

at least silence from Google.

I was going to say, and it's like,

I don't,

I don't want to make this political,

but I feel like it's almost,

cause you mentioned like, you know,

with all the stuff going on in Europe

about being forced to open up their

system.

But like,

I feel like a lot of this has

to do with the fact that at least

here in the U S we have a

very pro business administration right

now.

And companies are really getting away with

a lot of stuff.

Like there's investigations that were open

before Trump came into office that have

been shut down now.

And like, it's,

I almost feel like it's them being like,

yeah, we can get away with it now.

Like,

you know, if,

if the administration was being a little

bit harsher on businesses and forcing

that, cause I mean,

didn't they just lose like an anti

monopoly lawsuit or something like that?

So it's just, yeah, it's,

it's like they see an opportunity and

they're going for it,

which is unfortunate to the detriment of

everybody.

Yeah,

I do think like the EU has got

like, they have their own interests,

right?

Like they're not doing this EU digital

markets thing just because like they want

it to be a better experience for

everybody.

It's like, no, no,

you're doing this to like, you know,

weaken American tech companies influence

in your region, right?

Like, which is good, right?

Like I think countries should have like

sovereignty.

They shouldn't be relying on

tech products from a single country which

is like as much as people don't want

to admit it like literally like ninety

percent of the internet is just from

America so like you know like everyone's

on Google everyone's on um Facebook

everyone's on Snapchat like all these

platforms are like American tech

corporations um so it kind of makes sense

but yeah it can have goofy consequences

like you know making things not as secure

as they could be but

I think it's definitely an interesting

balancing act.

I definitely have seen that things are

definitely loosening up a bit in the US

at the moment.

And also the actual backbone of the

internet,

I'm on the Wikipedia page right now,

and like,

fifty percent of the tier one ISPs,

which are like,

the top level ISPs that literally provide

the cables that go between continents,

like, I swear,

about fifty percent of them are US.

So, and that's not...

What's this fiber out?

Oh,

that's not even counting how much actual

cable they control.

That's just like how many different

companies there are.

So yay.

Lumen technologies.

Hey, when is a,

when is the next season of severance

coming out?

Anyways.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think also people are,

people are definitely wary of.

changes and like you know I think the

I think people are starting to realize

that yeah the the the US government is

a little bit unpredictable at the moment

so they don't really want to rely on

them too much which you know it kind

of makes sense so I don't know uh

it's good to acknowledge though that these

things probably need to change at some

point but it definitely seems like at

least right now everything is basically

still run through the United States which

I

can be a problem,

but hasn't been so far,

but it could be a problem in the

future.

For sure.

Um,

before we move on into the next story,

uh,

somebody on YouTube and maybe Bob's your

uncle, maybe just maybe, um, you know,

you, you mentioned the Canadian news.

We did cover this last week, but yeah,

there's bill C-二, which, um, just,

I think has passed like part of your

government,

but not has fully has not fully passed

yet.

But, uh,

Yeah, the government in a classic,

they've tried to paint tinfoil hat privacy

fears

um, you know, for valuing your privacy,

you're crazy.

So yeah, um, we did,

we did cover that I think last week

or the week before,

but that is something definitely to keep

on your radar, especially for Canadians.

Um, please contact your politicians.

This is literally an encryption backdoor.

Like there's already a bunch of services

like signal duck, duck, go Nord VPN,

which we don't recommend,

but just to kind of show you,

like they've all said that they're, uh,

either going to limit services or leave

Canada entirely if this passes.

And, um,

It's a backdoor,

which I know I say this every time,

but we have proof thanks to Salt Typhoon

or maybe it's Volt Typhoon.

I think it's Salt Typhoon.

I should look that up and refresh myself

one of these days.

But that was when China hacked the US's

telecoms infrastructure using a backdoor

that only the good guys are supposed to

use.

And so we know that these things do

not work and they are not only for

the good guys.

We have actual it happened proof.

And for some reason,

politicians keep pushing that lie.

And yeah, this is a classic.

It's called a thought terminating cliche

where like we make you look bad.

That's why they do the whole protect the

children thing,

because then if you protest this,

it's so easy to be like, wow,

what do you hate children?

So, yeah,

definitely keep an eye out for that if

you're Canadian and please try to.

I mean,

do your like I can't do anything.

I'm not Canadian,

but you know what I mean?

Like it's a let's I hope that doesn't

pass because that's not good.

I think another thing that's obviously

this person, being a Canadian,

you probably already know this,

but the Canadian Parliament just went on

summer break.

So, like, this is the perfect time to,

like, you know,

get out there and actually make some noise

about this.

As far as I know,

it still needs to go through the Canadian

Parliament, I believe.

Like, it's been approved, but it's not,

like...

passed actually yet um so uh the house

of commons passed it now it needs to

go to the senate and then presumably the

prime minister or whoever's in charge

there yeah so it still needs to go

through more process so you know

everyone's on break now so you know

Get out there.

I think that'll be, you know,

I do want to say, like,

the previous bills that have,

I think it's C-II,

Bill C-II was another one that was going

through Canada and it was also a similar

type of thing.

It was accessing,

I think it was to do with strengthening

borders, but it had a whole bunch of,

like,

really terrible privacy concessions in

there as well.

And that got sent back.

So I think, you know, get out there.

If you're from Canada and you actually...

Um,

are able to get out there and do

some, there's definitely,

there might be some,

someone organizing protests and stuff.

I'm not sure, but, uh,

definitely send some messages to your

representatives as well.

That can help.

Um,

and hopefully it doesn't actually get put

into effect because yeah, like,

like Nate was saying,

it's like all these massive privacy

companies are saying like,

they're going to leave the country if it

passes.

So, um,

That's kind of a good indication that

something is a really bad idea.

Yeah, that was C-II, so yeah.

All right, well,

on the topic of governments and bad ideas,

I think we'll move into the next story,

which is about the White House app,

which auto-downloads to government phones

and can't be uninstalled.

So this story interests me in particular

because I think there's always a really...

I think it's a really valid debate and

a struggle that I think a lot of

us have as privacy-interested people where

there's a certain amount of privacy that

you give up with an employer, right?

There's a certain level of privacy that

they have to,

at least here in the US,

they have to report your earnings for

taxes and they have to verify your

employment,

like are you eligible to work and

citizenship status and stuff like that.

and um you know i think that's kind

of unavoidable uh for most people like a

handful of people are very lucky and you

can like start your own freelancing

business or something but as a former

freelancer i can tell you that is not

always easy and not right for everyone so

um there's always kind of like a bit

of a struggle between like okay it's your

employer's computer and they have a right

to do whatever they want to their computer

versus like you have a right to privacy

and um

I think this article talks a lot about

how this app is really unpopular for a

lot of political reasons.

I'm not trying to be political,

but just to give you some examples.

There's a button within the app that

allows users to text quote,

text President Trump,

which auto-fills a text bubble reading

greatest president ever,

which is definitely not something that is

very insecure to do.

Yeah.

And somebody said it's shooting pure

unadulterated propaganda into our veins.

So, I mean, there's that.

But I mean, from a privacy perspective,

like this app,

we've known for a while that this app

has a lot of concerns.

Like here, further down,

it gets into April, back in April.

Shortly after the app launched,

cybersecurity experts flagged several

concerns,

including the fact that the app initially

shared users' locations and IP addresses

with third parties.

And if I remember correctly,

it was like pinging them like every thirty

seconds with your location, which is...

Completely insane.

Like that is basically real time

surveillance.

They said that it goes through or it

was developed by this Ohio based company

called Forty Five Press,

which is obviously has a certain political

leaning there.

They say that they specialize in expert

WordPress developments,

expert WordPress development design,

hosting e-commerce and so much more.

Uh, I'll be honest.

I don't know if this matters.

They say that the founder also runs an

X account described as a website directory

of historical and paranormal locations.

Yeah.

And like,

I'm actually going to take their side on

this one.

Like I,

I like to watch a good trashy ghost

story.

Like who cares?

That doesn't mean I don't know how to

do my job.

Um,

Although not to be political,

I will say we have seen a lot

of these alt-right tech companies like

Parler and whatnot and Gab have a lot

of data breaches.

So I would argue that maybe they're not

always great with security, but I digress.

They said that the app incorporates a

widget created by a Russian-based company

called Elfsight, which...

They said there was a vulnerability found.

Oh yes.

Expose the personal information of white

house officials.

They also,

this was one where I kind of had

to put two and two together,

but they pointed out that like,

when you remove this app,

it just comes back.

And this happens to state department

phones as well, which the,

this is where I had to put two

and two together.

The state department is usually the one

handling spies in foreign countries.

So we're forcing this app onto phones and

potentially including of spies, our spies,

in foreign countries.

And I'm trying so very hard not to

be political right now.

But they asked the State Department

whether these concerns,

if they had concerns about the security of

devices of foreign diplomats abroad,

the spokesperson said the agency takes

cybersecurity and protection of department

related issue, blah, blah, blah,

is a PR response.

I'm not even gonna bother reading it.

It was a garbage PR response that didn't

actually say anything.

And again,

I'm not trying to be super political,

but this administration has shown they're

not always on the ball when it comes

to

thinking ahead about cybersecurity and

privacy issues.

So, I mean, this is,

I know it's like I'm not doing a

very good job of not being political,

but I this this is not just like,

well,

it's government phones and they have a

right to do that.

It's like I'm really worried about like

who is getting access to this data.

Why is it pinging this data so much?

Is it sharing this data with third

parties,

potentially hostile countries like Trump

has?

It seems we could be wrong.

We'll see what happens tomorrow.

Trump seems to have come around and maybe

he's not quite as close as with Putin

as he used to be.

Which, you know, on the one hand,

you could argue is a good thing depending

on your political views.

But also, again,

there was that that one like one of

the people who makes this app is Russian.

So it's like, where is this data going?

It's just I don't know, man.

This is this is really unfortunate.

I think it's it's it's pretty crazy.

I don't know.

I think I think I've said plenty there.

Did I miss anything or did anything about

this jump out at you that was worth

discussing?

I think this is funny.

This is pretty funny.

I think it is kind of like one

of those things where it's like,

Why exactly?

Why does this need to be installed on

every device?

I don't know.

I feel like Trump has a little bit

of an ego.

I don't know.

Maybe he thinks that every government

employee needs to have a direct line of

information to their phone, I guess.

But this is like you said.

It's kind of a security risk as well

because this random app that we don't even

know anything about that has a Russian...

like links, like Russian assets in it.

And it's installed on every government

employee's phone.

Like does that, that's, I think, you know,

obviously this would be a lot worse if

it was like forcing it to be installed

on people's personal devices, but like,

yeah, this is a,

this is a government issued device.

Right.

So it's not like it's,

that bad in that respect I think you

kind of unfortunately you kind of give up

any privacy when you're doing something

for work right like your your if your

work I mean it should be that your

work supplies you with devices to do your

work right that should be how it is

but I know that's not the case in

every country I'm not sure if that's the

case in the US maybe it isn't so

but obviously if you're working for the

government then that's a whole other thing

right so it's

Yeah, I don't know.

This is just kind of bizarre, actually.

It's just kind of bizarre.

Like,

I'm not really sure why they thought that

this would need to be installed on every

person's device.

Like, I could understand if it was, like,

every government employee needs to have

Trump Messenger on their phone.

I'd be like, okay, well, you know,

it's like, I can understand that, like,

because they need to communicate, right?

But this is just, like,

an app that has, like, some...

Like you said,

there's unadulterated propaganda or

whatever.

There's just a whole bunch of not really

that relevant stuff in the app that

doesn't really seem that useful.

It's just increasing the security risk for

no reason.

It doesn't really compute to me.

I'm not really sure what the purpose of

this is exactly.

Is it to make government employees...

be up to date on information about the

government.

Maybe I would say maybe, but.

So, yeah, it's, um, first of all, to,

to comment on something you said.

So legally in the U S a company

cannot force you to download an app or

something on your personal device.

Um, but generally speaking,

especially smaller companies,

they don't have the money to give you

your own device.

And especially for like lower ranking

jobs, like, you know,

if you're not to malign anybody flipping

burgers at McDonald's,

but if you're flipping burgers at

McDonald's,

the company's not going to give you an

iPhone just to like clock in or whatever.

Um,

And it kind of becomes one of those,

again, not to be too political,

but it becomes like a class struggle thing

where it's like, okay,

you desperately need a job.

This is the first interview you've had in

months,

which is a potentially true story here in

the US based on some of the stories

I've heard from fellow job seekers.

I don't know why I said fellow,

but job seekers.

And it's like, okay, we're hiring you,

but you have to download this app.

Are you really in a position to say

no?

You don't really have a lot of meaningful

choice there, in my opinion.

But legally, technically,

you can say no or they have to

provide you with a phone.

But the government, I think,

usually does provide a phone,

especially at the federal level.

They tend to have a lot of money.

I remember when I joined the military,

my recruiter had a government phone.

I did not, but he was, you know,

recruiter was a special job where they did

get a government phone.

So they probably do have them.

They probably wouldn't be forced to

download this onto their personal device.

But yeah, it's like you said,

it's so like...

They said this seems to be the same

version as the one that's available to the

public.

So this is not like a special version

of the White House app.

And it says that it promises a mixture

of, quote, real-time updates, live events,

and direct access to the presidency.

The article says that under the social

section of the app,

users can see posts from the White House

Twitter account,

Trump's own true social posts,

and videos shared on an official TikTok

and Instagram account,

among other platforms.

The new section of the app includes White

House press releases, briefings,

and fact sheets,

as well as selected articles from Fox,

Breitbart, Reuters, the New York Post,

and other outlets,

all of which paint a positive picture of

the administration's policies or attack

Democrats.

So, I mean, again,

struggling as best I can to put personal

opinions and political commentary aside,

you're absolutely right.

Like, what purpose does this serve?

Especially because based on my limited

time working in government –

Anything important is an email.

Like,

I cannot imagine that you're going to get

a ping from this app's notifications

that's like, by the way,

you're getting a raise or like, you know,

like they've changed the menu in the

cafeteria today.

Like,

I just cannot imagine what this app could

possibly tell you that you couldn't figure

out either A,

by just reading the news yourself from

your outlet of choice or B,

that you won't get an email from your

boss.

So yeah, it's...

It's a very strange,

as far as I know,

I could be wrong,

but I don't think any other administration

has ever like done this.

And I know relatively speaking,

we haven't had a whole lot of digital

presidencies.

I think Obama was like the first really

digital president, so to speak.

But yeah, this is definitely,

it's a choice.

We'll say that.

Yeah,

I think the easy way to get through

to people about this, you know,

depending on,

I know there's people out there who,

you know,

probably don't agree with us on our

political views, but like, you know,

I think we can all agree that like

a crappy,

poorly coded like app that has like

malware in it is probably not a good

idea to have on government employee

devices, you know,

especially like you said,

people in other countries, like,

You know, spies, government employees,

all sorts of stuff.

Like it sounds like a national security

risk to me.

That's what it sounds like.

That's what jumped out at me is like

I guarantee you from that garbage PR

response that the White House gave Wired

or Ars Technica here,

it's like if it wasn't on foreign devices,

I feel like they would say that.

It's something to that effect.

But this whole like we take cybersecurity

and protection of department-issued

devices, not personnel by the way,

just devices,

any applications made available on the

blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

It's like so yes.

So right now,

there is somebody operating in China that

keeps getting this crap pushed to his

phone every freaking night when he removes

it, and you're putting his life at risk.

And I need to stop there.

Yeah,

I don't really think I have too much

more to add here.

I think this is for people outside the

US.

This is kind of funny.

But like for people in the US,

you know,

this is kind of a this is kind

of a national security concern, I think.

So I mean, I'm with you.

Like for as somebody who's not working in

government,

it's like it's easy for me to just

put my head in my hands like, oh,

but it's like, dude,

like you're getting you're putting people

at risk.

It's

Yeah, exactly.

I think also,

I guess we can dive into the next

story here.

We kind of talked about that for a

while, unless you have any more to add,

Nate?

No, I'm good.

Cool.

All right, so this next story,

fifty percent of LG and Samsung smart TVs

embed residential proxies.

So thousands of smart TV applications

available on LG and Samsung platforms

contain software that turns devices into

residential proxy nodes.

Researchers at Spur Intelligence

identified proxy SDKs in two thousand of

six thousand WebOS and Tizen apps they

analyzed.

So I guess if you don't know what

a residential proxy is,

it's basically like a VPN node,

but it's in a residential IP.

So basically, you know,

turning someone's smart TV into a VPN

node.

And the reason why this is actually useful

to, you know,

threat actors is because they

a lot of times these residential IP

addresses aren't actually,

they have good reputation.

They actually don't have restrictions

because a lot of these, you know,

VPN IP addresses,

a lot of times they're abused by,

you know, people doing nefarious stuff.

So, you know,

when you have a residential proxy IP

address,

you're actually bypassing a lot of the

issues that VPNs have.

And a lot of times these residential

proxies are even used in botnets and DDoS

attacks.

You know,

having all these thousands of Tizen and LG

TVs just like all DDoSing somebody.

So, you know,

that is another thing they can do.

I guess also kind of, you know,

Reading more from the article here,

researchers found that Bright Data,

Bright Data LTD and Bright SDK were

associated through three hundred and sixty

seven proxy enabled apps,

while Honeygrain UAB,

an Oxylab subsidiary,

appeared as the publisher of sixteen

applications.

And most of those apps were identified as

simple games, screensavers,

clocks and utility tools.

And basically,

the way these apps would work is they

would obtain consent basically through a

one-time prompt during the setup process.

And it would basically say like, oh,

do you want to allow network access or

whatever?

And yeah,

the report sites examples in which users

are given a choice between viewing

advertisements and allowing the app to

monetize the internet connection via a

proxy network.

And I guess this is also kind of

a massive security risk, right?

You're basically allowing some random

company to have access to your internet

connection to make connections to other

people outside the network.

So, yeah,

you don't want like random traffic

associated with your IP address, right?

Like it could be people doing stuff that's

illegal.

It could be people DDoSing.

You know,

you don't want your residential IP address

associated with that activity.

So...

Yeah,

the article also says it can raise privacy

concerns because proxy-enabled TV apps

could create security risks because they

operate on the same network as routers,

printers, cameras, NAS devices,

and computers.

And if a proxy provider's safeguards fail

or are bypassed,

attackers could potentially gain a

foothold inside some home networks.

so i kind of shared this a little

bit um with people in my life because

unfortunately i know people that are using

lg and samsung televisions and honestly i

wouldn't be surprised if some of them

actually had these residential proxy apps

installed so it's kind of concerning that

this is so popular and it actually exists

on so many apps on these tvs um

do you have anything you wanted to add

as well nate

No, I think there's a couple of things.

Like you said, it's very,

like I'll admit on one of our TVs,

I did kind of poke around the app

stores a little bit and I did look

at like, oh, here's a really cute,

it's the Roku TV, I'll say that.

And I'll say why I said that in

a minute.

You know,

I poke around and I look at like,

oh,

there's a really cute like a like it's

a screensaver of foxes or whatever.

It's super cute.

But then eventually I just decided like,

yeah,

but I like the standard Roku one where

it just shows the city and there's like,

you know,

you get to spot all the movie references

and stuff in the background.

So but my point being is like, yeah,

you know,

I feel like a lot of the time,

especially with Android, I am.

We talk about like, oh, you know,

there was this malicious app that was

removed and it's been downloaded like five

hundred thousand times.

And it's like it's actually like thirteen

different apps that all have the same

malware in it.

And when you look at the list of

apps, in my personal opinion,

it's some of the dumbest crap I've ever

seen.

It's like, oh, it's like a flashlight app.

And it's like your phone already has a

flashlight.

What are you doing?

Or, you know, it's like...

like an AI powered PDF scanner or like

just all these weird things that I'm like,

why are people even downloading this?

But, you know,

things like I don't know who's playing

games on their TV, but like screensavers,

clocks, utilities.

I'm like, OK,

I could see why people download that kind

of stuff.

So it really sucks.

And.

Yeah, it's just a reminder that,

especially with these IoT devices,

at the top of the show,

we talked about desktop versus mobile

device and privacy and security.

And with these IoT devices,

you get neither.

There's so little meaningful stuff you can

do to them.

in terms of hardening them or adding

privacy protections.

There's the classic joke that the S in

IoT stands for security.

And if you're confused,

just think about it for a second,

because I didn't get it the first time

either.

And so it's one of those things where

less is definitely more with these kind of

devices.

Just stick to the official apps that you

really need to use.

And I mean, I'll note, you know, like,

yeah, in a perfect world, like, you know,

spin up a Jellyfin server, right?

And just like try to keep it in-house

and then it doesn't even need to hit

the WAN.

But, you know, basic things,

changing the default passwords, you know,

trying to put,

maybe put like a DNS on your router

that's known to block malware.

That's not a hundred percent safe,

but it's, I mean, it's, you know,

it's all these things add up and,

I think, um,

the last thing I want to say, uh,

just because I can never resist a chance

to take a shot at Samsung.

The article does point out that, um,

cause in, in these,

I think these particular ones,

they focus it on like bright data,

massive and oxy labs.

I think these are actual like advertising

companies that technically aren't doing

anything illegal.

They're just being really shady and not

super transparent,

but they're not malware by the technical

definition.

Um,

But they do know that...

Where did it go?

They say one of the reasons that this

is popular,

especially with LG and Samsung,

Amazon's developer rules prohibit apps

that facilitate third-party proxy

services,

while Roku has reportedly blocked

applications that use the Bright SDK and

similar technologies.

Spur found no equivalent public

restrictions from LG or Samsung.

So...

Yeah,

basically the LG and Samsung are letting

this happen, which is super unfortunate.

But yeah, it's – oh,

there was one other thing I wanted to

say.

You're absolutely right about – a lot of

the time when we talk about compromised

IoT devices like routers, for example,

we try to point out –

Partially as like, here's how you,

one way that you can find out if

this has happened to you,

but also like just to kind of,

I think I do it to kind of

motivate people.

If your router, for example,

has been hijacked by a crypto miner,

you'll notice a slowed network.

So that's not only one way you'll know,

maybe not know, but you might suspect,

but also to kind of motivate people like,

yeah,

you should care about this because your

internet's going to slow down and that

sucks.

Yeah.

But yeah,

Jordan noted that this could even come

back to you.

There was a story that I could try

to go find if anybody cares,

but there was a story about a British

couple that the police showed up at their

door and basically accused them of

downloading CSAM,

like child sexual abuse material.

And it turned out that somebody,

I think it might've even been their

neighbor,

like hijacking their wifi or something,

but somebody somehow had gotten access to

their router and done illegal things from

their router.

So it all pointed back to them.

And thank God the family was cleared.

Like the cops spoke to them and the

cops were like, okay,

clearly this was not you.

I think they found the malware.

They got it all cleared away,

but still it's like, those are, um,

A very good book,

not to ramble too much,

but what's it called?

Tracers in the Dark by Andy Greenberg,

who is a fantastic tech journalist for

Wired, I believe.

this book takes place in four parts and

it's basically talking about a cyber

crime.

The last part of the book specifically

focused on like CSAM sites.

And they talked about the first person

that the cops, like not the first ever,

but the cops he spoke to,

they started this new operation to take

down a site.

And the first person that they like

arrested.

So they arrested him,

they booked him and they're like,

you're charged with this.

Okay.

Like go home.

And cause you know, if you don't know,

you know,

Um, when they let him go,

he jumped out of his high rise apartment

building, um,

to put it in a way that YouTube

will let us get away with.

And, uh,

that was the moment that all the cops

realized it's like, we need to,

and I'm pretty sure he was guilty,

but they realized like,

we need to make a hundred percent sure

that we're guilty if we arrest people,

because this destroys people's lives.

Like this dude was basically like,

my life is over.

I can't go back to work.

And again, he was guilty, but you know,

it's, it's like, that's my point is like,

even though this family was cleared, um,

those are the kinds of things that like

stay with you.

And it doesn't matter how many times you

say like, Oh,

but the cops said we were good.

It's like, people are like, uh-huh.

Did they really sure?

Like, yeah.

So I don't know.

I'm not trying to scare people, but it's,

it's,

this stuff does have serious consequences

and it's scary stuff.

So be careful what you put on your

devices and what devices you let into your

home and which ones you let on the

internet in general.

Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.

Tip your servers.

I would say, yeah, I kind of,

I don't know, maybe this is bad advice,

but I would say probably try not to

use the integrated operating system

included on your smart TV.

I feel like a lot of times it's

got a lot of issues.

Like it'll be, you know, not secure.

It'll allow installation of malware like

that.

It's usually not getting security updates

as well.

And, you know, it depends.

Maybe you're logging into a bunch of stuff

on your smart TV and all those accounts

could get compromised.

Or like we saw in this story,

like a bunch of apps have just got

like a residential proxy included,

which I think most people would say they

don't want on their

on their TV.

Um, and you know,

there's options outside of using the

operating system included on your

television, or, you know, you could do,

you could do something really wild.

You could like not use a television.

I mean, but that is,

maybe that's too far.

Um, but I think, you know, there's,

there's definitely,

there's definitely issues with

this sort of stuff.

We've,

we haven't really looked too much into

like what the options are like at privacy

guides.

Like we don't have any formal

recommendations, I guess, but I mean,

I think you'd probably be a lot better

off if you went with something from like

a major manufacturer,

like Google or Apple,

like as much as I dislike Google and

Apple,

like

you know,

you're not going to have an issue with

an app being a residential proxy or, like,

getting software updates.

So, yeah,

I think it's definitely something that you

should try and think about.

A lot of people kind of forget when

it comes to IoT devices, like,

is this device getting updates?

Is this whole process of installing apps,

is it, like, you know,

are these apps vetted?

Is this an official app, you know?

I think it's a good thing to think

about if you haven't really thought about

using, you know,

securing your that area of your life I

guess so I mean I don't really have

more to add to this but I think

it's definitely worth checking and you

know the the the worst the best I

think process here would just be using as

little apps as possible just like install

absolutely the bare minimum that you need

you know don't install screen savers don't

install like

random apps that you don't know what they

do.

So just be careful out there.

Yeah,

don't really have too much more to add.

Yeah, I mean, me personally,

I'm the kind of person, like,

if the screensaver comes on,

that probably means I need to turn the

TV off because I'm doing other stuff.

But yeah, I'm with you.

Like,

the only things we have installed on our

TVs are Jellyfin, Crunchyroll,

because my wife does actually watch a lot

of anime, and Apple Music,

because I'm the one who will be like,

oh, okay, I'm sitting out here.

Or it's more like if company comes over,

like, we're not really watching TV,

but we just want some background noise on,

so I'll just put on, like, some music.

But yeah, it's definitely...

The only other thing I wanted to add

is I think if you're reasonably tech

savvy,

which I think most of our viewers are,

maybe one of those DNS options that lets

you see what network connections are

happening, like Next DNS, Piehole.

I know IVPN's got their mod DNS or

whatever now, something like that.

I don't know.

Some of them I think don't really give

you a lot of control over it,

but I know like mod DNS and pie

hole, for example, you'll be able to see,

you know,

where it's connecting and block it,

which I mean,

really the important thing is to know

like, Oh, this is making connections.

Like what the hell is this random Russian

IP address that it's connecting to?

And I mean,

that alone will let you know what's going

on, but yeah, I think,

I don't know if I want to,

I don't know if I want to say

too much.

Somebody well-known in our privacy chat

was actually asking about this very

specific article earlier.

And we were kind of talking about what

sort of defenses,

like how can you detect it and stuff

like that.

So hopefully they will dig up some stuff

in the research and maybe we can share

it with you guys about how to detect

this stuff and defend against it.

But I don't want to say who and

too much more because I don't want to

commit them to something if they don't

turn anything up.

But yeah.

That's all I got.

So, yeah.

I mean, again,

it's been kind of a more relaxed episode.

And we've been taking viewer questions.

But we'll definitely shift over to the

official Q&A segment in a little bit.

So if you've been holding on to any

questions or you've just been kind of

listening in the background and anything

popped into your head,

go ahead and leave your questions either

in the chat or we do have a

forum that I've been keeping open in

another window and keeping an eye on.

Forum post, I mean.

But in the meantime,

we're going to hop over to the community

forum.

Um, there's always a lot of activity and,

uh,

there were definitely a lot of posts this

week.

Um, but this week specifically,

I think the, uh,

the one I wanted to share the most,

um, came from one of our,

our regulars and the title of this post

says deflock groups may be organizing near

you.

And I think I, um,

I wanted to share this just kind of

as a shout out and like a call

to action for anybody who doesn't know.

So you guys probably know about Flock,

the license plate reader,

very wildly unpopular company with a,

I live in America,

I'm going to say a completely insane CEO

and has a lot of hot takes about

how all privacy people just like want

crime and lawlessness to win.

Clearly I love crime.

It's my favorite.

Um,

that's why I've never publicly endorsed

piracy because I love crime so much

anyways.

Um, so yeah, one of our members has,

uh, posted this,

this forum post that is a deflock groups

may be organizing near you.

And basically they say,

if you're living in the U S and

you're concerned about flock cameras, uh,

there's a good possibility that there's

local groups at either the state or the

city level.

And, um,

they may also care about additional rights

besides just flock.

And they basically just left a list of

local groups that they're aware of.

And, um,

I am so sorry,

but I am going to read off the

list of states here very quickly.

So if you think you heard yours,

go ahead and check the newsletter in the

show notes and see if it's in there.

But Alabama, Arizona, California,

Colorado, Connecticut, Washington, D.C.,

Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana,

Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Missouri,

North Carolina, Nevada, Ohio,

South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas,

Virginia, Washington State, and Wisconsin.

And of course,

you can always start your own.

So, yeah,

I guess I just wanted to share that

because I know we do have a –

we're trying to encourage people to get

involved and speak up wherever possible,

and that may be a good starting point.

If you're, like,

not really sure where to go and you

live in one of those areas,

definitely check this link that they left

here and see if you can get connected

with a local group.

I –

I'll go ahead and say, um,

I'm on the board of EFF Austin.

I know I mentioned that before we have

done some work with, uh,

the no ALPRs chapter in Texas.

Um, super awesome people.

And that is how I ended up on

the board was I was just like, I,

I don't really have a lot of money

to donate, but I want to get involved.

And I found like a local digital rights

group and I just started showing up and

attending meetings and volunteering my

time.

And, um,

we've been able to do some really cool

stuff.

Um,

Mostly thanks to other board members,

not really so much myself,

but I help keep us organized, I guess.

So yeah, it's definitely, in my opinion,

I mean, I'm biased,

but I think it's worth it to get

involved in these kind of groups.

So yeah,

I think that's all I got on that

one.

Do you have anything you wanted to add

about that, Jordan?

I think it is kind of important to

get involved locally.

A lot of people, I think,

they kind of think that this is a

privacy thing, like, oh,

I'll just install uBlock Origin and run

Linux and Graphene OS and not do anything.

But it's like there's all these issues

that are going on in the real world,

too, that are super important.

There's not that many default groups right

now.

You've got, what, fifty states?

And there's not even twenty, maybe?

I was going to say,

is that maybe just under half,

give or take?

Okay.

Definitely a lot of room for improvement.

Yeah, definitely a bit of room to improve.

And, you know, even some,

it looks like some states have got,

you know, like five or six.

So get out there.

You know,

maybe if there's no group in your local

area, you know, get on it.

Start a chapter or something.

And I just want to say smaller States

too.

Like obviously you would look at a state

like California, that's just massive.

And you would expect to see multiple

groups,

but I mean like Arizona has to Colorado

has to Florida has like five, which, okay.

I guess Florida is a little bit bigger

of a state,

but Illinois has got like five.

Virginia's got four.

Ohio's got five.

Did I say Virginia?

Virginia's got like seven.

Holy crap.

Virginia is not that big of a state.

So yeah, I mean,

Yeah, there's room for everybody for sure.

It also does seem like some of these

groups are groups for other stuff,

but they also are against this stuff.

So if you're involved in a local...

political group maybe you can get them on

board with this sort of stuff it looks

like i did see there was one in

virginia dsa so maybe see if you've if

you're a part of a local like political

group you can get involved with that or

you know start your own thing yeah and

i mean just to put it out there

we have the privacyguides.org activism

talks about like how to organize how to

uh

how to, you know, it's,

it's not like a step-by-step maybe,

I don't know that I don't want to

commit.

That might be a little too much,

but maybe we should look into seeing if

we can put out a guide about how

to actually start a group.

Cause I mean, it's honestly,

in my experience,

granted limited experience,

but it's not that hard.

It's just,

it's a patience game because you have to

like,

Okay.

You have to go find a venue,

which is usually not too hard.

You can usually find someplace that's

willing to like, yeah,

you guys can have like, you know,

you can go to a restaurant and it's

like,

you guys can have the back room like

once a month or something.

And then, but then from there,

like the real challenge is just getting

the word out and getting people to show

up, I think.

So it's, it's, it's not complicated.

That's what it is.

It's not hard or it is hard,

but it's not complicated, but you know,

it's, I mean, I don't know.

I think we should, uh,

maybe look into that.

I'm not making any promises,

but I'll look into that and see if

we can offer any advice there.

Yeah.

There's public spaces, you know,

libraries, all sorts of places there.

They don't care about that sort of stuff.

They'll let you, if you have a group,

they'll let you, you know,

set up shop a little bit.

So I think it's definitely very positive

stuff.

I think, you know, we should try and

make sure this gets more popular because

the more that this stuff gets more

popular, the more normalized it is.

You know, I feel like some people,

they hear the word like activist and they

immediately recoil,

which is a bit of a problem, right?

Because, you know,

like this stuff isn't going to change if

nobody does anything.

So like,

When we see all these flock cameras being

put up and then nothing happens,

it's like, well,

you've got to do something.

You've got to actually get out there and

make some noise because...

That's kind of how you get your rights,

right?

You have to fight for them.

You don't just get them automatically.

So yeah, definitely important.

Definitely check out privacyguides.org

forward slash activism if you're

interested in learning more about that.

But yeah,

we're definitely not opposed to expanding

the activism section.

It's something we've been talking about.

you know,

possibly doing more improvements to that.

But we kind of just, yeah,

see how we go with that.

I don't really have anything more to add

on this.

Was there anything else you wanted to

cover on the forum this week?

No, it was a really busy week,

but a lot of it... And personally,

this actually makes me happy.

A lot of it was questions,

especially from newbies.

I feel like I saw a lot of

questions from new people this week,

which makes me so happy, personally,

that there's new people getting into

privacy.

I am a...

I am a firm believer that there are

no stupid questions that are asked in good

faith.

So, um, I mean,

definitely use the search function.

Cause I mean,

the forum has been around for a long

time and there's a good chance that

somebody else has asked your question,

but, uh, it's still like,

if you do a search and it's not

there, like, you know, it's, it's,

it's cool to see people like getting into

privacy and learning is kind of what I'm

getting at.

But,

Um, yeah, that was,

that was kind of all I saw in

the forum.

So I think we're good to open the

floor if anybody's been holding on to any

questions.

Definitely.

Um, I guess, yeah,

I didn't really see any other stories in

the forum this week either.

Definitely been, oh, we keep saying it,

but like, yeah, it's been,

it's been a kind of slow week and

yeah.

you know, it's very rare.

I feel like it is so rare.

Like we've been kind of working pretty

hard since and, you know,

we rarely get a week where we're like,

oh, there's nothing we can talk about.

There's not really any big story.

So it's nice to, you know,

sometimes have a little bit of a more

chill time and, you know,

talk about some more positive stuff as

well.

So that is good.

Yeah,

I think one time when I was at

Surveillance Reporter, when I was there,

our episodes averaged about thirty to

forty five minutes, depending on the week.

And I think there was one time we

literally had like an eleven minute

episode because there was just no news at

all that week.

It was it was really weird.

But, you know,

in the like five years I was there,

that only happened once.

So.

So it does happen.

Definitely.

I mean,

not really seeing any other questions,

unless there's anything you really wanted

to talk about this week.

Trying to think.

Yeah.

Like we've covered most things.

I'm not really seeing any,

any other comments anywhere else either.

So maybe we do wrap it up early

this week.

I guess so.

Yeah.

I mean,

I don't know why I want to talk

about sci-fi, but what else is new?

I always want to do that.

That's all I got.

Yeah.

Okay.

So yeah,

we'll wrap it up a little bit early

this week.

Again, for the ten millionth time,

lighter week.

But all the updates from this week in

privacy will be shared on the blog every

week.

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