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0 pointspulse75y ago0 comments

It is time for the governments to take control back and start regulating BigTech: you can not easily opt-out from any data gathering from Google, Microsoft, Apple, Facebook, ... If you try it and turn it off on mobile phone and desktop you will constantly have issues and be flooded with messages like "turn on location services", etc. Yesterday I learned that my private calendar on my phone was replicated to Google Calendar >>for many years<< without my knowledge, because the default setting was to save new events into Google Calendar and not a local phone calendar... and I was not asked during setup if I would like that (I have turned off all replication / data sharing / etc.)... this is just crazy... they are basiclly STEALING MY DATA and sending it to the cloud where it is processed without my knowledge... I hope they pay BIG MONEY for these GDPR breaches...

0 pointspulse75y ago0 comments

0 comments

6 comments · 2 top-level

sam3455y ago· 4 in thread

How is this possible? Probably forgot you gave consent to Google calendar?

ryukafalz5y ago

Recent Android phones sync a ton of stuff automatically - which I suppose you agree to by signing in with a Google account, but that's also typically required. I know this because on the last two Android phones I purchased, a set of old outdated contacts from my Google account were automatically synced to the phone as soon as I logged in, which I was required to do to begin using the device.

Believe me, I would have opted out of this had I been prompted to do so during setup.

pulse7OP5y ago

Time to go away from GMail account...

pulse7OP5y ago

I checked again exactly why this happened: Samsung Calendars app (which is a default calendar app on Samsung phones) has set a default calendar for my new events to my Google Calendar account. And if you just enter the event title and set the time (what one would usually do) - and leave all other settings untouched - then by default it will be added to your Google account which will then be synced to the cloud... You can change these settings (see [1]), but the default is wrong!

[1] https://eu.community.samsung.com/t5/galaxy-s9-series/default...

pulse7OP5y ago

Be sure that I didn't give any consent...

II2II5y ago

I doubt there is an easy fix in cases like Google Calendar due to consumer expectations. Simply put, there are certain types of data that many consumers expect to be synchronised, and those of us who have the opposite expectation (or only want certain data to be synchronised) are likely in the minority.

This is somewhat different from most tracking done on the web, which is done for the exclusive benefit of those doing the tracking.

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