cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/25882429

scarily… They don’t need to to be this creepy, but even I’m a tad baffled by this.

Yesterday me and a few friends were at a pub quiz, of course no phones allowed, so none were used.

It came down to a tie break question of my team and another. “What is the run time of the Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the ring” according to IMDb.

We answered and went about our day. Today my friend from my team messaged me - top post on his “today feed” is an article published 23 hours ago…

Forgive the pointless red circle… I didnt take the screenshot.

My friend isn’t a privacy conscience person by any means, but he didnt open IMDb or google anything to do with the franchise and hasn’t for many months prior. I’m aware its most likely an incredible coincidence, but when stuff like this happens I can easily understand why many people are convinced everyone’s doom brick is listening to them…

  • Fetus@lemmy.world
    122·
    19 hours ago

    Why do you think phones aren’t listening? All of my anecdotal evidence leads me to believe that they absolutely will, depending on the apps installed.

    I’ve been using LineageOS and GrapheneOS for maybe 8 years or so, and never have any social media / google apps installed, as well as ad / tracker blocking.

    My friends, family, co-workers etc. are often served ads for very specific things immediately after we were talking about them. Toys, tools, kitchen equipment, even flights to countries or cities that were being discussed. All far too specific to be coincidence.

    So while the phone itself may not be listening, apps can, depending on permissions etc.

    • Ulrich@feddit.orgEnglish
      1·
      9 hours ago

      Why do you think phones aren’t listening?

      So while the phone itself may not be listening

      Probably the same thing that makes you think they aren’t. There’s no evidence to suggest otherwise. My phone has an indicator for when the microphone is accessed, and it’s never come on without good reason. I suppose it’s possible the OS could be accessing it without tripping the indicator, but that’s why you should use an open source OS.

    • MajorHavoc@programming.dev
      1·
      17 hours ago

      So while the phone itself may not be listening, apps can, depending on permissions etc.

      Yep. That’s the best of my knowledge, today.

      I haven’t seen any evidence that the operating system, itself, is listening.

      But we know that many free, and even some paid subscription apps (check out the permissions on Paramount Plus!) are watching the screen or listening to the microphone.

      We know these apps sell the data they collect to absolutely everyone.

      There’s every reason to believe that collected screen, microphone (and possibly camera?) data then gets correlated with location data collected directly by Google.

      Source: I’m a Cybersecurity professional who knows waaay too much about the state of what is possible, and why.

      The why is mainly just Google and Meta using their influence for evil.