De-centralization and open source was always the better way. Technology started on this path and the corporate powers have done everything they can to sabotage and destroy open tech.
this post was submitted on 18 May 2024
18 points (100.0% liked)
Curated Tumblr
3959 readers
222 users here now
For preserving the least toxic and most culturally relevant Tumblr heritage posts.
Image descriptions and plain text captions of written content are expected of all screenshots. Here are some image text extractors (I looked these up quick and will gladly take FOSS recommendations):
-web
-iOS
Please begin copied raw text posts (lacking a screenshot that makes it apparent it is from Tumblr) with:
# This has been reposted here to Lemmy as part of the "Curated Tumblr Project."
I made the icon using multiple creative commons svg resources, the banner is this.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
Been this way with every new tech I reckon. See also DVD burners and DRM/regional codes.
The problem you are describing is not malware or viruses. They’re just the tools.
The problem is capitalism, which turns everything free into something on which a profit can be made
No.... It's malware. It's not a virus, it's malicious. It's malware.
Thorsquint.jpg
I think i read somewhere that the cia said they dont install bugs anymore because now ppl do that themselfs.
It's also a lot easier to do it in software, since you don't need to splice wires and leave physical traces like you would have had to do in the day.
A well-configured charger or Flash drive can do that job for you, and can spread itself.
USB charger ?
Yes, since most modern chargers and cables have internal chips to communicate capabilities with for things like fast-charging. It is not difficult to have the chip identify itself as something else, and execute a payload.
A common attack method is to have it show up as a keyboard, and execute a series of key-sequences when connected to a computer (like opening and executing things through a command prompt).
It is also why you should try and avoid plugging random USB cables/chargers into your phone/computer when out and about, since you don't exactly know if the other end is what it appears to be.
It was considered best practice to never install anything
In what universe? You might as well never turn on your computer.
In this universe. I didnt want to have 10 fucking different toolbars for my browser. You had to see the correct download button, so that you get your wanted download plus malware/viruses. If you got the wrong you got a lot of malware xD
If there's anyone here that cares about their privacy and doesn't know this already:
If you have a choice between accessing the website through a browser and installing an app, use the browser. Browsers (typically) at least try to protect the types of information that gets sent, whereas there are much fewer restrictions (again, typically) for apps.
Everyone wants you to install apps because apps (typically) get access to much more data.
The worst is many of these apps are just websites repackaged as apps. They just want the elevated access being an app gives them.
That's why Foss will always be better, and we need to support these developers. They also need to protect their software better from capitalist ghouls that will profit from it for free
Protecting FOSS is impossible, there will always be a company that uses your codebase, credits you and includes advertisements to your program.
We need to make using FOSS projects the default and using the corporate options as the backup option.
What I mean is better licenses that make sure you get paid if companies profit from it, and harsher penalties for those that get caught infringing the license
In what fucking universe is this even remotely true? I don't know about you guys, but around those places, in early 2000's, internet access was extremely fucking expensive, so most software was peer-to-peer shared, not even by torrent, but on CD's or floppys, or local neighborhood ad-hoc and internal ISP networks. And the way it got there was mostly from shady CD stores around the corner, where owners paid fortune to download shit and made it back selling it, or PC journals with CDs where they were just filled it up to a brim with whatever garbage they had to boost value.
And there was no access control whatsoever. A literal spyware with full access to your system, that only puts a purple fucking gorilla on your screen, that runs around and does absolutely fucking nothing? Sign me the fuck in. If your virus did something even something remotely useful, like show weather and currency rates, then you could rest assured that it would infect every single computer in the country.
If you were savvy, though, what you'd do is forever sacrifice 50% of your CPU and RAM to the anti-virus and pray to fucking gods you don't touch anything newer than the last version of it you have. Because anything uncaught can and will infect absolutely everything and anything the computer has access to. And your only option would be to just nuke the entire system with all of your data because because any backups you make would also get infected.
Even later, when broadband got cheap and widely available, the internet was for a long time a complete shit show. Remember Flash? Every single ad and every other site used Flash. That shit, along with java applets, was equivalent to automatically downloading and executing any app you see, before you actually even see it. It was also filled with shit like rapidshare and depositfiles, with questionable content and ads on ads over ads, as there was a financial incentive to spam that garbage everywhere and bury anything half-legit under it.
Kids these days really got it easy. See an app requesting something you don't think it needs? Just say no. Us, boomers, didn't have such a luxury. By the time you suspect anything shady going on, it was already too late. There is a downside, though, that manufacturers control what you can and cannot do. It took, like, almost a decade for trivial things like screen recording to even be possible on Android, and things like CheatEngine are straight up impossible. But hey, I'd say that's a reasonable price to pay for not being completely paranoid.
Yeah, when I was setting up my first smartphone there was a very weird moment where I had to go against a lifetime of training on laptops and desktop PCs and just immediately invite every single app to fuck me up the arse if I wanted it to function as anything more than an expensive telephone with a fancy screen. But invite them up my arse I did.
shit like this is why im going to eventually create my own little internet island.
Dw, i'm going to rule over it like a dictator, no democracy here :)
Do it. It's so nice.
Use Wireguard to access it remotely.
I have a theory that this is the next iteration of Internet. A private internet linked by vpn over the public Internet. Probably already exists in some form over Tor or in dusty Pirate communities. All we need is a no-commercial-entities clause and a Yahoo clone and we could rock like it's 1994!
Reminds me of that Futurama clip from over 20 years ago where Fry is on the internet and a literal mob of advertisements surround him.
My God...it's full of ~~stars~~ ads!
Is this an Android issue I am too iOS faithful to understand?
Never seen a calculator ask my location. Most apps will ask nothing besides notification privileges, and will generally explain themselves fairly well before even attempt to ask for anything else. Walled gardens DO have some advantages, it seems.