this post was submitted on 15 Aug 2025
1123 points (98.9% liked)
unix_surrealism
2997 readers
173 users here now
The underscore is very important!
A place to share original content related to computers, content, surrealism, wizardry and everything else.
analognowhere things of interest:
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
How does this theft work? Do they break into my computer or accounts & take it unauthorized? Is it my data?
It's mostly passive tracking of network traffic. You data could be further compromised depending on the operating system you use and the threat model under which you operate.
That data seems as much the recipient's data as the sender's or of any system capable to observe transport. If I see someone go down the street & stop somewhere, is that traffic observation really their data? The internet protocol wasn't built for privacy of that layer of activity.
A protocol disclosing data as designed is compromised? Are we talking about (1) actually compromised systems permitting unauthorized access to data or (2) services working as designed & getting data per usage agreement?
Legal definition
If we're talking about (2), then how is that theft?
afaik if you accept to log in to a microsoft account when you install windows 10 or 11, it'll set up your documents, photos and some other directories for sync to your onedrive account.
but if something's running on your computer outside of a browser or VM, it has access to all your files anyway.