Hans-Christoph Steiner @eighthave@librem.one
Joined Aug 2019
Its frustrating to see how deeply #Copyright cartels have infiltrated our culture, that people call making cost-free digital copies "theft" even in countries where it is fully legal to do so. It is not even "copyright infringement" if it is not against the local copyright laws. And yes, unlike laws about theft, copyright laws vary widely around the world. I've always liked "Copying Is Not Theft" has an illustration of the difference https://yewtu.be/watch?v=IeTybKL1pM4
I still don't get why #Apple #AppStore or #GooglePlay do not allow devs to give source when uploading apps for review. It makes review tasks much easier and more reliable, as we've seen with #FDroid's review. Would it scare the #proprietary app devs too much? Are they more interested in cheap "window dressing" reviews than actually catching things? It is hard not to see bias since both are #gatekeepers getting lots of money from apps they are policing.
For example
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/apple-tries-to-close-privacy-loopholes-with-new-app-submission-policy/ 1/
Crazy #circumvention tool idea: set up #spam #honeypot then mine the emails for #IPFS gateways, which are then automatically shared out to users who have browser plugin installed which unblocks access to anything in IPFS.
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
Turns out that Web Environment Integrity proposal everybody is getting angry about (imo very legitimately) was effectively already shipped by Apple in Safari last year: https://httptoolkit.com/blog/apple-private-access-tokens-attestation/
That means if Chromium ships it too, we could quickly move to 90%+ of browser traffic being attested. Not good!
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
#Mozilla has published its position on the "Web Environment Integrity API" proposal put forward by the #Google #Chrome team.
First paragraph: "Mozilla opposes this proposal because it contradicts our principles and vision for the Web."
https://github.com/mozilla/standards-positions/issues/852#issuecomment-1648820747
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
'Ada & Zangemann - A tale of software, skateboards, and raspberry ice cream' book reading
☑️ FrOSCon 2023
🗓️ 6 August
⏰ 10 h
📍HS7
💻 https://programm.froscon.org/2023/events/2986.html
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
"#Google's newest proposed web standard is... #DRM?" -- Google is proposing yet another user-hostile feature and aims to make it an web standard called "Web Environment Integrity API". This lets websites confirm the browser has limitations on what it can do, going against #UserFreedom. The #IETF internet standard RFC 8890 declares "The Internet Is For End Users". Google's API circumvents that.
Thanks to Ron Amadeo for his a concise, cutting analysis:
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-web-integrity-api-sounds-like-drm-for-the-web/
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
#Google’s nightmare “Web Integrity API” wants a #DRM gatekeeper for the web | #ArsTechnica
Oh, great! Seems we have a 180° turn, and we are now doing the #NetNeutrality 2.0 discussion. Honestly, I always wonder how they think they could possibly implement something like this?
Do they think no one in the tech world will notice and not resist something like this? Do they think this would just result in a 100% conversion rate and every single person would uinstall #Firefox and #Chrome would be the #Netscape of 2023?
Now I understand why they removed the dislike button from #Youtube before they pitched this idea. This is such a #Zuckerberg idea. And the worst part is, he'll probably slap his sticker on this and we'll have this argument again in 6 month's where he'll want to limit the internet to people having VR headsets and being in the #metaverse.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-web-integrity-api-sounds-like-drm-for-the-web/
Looks like the latest release of #FDroid, v1.17.0, does not get flagged by #Google, at least in the #Android 14 emulator. I heard some reports that v1.16.4 also isn't flagged. I don't really know why its flagging F-Droid then. v1.16.4 has an unchanged #targetSdkVersion, but v1.17.0 has it bumped to 28. I have found no way to get info on why they are flagging the app, just this silly "unsafe" warning screen. Is F-Droid being flagged by Google Play Protect on your devices? Please let me know.
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
reminder that #ETSI is overtly and institutionally #backdooring #standards https://media.ccc.de/v/26c3-3721-de-etsi-vorratsdatenspeicherung_2009
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
What to do about the lack of #DataSkills?
In the iTalks series organised by our iLab, 🔟 experts on #DataLiteracy discussed it with almost 7⃣0⃣0⃣ participants from public sector, academia, and civil society! 👩💻
Missed it? Check the slides & recordings 👉 https://europa.eu/!x98WfB
On the other hand, #MLS includes "Group Integrity", which means that all members in a group see the same state. This means all members see the same list of members, same message transcript, same message order, etc. #Signal Protocol does not guarantee Group Integrity. I think this is an important property, but I wonder how much this was actually abused in the real world with other protocols? 3/
Hans-Christoph Steiner
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New: NitroPhone MDM For Enterprise #cybersecurity #android https://www.nitrokey.com/news/2023/nitrophone-mdm-enterprise
One big concern I have about #MLS over something like #Signal Protocol is that it makes it so the cost of sending a message to a group of 10 is about the same as sending to a group of 1000 or more. This is the opposite of how physical social interaction works, it is much more effort to speak in front of large groups. This gives advantage to spam, disinfo, trolling, etc. as compared to protocols where the cost linearly increases as the number of users in the group increases. 2/
#MLS Messaging Layer Security has just been officially standardized by the #IETF, this is a great new development, especially in combination with standard protocols like #Matrix and #XMPP. https://blog.phnx.im/rfc-9420-mls/ 1/
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
Public Money, Public Code! Code paid by the people should be available to the people!
🔹 Sign the Open Letter: https://publiccode.eu/en/openletter/
🔸 Listen to @johas explaining this demand in this podcast: https://egovernment-podcast.com/egov139-fsfe-pmpc/
#CriticalMass #Vienna heat map of paths taken since 2011.
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
Turkmenistan continues to block Tor and anti-censorship tools at a large scale. Tor bridges prove to be one of the few free alternatives to access the open internet. If you have the resources to help, please consider running bridges. How? Take a look: https://forum.torproject.org/t/tor-relays-help-turkmens-to-bypass-internet-censorship-run-an-obfs4-bridge/7002/7
After mostly living off grants I wrote or helped write for a decade, it still feels like a gamble whenever I submit a proposal. I guess the key is to submit many, and find an acceptable failure rate. It still sucks to put a bunch of work into something, then it is just rejected.📝 💥💨
Hans-Christoph Steiner
boosted
While F-Droid appears to be "just" an alternative #OpenSource #AppStore for #Android, it is actually the apex of a lifestyle movement that's choosing to use Android only with #FreeSoftware and without #Google or advertising-related #surveillance. Realising that makes many of its features - and shortcomings - easier to understand. I was the main interviewer in the discussion this week on #FLOSS Weekly with core @fdroidorg developer @eighthave and it was a good show.
https://twit.tv/shows/floss-weekly/episodes/741?autostart=false
Joined Aug 2019
