Nonsense - internet interactions

[Dave2002]

I wonder how much time we spend - waste - clicking on the popups on every web page asking us for permission to do .... well ... whatever?

The legislation which required companies/organisations to do that is totally bonkers IMO, as surely almost everyone clicks on the wretched things without thinking.
How many people actually ever bother to dig deeper, and find out more? Not many, I guess.

I have done so on a few occasions, but not too often.

Some web pages do link to quite detailed descriptions of other organisations which might track the end user, but many have hardly any information.

It's just a time wasting bit of annoyance - perhaps meant to "protect" us - but in fact gives little if any extra protection IMO.

In the meantime all the interactions we have with web sites are hoovered up in order to track our lives in at least moderate detail.

[LMcD]

I wonder how much time we spend - waste - clicking on the popups on every web page asking us for permission to do .... well ... whatever?

The legislation which required companies/organisations to do that is totally bonkers IMO, as surely almost everyone clicks on the wretched things without thinking.
How many people actually ever bother to dig deeper, and find out more? Not many, I guess.

I have done so on a few occasions, but not too often.

Some web pages do link to quite detailed descriptions of other organisations which might track the end user, but many have hardly any information.

It's just a time wasting bit of annoyance - perhaps meant to "protect" us - but in fact gives little if any extra protection IMO.

In the meantime all the interactions we have with web sites are hoovered up in order to track our lives in at least moderate detail.

At a rough guess, I would say that the total amount of time I've spent clicking on popups in the last 6 months is 0 hours 00 minutes - on the other hand, I've spent too long deleting them when they obscure all or some of an item I actually want to read!

[Dave2002]

At a rough guess, I would say that the total amount of time I've spent clicking on popups in the last 6 months is 0 hours 00 minutes - on the other hand, I've spent too long deleting them when they obscure all or some of an item I actually want to read!

You amaze me. There are several internet irritations. One is the "We are asking your permission to put cookies on to your machine, eat your children, empty your bank account, kill your mother ..." sort of thing. Another is the increasing prevalence of advertising - some of which appears in the middle of documents, and in the case of Youtube videos, interrupts what are quite often worthwhile sources of information. Oh - yes - I heard there are ad-blockers which work.... Has anyone read the T&Cs connected with those - and wondered if they also could be misused?

[Serial_Apologist]

You amaze me. There are several internet irritations. One is the "We are asking your permission to put cookies on to your machine, eat your children, empty your bank account, kill your mother ..." sort of thing. Another is the increasing prevalence of advertising - some of which appears in the middle of documents, and in the case of Youtube videos, interrupts what are quite often worthwhile sources of information. Oh - yes - I heard there are ad-blockers which work.... Has anyone read the T&Cs connected with those - and wondered if they also could be misused?

I have also found in a large number of instances that refusal to agree to cookies has prevented me accessing sites.

[Bryn]

I have also found in a large number of instances that refusal to agree to cookies has prevented me accessing sites.

Indeed, and I have also come across newsagents that will not let you read the papers they sell without paying for them. There's a massive difference between clickbait and abiding by conditions imposed by national and international legislation.

[ahinton]

You amaze me. There are several internet irritations. One is the "We are asking your permission to put cookies on to your machine, eat your children, empty your bank account, kill your mother ..." sort of thing. Another is the increasing prevalence of advertising - some of which appears in the middle of documents, and in the case of Youtube videos, interrupts what are quite often worthwhile sources of information. Oh - yes - I heard there are ad-blockers which work.... Has anyone read the T&Cs connected with those - and wondered if they also could be misused?

I have never knowingly encountered any problems with the AdBlockers that I have tried.

[Dave2002]

I have never knowingly encountered any problems with the AdBlockers that I have tried.

You probably haven't, but if you look at the Small print it probably states that the app will have permission to do various things, including:

accessing all the data in the machine
altering or deleting any data [not just the data areas specified for the app to work ..]
etc., etc.

Ok - so most "reputable" companies, and well written apps won't do things like that, but agreeing to terms like that is rather like agreeing with a person or organisation that they can do something - such as repossessing your house - taking funds out of your accounts, while at the same time being assured that "of course that will never happen, and of course we won't do it ...". I was once asked to be a guarantor of someone else's loan - which I ignored - as when I checked I found that despite there being no obvious intent to defraud me, the banks involved would have had no compunction in chasing me for the funds if they failed to get payment from the person on whose behalf I was asked. They would also have had legal authority to do so.

[french frank]

I was once asked to be a guarantor of someone else's loan

I think that's a bit different. If the loan is for £1m and the debtor defaults, of course you'd have to pay up - and sell up if necessary. What else would 'being a guarantor' mean? If the debtor is a close friend, you'd do better to give them the money to pay off the loan and owe the money to you instead. If they aren't a close friend, erm … ?

(I use AdBlock Plus)

[Petrushka]

I think that's a bit different. If the loan is for £1m and the debtor defaults, of course you'd have to pay up - and sell up if necessary. What else would 'being a guarantor' mean? If the debtor is a close friend, you'd do better to give them the money to pay off the loan and owe the money to you instead. If they aren't a close friend, erm … ?

Faced with this very question, from a close relative, I chose instead to take on the loan myself and be paid back by said relative. Had there been a default I calculated that I could take the hit but, now that the loan is in its final year, I'm wondering if there is any mileage in paying off the balance early while said relative continues to pay me back. On the whole there may not be much point but I don't know what the final settlement figure might be unless I ask.

[Dave2002]

I think that's a bit different. If the loan is for £1m and the debtor defaults, of course you'd have to pay up - and sell up if necessary. What else would 'being a guarantor' mean? If the debtor is a close friend, you'd do better to give them the money to pay off the loan and owe the money to you instead. If they aren't a close friend, erm … ?

(I use AdBlock Plus)

I don’t think it’s different at all. Suppose you install a lock on your house to prevent thieves from getting in, but in the small print there was a note that the installation would allow those who fitted the lock to enter your house for any purpose whatsoever. You point out that they could come in and steal all your possessions, or cause any amount of mayhem. If you challenge them the response would be “but we’ll never do that...”. However, if later on some such event did occur, then it would be very hard to deny that there was an agreement.

Allowing other people free access to all the data on your computer is potentially very risky, even though at any point in time the risks would be low. Also you have to remember that the criminals - and possibly others - such as government agencies - are not simply working with small likelihood of being able to access such data, but are actively working together in order to gain access. They are not “accidents” - the criminals do collect and exchange data about how to gain access, to steal data, to cause damage, and also to try to avoid detection.

The internet has global reach, and many of the people who use it are not under the UK’s jurisdiction. The relative ease of accessing data and causing damage to an installation is far greater than the ease of travelling and causing similar damage to physical systems.

Re your comments about guarantors that is exactly why I chose to ignore the request, rather than explicitly reject it. I understand why the request was made - it was quite a while back - and I’m still in amicable contact with the person who made the request on behalf of one of his children. I did consider it, and it became apparent that if anything did go wrong we would have been taken to the cleaners.

[Frances_iom]

One obvious approach is to use only one computer, for significant monetary transfers - set up a shopping fund with limited amount in it for your phone.
It's trivial under linux to place the O/S and necessary files for banking on one SSD harddrive and swop this in and out as needed - eg most of my Lenovo laptops swop roles as appropriate by merely exchanging the harddrive - SSD makes it fast to reboot. I release that windoze and apple make this somewhat difficult

[Andrew]

As regards attempted bank frauds, I've two bank accounts; my main one, with First Direct, handles all salary, pension & other in-payments, standing orders and direct debits. My other account, with Nationwide, is only used for internet transactions. Anytime I want to buy something over t'net (E-bay, internet shopping etc) I transfer the appropriate amount (rounded up to the nearest £) from my First Direct account to my Nationwide one and then go ahead and make the payment from my Nationwide one. Yes, it's a bit of a faff, but it helps prevent financial loss & more often than not makes me think twice about my initial purchase.......

[Andrew]

Sorry-forgot to add: the latest version of the Apple operating System actively prevents one's details being "followed" and informs you so. This week 107 attempts to "follow" my details have been prevented.

[LMcD]

You amaze me. There are several internet irritations. One is the "We are asking your permission to put cookies on to your machine, eat your children, empty your bank account, kill your mother ..." sort of thing. Another is the increasing prevalence of advertising - some of which appears in the middle of documents, and in the case of Youtube videos, interrupts what are quite often worthwhile sources of information. Oh - yes - I heard there are ad-blockers which work.... Has anyone read the T&Cs connected with those - and wondered if they also could be misused?

I should have made myself clearer - I was referring to time spent clicking on popups that are totally unrelated to whatever I'm reading or trying to read. As far as cookies are concerned, I simply 'accept all', having assumed long ago that 'they' will probably find out all they want to know about me one way or another. I recently cleared all the cookies from my PC and experienced quite a bit of inconvenience until I agreed to accept them again. Where I have the option to skip adverts I do so. I could pay to watch some catch-up services ad-free but adverts really don't annoy me that much.
It could be argued that this is a simplistic approach, but then I'm a simple soul, and it's proved perfectly effective.

[Dave2002]

Sorry-forgot to add: the latest version of the Apple operating System actively prevents one's details being "followed" and informs you so. This week 107 attempts to "follow" my details have been prevented.

Yes - but how do you know that actually happpened - either that there were attacks - or that the Apple OS successfully stopped them?

I'm nothing like as trusting as that.

Yesterday there was a problem with my Apple system - still not figured out what it was. So I started to make some changes, and then thought I'd actually "log in" to the Apple system and see if I could fathom it out. Then I received a message saying that I had to use another device to satisfy 2nd factor identification. When I looked at my iPad I was informed that someone near Banbury was trying to access my account. Since that's more than 400 miles away from where I actually was I ignored it, and tried again - working on the principle that if I got the same message it probably was due to my actions. Indeed a few seconds later I was again informed that someone in Banbury was trying to access my account, so the second time I assumed that the code was good and typed it in.

I've still not got to the root of the problems - but if you're happy with dealing with a company which can't figure out where you actually are even to within a couple of hundred miles that's your business.
Remember also that Apple itself had servers hacked a few years ago, so you think I should trust them? No ......