Popular Posts

Thursday, June 25, 2015

Google eavesdropping tool installed on computers without permission

Privacy advocates claim always-listening component was involuntarily activated within Chromium, potentially exposing private conversations

Privacy campaigners and open source developers are up in arms over the secret installing of Google software which is capable of listening in on conversations held in front of a computer.

First spotted by open source developers, the Chromium browser – the open source basis for Google’s Chrome – began remotely installing audio-snooping code that was capable of listening to users.

It was designed to support Chrome’s new “OK, Google” hotword detection – which makes the computer respond when you talk to it – but was installed, and, some users have claimed, it is activated on computers without their permission.

“Without consent, Google’s code had downloaded a black box of code that – according to itself – had turned on the microphone and was actively listening to your room,” said Rick Falkvinge, the Pirate party founder, in a blog post. “Which means that your computer had been stealth configured to send what was being said in your room to somebody else, to a private company in another country, without your consent or knowledge, an audio transmission triggered by … an unknown and unverifiable set of conditions.”

More

3 comments:

  1. This is not a Google product. It is a Debian product. DIFFERENT COMPANY!

    Will this comment fail to get posted like the last one?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Debian is not a company. It is a type of linux.
    This 'black box' IS a google product, included in Chrome and chromium.
    It may be that a debian-based linux distribution is activating it without permission, but why is it even in there to begin with?

    Who else do you think might be able to activate it without permission? Huh?

    Google cannot be trusted.

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.