spy (/spaɪ/) v.,
1 : [intransitive] to collect secret information about another country, organization or person
1 : [intransitive] to collect secret information about another country, organization or person
If you feel like a bunch of developers getting info about how many times the world clicks on a button hurts you personally, then don't install it. Calling it a privacy issue it taking it too far.
I love windows terminal, but it should collect nothing by default. Another subjective opinion.
And yes, I think that an HTTP POST to Microsoft's Windows Terminal team saying "UserUsedTerminalInInterative = true" is not a privacy issue, nor is it spying.
Can you explain to me how this information hurt users of Windows Terminal? If it indeed is spying, it should be possible to demonstrate how it is used for hostile purposes or why such an innocuous piece of information must be kept a secret.
Until then, I think it is fair for the Windows Terminal team to collect such basic telemetry for their software
Yes, words have meanings.
Company A May decide telemetry exposes too much internal information to a potential competitor.
Company B May decide that telemetry does not release anything they want kept secret.
Those are subjective opinions. If I want the data to be kept secret and somebody takes it without my explicit approval, that is a privacy violation. If I don’t care, it’s not. Same thing with spying. If I deem it a secret, it is now spying to take it from me.
No it isn't.
The word "spy" has a very specific definition, that you'd have stretch pretty far to include any of the data collected by the Terminal app.
That is the definition of spying.
You know most of what an actual spy collects isn’t super secret stuff right? Aggregated unclassified information can still reveal secrets.
Nothing. Nothing at all.
It’s very easy to de-anonymize telemetry data, track users across IP addresses, collate with other application’s telemetry data, determine which users are in the same places at the same time, and generally extract a huge amount of data about people, who they spend time with, where they spend time, and what they do there.
Telemetry is unequivocally spyware.
It feeds a firehose of data to the internet, and both data brokers and state actors do absolutely everything they can to gobble it up.
I think some people will have a hard time with this concept, but the idea of data being “private” or “secret”, by default, is disappearing. And it won’t be coming back if the world continues to digitize.
If you want those attributes for your data, you’ll have to take measures. That means reading user agreements, verifying open source, using encryption intentionally.
Vacuuming up data is not spying. Especially if you essentially agree to it when you accept the Windows terms of service (ethical issues of this aside).
“But the plans were on display…”
“On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them.”
“That’s the display department.”
“With a flashlight.”
“Ah, well, the lights had probably gone.”
“So had the stairs.”
“But look, you found the notice, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” said Arthur, “yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard.”