Ask HN: Google account and WhatsApp user data exchange | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Google account and WhatsApp user data exchange

6 pointsaljes4 comments

Hi HN, I think i got another paranoia after a few cases when i was googling stuff from my Android based devices.

First case, Paris 2019. I have googled something like "jewelery store" right in google maps. Ive immediately got an advertisement on my WhatsApp account from one quite famous brand in home country. On that time I think I was using Asus Zenofone 3.

The second case has happened just yesterday in Stockholm, Sweden. I started wondering about crypto currencies which required some nybie googling (Chrome with google account login on Linux laptop). Within a few hours I got an new contact request in WhatsApp(phone) with text looking like "hello my friend. I am a politically affiliated person who got a lot of tokens. Here's wallet number and password"

I have receive spam messages sometimes. But both messages look so connected to the subject I was googling..

Has anyone had a similar experience?

Nope.

If you get contacted via Whatsapp, then it's just s coincidence. Each spam on WhatsApp is

- fake woman wants to sell you trading secrets - fake whatever wants to turn you rich

And each of them points to crypto. But, there is a valid point you made with the jewelry ad.

I've activated the WhatsApp backup, which happens to be not secured and is plaintext uploaded to Google.

This may be a culprit. Google can analyze whatever you're writing on WhatsApp and feed it into their ad system.

And yes, why would Google spend gigabits of their Google drive storage, when they don't get anything out of it? Why would Facebook miss the opportunity to wire their ads and feed their knowledge of the user to their system?

All the ad systems are connected somehow and having a lot of different companies want and use your data. the possible outcome is that you get ads served, but not necessary by Google - it could be as well served by others.

Usually the other way around is the case. For example, you text a friend "I'm thinking about buying a bike' and you start getting ads everywhere about bikes and motorcycles and such. WhatsApp messages say they are encrypted but if that kind of thing gets out and is sold to advertisers, one can presume its not very private.

I guess some lawyer at Meta got creative, saw this as defensible in court and now selling phone numbers wholesale is a standard practice from now on. I hope not.

WhatsApp backups all your conversations unencrypted to Google, if you dont switch off the backup..

At least it was like that. Haven't looked into newer versions of the last year.

happens everywhere.

facebook, instagram, telegram, whatsapp, viber, twitter, wechat, etc.

your convos aren't directly sold, but the heuristics of your convos are sold.

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