Social media tracking, "self-sensoring', and "thoughtcrime before it happens" - Having your posts datamined before you've even hit 'Submit'

[need shoeonhead nudes]

I was curious how Kiwifarms was keeping my posts cached in threads where I wrote something and decided not to submit it. So I wrote a little tidbit in a thread reply box, opened up a private firefox window and logged in browsing that thread. My WIP post was still there. So obviously the server is keeping that somewhere because it isn't my browser cookies storing it, which was how that kind of thing was generally handled.

This is standard practice now, keeping this data for us. It's convenient. But it can also be negative. Referred to as "self censorship" as Facebook calls it. When a user decides not to post what they've typed into their status box, they still harvest it. And facebook doing it is a lot more insidious than kiwifarms.
I think it's interesting in the context of thoughtcrime. You were going to post a very threatening message towards a particular individual but decided against it. Then that person dies, and suddenly you could become a suspect. Just for thinking and typing on a keyboard, then hitting 'cancel'.

Of course the ramifications about invasion of privacy are huge with this technology. Null, his admins, Mark Zuckerberg would have access to this information. Information that people have typed, then on second thought decided nobody should ever know about.
Is it a big enough convenience to justify the privacy ramifications? I think so, however it should be something that more people know about. So if they are bothered by it they can use some kind of notepad to first type their posts in.

Facebook tracks everything you type even if you DON'T post it

A San Francisco-based Facebook data scientist studied HTML code on 3.7 million profiles to find that 71% of users type comments and posts but don't submit them.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Have you ever written a comment, or Facebook status, before deciding not to post it? According to new Facebook research, 70 per cent of us do this regularly.

The study found that men are more likely to 'self-censor' their social network posts, compared to women, and this is especially the case if they have a lot of male friends.

More surprising, however, is the reason why the site knows this information - because it can track what you type, even if you never post it.

To be clear I'm not making any accusations against Null, or condemning kiwifarms for using it. I just wanted to bring this stuff up because it's interesting to me.

 

[Bongocat]

Bruh, you should not assume any privacy anywhere on the clearnet. Do not tie internet accounts to your real ID unless it is really necessary, and those should be highly limited accounts. I just use a VPN everywhere these days any time I am submitting content (and most times when I'm viewing).

Also, if you want to circumvent this technology in a lot of places, just turn off javascript.

 

[Kosher Dill]

I was curious how Kiwifarms was keeping my posts cached in threads where I wrote something and decided not to submit it. So I wrote a little tidbit in a thread reply box, opened up a private firefox window and logged in browsing that thread. My WIP post was still there.

You know there's a "delete draft" button, right?

 

[DumbDude42]

Bruh, you should not assume any privacy anywhere on the clearnet. Do not tie internet accounts to your real ID unless it is really necessary, and those should be highly limited accounts. I just use a VPN everywhere these days any time I am submitting content (and most times when I'm viewing).

Also, if you want to circumvent this technology in a lot of places, just turn off javascript.

this sort of thing is next level though
usually "dont assume privacy" applies to data you actually submit, not the website essentially keylogging what you type before you even submit it
once you know about it it's possible to operate around it, but most people are not even aware that this exists

You know there's a "delete draft" button, right?

you don't know whether this actually deletes it from their servers. might just delete it from your view while still keeping it as an entry in their database.

 

[Finder]

I don’t write anything unless I mean to post it. If they keep revisions of what I type I guess they just get to see my spelling errors.

Just safer to assume everything is logged everywhere these days. The company I work for goes so far as to record every mouse movement, click, and keyboard input. I can watch user sessions just like a video and the users have no idea this is being done.

 

[Never Scored]

Turn off javascript and it won't save drafts anymore. Site still works pretty well, but giving anyone a sticker besides like is a bit of a pain in the ass.

Look, I won't mince words here, I know some of you younger guys need social media to get laid because women are into it, but if you earnestly use social media to express yourself other than forums and shit, you're a complete fucking faggot, imo.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

this sort of thing is next level though
usually "dont assume privacy" applies to data you actually submit, not the website essentially keylogging what you type before you even submit it
once you know about it it's possible to operate around it, but most people are not even aware that this exists

Reading the clipboard is another interesting snooping possibility, I think a bunch of apps on iOS got caught doing that. On PC and web browsers I don't really know what's possible but things are way more advanced now in the past. Right click an avatar, choose "copy image"(not link) and paste it into the reply field and the image data will be processed and inserted as a new image, download it and compare it to what you copied and you will see that it is a new image.
Ctrl-c an image on your computer and ctrl-v it in the reply field and it will do the same thing.

 

[Jimjamflimflam]

I find it very strange that not posting your thoughts is called self censoring as though you must post every thought you have.

I know I've written stuff but decide not to post because in further thinking I realize it's not interesting or funny enough to add. Hardly self censoring but some level of standards

 

[moocow]

I know I've written stuff but decide not to post because in further thinking I realize it's not interesting or funny enough to add. Hardly self censoring but some level of standards

Yup. I've done that a lot as well. I've also long been in the habit of drafting posts in a separate text editor and copy/pasting into the page when finished -- a holdover from the days when Netscape Navigator and Mozilla Firefox were unstable piles of shit that had a good chance of crashing as you wrote text in a box on a web page (and wouldn't restore the lost entry on restart).

 

[Pissmaster]

The first application of this kinda technology I can remember is when Google started giving auto-results as you type, which, according to this, started in 2004. What you type into the search bar immediately goes to Google's servers to process in order to give you those results, meaning it can be captured at any point along the way. So if you search by way of your browser's address bar and it autofills your search results, everything you type into that can be saved, even if you're just typing a URL. So turn that shit off immediately.

edit: The link to that PDF paper in the dailymail article is broken, and it took me a while to find it. Weirdly, there were a number of mirrors here and there, but they were all dead. But, somehow, Facebook themselves were still hosting a copy. So I attached a local archive of it, for posterity and so that you don't have to have Facebook see a hit from your IP address. If you're curious, it was at: https://research.fb.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/self-censorship-on-facebook.pdf

 

[Jones McCann]

Tangentially related but what about YouTube videos on kiwifarms? Does YouTube see that the video is on kiwifarms and that we're viewing it from there? My gut tells me yes but I'm not sure.

 

[moocow]

Tangentially related but what about YouTube videos on kiwifarms? Does YouTube see that the video is on kiwifarms and that we're viewing it from there? My gut tells me yes but I'm not sure.

Very probably, yes. I would assume the browser sends the usual referrer header with the request, and the Youtube player has enough bits and bobs inside its byzantine codebase that it probably sends other telemetry as well.

 

[TheSkoomer]

Very probably, yes. I would assume the browser sends the usual referrer header with the request, and the Youtube player has enough bits and bobs inside its byzantine codebase that it probably sends other telemetry as well.

And this is why everyone should be running a browser extension to disable the HTTP referrer.

Furthermore:

• Never stay logged into anything; Log in to do what you need to do, then log back out. Clear all cookies with every new browser session.
• Use TOR or I2P every time for the farms, and for chans. VPNs are worthless and are likely to roll over on their users the moment the feds or someone with a pile of money comes knocking.

JavaScript is dogshit, and I fucking hate having to temporarily enable it to post here.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

Very probably, yes. I would assume the browser sends the usual referrer header with the request, and the Youtube player has enough bits and bobs inside its byzantine codebase that it probably sends other telemetry as well.

Maybe it's just me but I've noticed that Imgur won't display images with a kiwi-referrer and clicking on links to an image or gallery from kiwifarms won't work either. Copy-paste the link into a new window, no problem.

 

[moocow]

Maybe it's just me but I've noticed that Imgur won't display images with a kiwi-referrer and clicking on links to an image or gallery from kiwifarms won't work either. Copy-paste the link into a new window, no problem.

They're reddit-adjacent (either they're partners, or share/exchanged employees, etc.) and fully pozzed so they adopt similar silent blacklisting the way reddit does. I'm certain the Farms are on their blacklist just like reddit's.

 

[R00T]

Op if you did as thorough a job on this as you did on proving Just a Butt was spam inviting you I am inclined to believe you messed something up horribly along the way.

 

[Knight of the Rope]

Use TOR or I2P every time for the farms, and for chans. VPNs are worthless and are likely to roll over on their users the moment the feds or someone with a pile of money comes knocking.

How hard is it to just not glowpost? If your risk analysis for a post on this hallowed gossip forum ever has you reaching the conclusion that you need to be posting anonymously via TOR on a spoofed internet connection that you bought cash-in-hand using a fake ID and a burner phone, then maybe just don't post it at all?

 

[seri0us]

How hard is it to just not glowpost? If your risk analysis for a post on this hallowed gossip forum ever has you reaching the conclusion that you need to be posting anonymously via TOR on a spoofed internet connection that you bought cash-in-hand using a fake ID and a burner phone, then maybe just don't post it at all?

Fuck privacy amirite gaize

 

[Knight of the Rope]

Fuck privacy amirite gaize

All I'm saying is match your level of privacy (and inconvenience, since they always go hand-in-hand) to the threat level.

Sure, VPNs are fucking worthless if you're worried about evading the attention of the feds and other state actors. For staying anonymous so you can mock retards in relative safety, they're perfectly fine.

 

[ZMOT]

Fuck privacy amirite gaize

you're also ignoring that having a (fake) footprint is better than having none at all, because inevitably the question comes up what else you're hiding if you take your shitposting that serious already. best way is treating it like a glowie credit score obfuscating your "real" profile.

this way you can also control much easier and consciously what you wanna share and what not. it's nice to be principled and you absolutely should be, but the use cases for the knowledge of someone trading rare pepes on 4chins is rather limited.

They're reddit-adjacent (either they're partners, or share/exchanged employees, etc.) and fully pozzed so they adopt similar silent blacklisting the way reddit does. I'm certain the Farms are on their blacklist just like reddit's.

they're just shit in general, I remember waterfox not working at all. that's why I rather blame incompetence than malevolence (they're too thirsty for your data anyway)