Privacy Debate

[Corenat Rovarnus]

So because you two don't seem to have any other common channel of communication, I'm going to try and forge one here.

The stances:

@"vroop" refuses to use Discord as it doesn't have encryption and the privacy policy does not exclude the possibility of 3rd party data use.

@Interovegas is incumbent to Discord, and hasn't had any (direct) explanation as to why he ought to switch to Riot, or some other security-focused communication app.

Apologies in advance to both you for not offering any arguments of my own, as I'm just a conformist sheep.

The goal here is to find a voice chat app that we can all use, or at least reach some understanding on the privacy issue. Discussion commence!

[SilkScarf]

Cool. We may not reach an understanding, but I've been meaning to write a relatable privacy rundown for a while.

Before I start, @Interovegas, can you share why you'd want to use Discord over Riot? I'm guessing it's convenience and resistance to change, but I might be missing some things.

[Interovegas]

Discord offers me convenience on several major fronts.
- Other social groups: I've got other friends who make regular use of discord and I prefer keeping my socializing centralized to fewer lines of communication when possible.
- Dials and options: In discord I can edit the broadcast sound of individuals to turn up quiet people, turn down loud ones, etc. Also adds push to talk and all manner of less critical features that together add up to some pleasant benefits.
- Ease of adding randos: When I want to invite a pub player from a game, or even just a new friend, it's as simple as sending link from the discord server. With Riot the security shenanigans make it worthless to me for communicating with strangers.
- Activity tracker: Seeing what my friends are doing helps me know what to hop on to, or if I shouldn't bother them to join me in whatever I play. Of course on occasion I'll set myself invisible. The option is nice though, and more broadly encompassing than just steam game activity.

I'm down for something like steam in game voice options, they are also convenient to use if we can get them working.

Having already tried Riot a couple times with you guys, I find it more of a hassle to work with. I personally have less care about a group like discord pulling metrics from my usage of their service. As far as I can tell the only thing Riot offers is end to end encryption, and I have no understanding what the value of keeping our communications private is.

[SilkScarf]

Those are all cool features, and I understand why you'd like to keep those convenient aspects of Discord. "Other social groups," AKA 'the network effect' is also a big draw; I'd probably be using Discord right now if they open sourced their app and implemented end-to-end crypto, because Discord is very popular among gamers.

Riot won't have an activity tracker near future, but 'dials and options' is an easy UI fix they're working on. Thanks to the double-rachet aspect of Riot's encryption, 'adding randos' is feasible, and is a major area of development. Gaming integrations, like an activity tracker, will be added as the project grows into that market, but that probably won't be for a while.

If by "steam in game voice options" you mean something like the built in push-to-chat on Alien Swarm, I'd be down for that too. I found out last night after the game that my mic wasn't working, so we can try again next time.

I personally have less care about a group like discord pulling metrics from my usage of their service. As far as I can tell the only thing Riot offers is end to end encryption, and I have no understanding what the value of keeping our communications private is.

Regarding the value of private communication, I can give a sort of general run-down on privacy. After that, I can talk more about services like Discord and how we use them.

Why should I care about privacy?
Generally, the more data someone has on you, the more they know about you. This becomes a big deal when people and organizations that can affect your life can access and analyze that data.

When companies have your information, they can overcharge you on an Uber ride based on your travel habits, or possibly artificially raise your airfare via dynamic pricing. If you use certain dating apps, they can share your HIV status with advertising companies.

But what about Discord and similar platforms? Can they see my data?
Since they have not implemented end-to-end encryption, and have no plans to, the answer is yes.

All we do is shoot the shit though? What's so bad about that?
True, but what seems harmless in the moment might deny you access to education/employment opportunities.

You might see it as shooting the shit, but others might take it out of context (or so the officers claim).

I doubt they'll ever misuse our data. I trust the company.
But do you trust all of their employees?

The bad thing about relying on 'privacy by policy' instead of privacy by encryption is that it depends on everyone doing the right thing. There are multiple examples of individuals in organizations who used their access to spy on users:
- Google employee spying on emails/chats of minors (2010)
- Uber employee spying on ex (2016)
- Rogue Apple employees selling customer data (2017)
- Facebook employee fired for stalking women (2018)

Oh, and can't really avoid the government:
- NSA staff spy on spouses and exes (2013)

As Discord hires more employees, it will be more and more difficult for them to self-police.

Even if Discord employees are 100% respectful of your privacy, "in the event of a corporate sale, merger, reorganization, bankruptcy, dissolution or similar event, your information may be part of the transferred assets," as stated in their privacy policy.

Giving the mic back to you @Interovegas.

F.A.Q.:

What's a privacy-friendly communication platform?
One that is FOSS (free and open source software), so that users and experts can examine the code, and one that implements end-to-end encryption, so that only the communicating parties can see their conversation.

What's the point, when I already use Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn/Instagram? Isn't my privacy already gone? 
Only if you share the exact same content on every platform. Let's say you only use Facebook to find people you meet IRL, and then move to a different platform to talk. Facebook knows who you're friends with, but not the frequency or content of your communication.

My information is already out there. What's the point of switching to a more private platform?
You generate data every day. Some of your information up to this point is out there, but if you switch to a private platform, further information might be kept private. In the future, you might test positive for an STD, change your political/religious beliefs, or encounter some other sensitive life event.

This is too much to worry about! It's hypocritical to talk about privacy unless you live in a cave.
Better to have some protection than none; perfect is the enemy of good.

However, the definition of 'good' also changes everyday. Google, Mozilla, and other internet organizations are working to deprecate HTTP with the aim of making encrypted HTTPS the default protocol of the internet.

In 2016, 79 of the web's top 100 sites didn't deploy HTTPS by default. Today, that number is down to 38.

For many messaging/teamchat apps, end-to-end encryption will probably be the next norm. Big platforms like Whatsapp already claimed to learn and implement end-to-end encryption from a FOSS app called Signal. (Although, Whatsapp is closed source, so we can't be sure it's not backdoored).

But companies only violate my privacy if I consent. So didn't I basically 'ask for it'?
Not necessarily. Consent might've been obtained in a misleading way, or they might have shared your data without ever asking for consent, like in Facebook's Cambridge Analytica scandal.

Tech companies also profile people that never signed up for the service.

I don't care about privacy. Where does that leave me?
But your family and friends might care! Tech companies build "'shadow profiles' of people who aren’t users by accessing data from inboxes and smartphone contacts of those who are active users."

Privacy is like vaccination, there's a certain benefit in 'herd immunity.'

[Interovegas]

I have an early start at work tomorrow so I have to keep my response short for now.

It's possible discord is recording all voice data of all users, but I'd say it's unlikely they store that data long term even if it was recorded. My worries about voice information being divulged on discord is minimal.

I also maintain that while the argument to use encryption even if you haven't in the past is valid, it seems moot to me since we actually share more information on this forum than we do on the voice calls. That is, this encryption activity only covers a minor sliver of our regular communication and practically the least personal part at that.

Pointedly, I communicate more often with other people on discord than I do the forum. And from what you've described, while Riot may some day have these convenience features it doesn't have them yet. If it currently had easy use applications of the features I extol in discord I could concede it's value, though the population of users is still big.

[Corenat Rovarnus]

Just FYI for both of you, the intent is not to get you to stop using whatever app/client you're currently on or use Discord/Riot/etc. instead of the alternative(s).
I'll throw my hat in the ring by contending there's no reason that you can't install and use two communication apps or more alongside each other.

Now obviously, you might only use a certain app only for contacting a certain person because that's the only way to reach them. You can do this without admitting that it's better, or that what you prefer is worse. If it's shown that you were willing to do this for a single person before, it now becomes a question of how much you value the other as a friend.

I'm assuming that's not the case though, and that you are driven by principles rather than any personal animosity. From what I understand these principles can be boiled down to encryption/security vs convenience. Does this adequately sum things up or is there another angle?

[Interovegas]

Convenience is a principle and it's own benefit at the same time.

[SilkScarf]

It's possible discord is recording all voice data of all users, but I'd say it's unlikely they store that data long term even if it was recorded. My worries about voice information being divulged on discord is minimal.

I agree, it's unlikely that they're storing all voice data of all users long term. It's more likely that they store all voice data for a certain period of time, during which it's vulnerable to abuse.

Additionally, since 2013 (release of "OK Google" conversational search), organizations no longer need to record all data at all times to profile their users. Keyword activation (OK Google, Hey Siri, Hey Alexa) is used to identify words/phrases that they consider relevant (whether it be for voice search or profiling).

No one can know for sure what happens to the recordings; they might be stored as audio, or transcribed and logged, which costs way less, and is very viable to store long term.

Keyword search can also used retroactively on voice data they already have. That means a rogue Discord employee (or ex-spouse, etc. in the government) can carry out abuse at their leisure (they don't have to be intercepting it live).

it seems moot to me since we actually share more information on this forum than we do on the voice calls

That's not true at all in my experience. Maybe there's more memes on this forum, but what's crucial is that we often share detailed and personally identifying information on calls.

I also want to point out that Discord text chat is also vulnerable, and way easier to log and store for long periods of time (they kind of have to, if they support chat history). Unless you never use the text chat, you'd have to consider that avenue of abuse as well.

Convenience is a principle and it's own benefit at the same time.

The same goes for privacy, as I've just shown.

I'll throw my hat in the ring by contending there's no reason that you can't install and use two communication apps or more alongside each other.

Yeah I agree. We can talk about potential solutions once everyone's ready.

[SilkScarf]

We ended up using https://meet.jit.si for our last few Alien Swarm sessions.

Does anyone have more to add on the privacy debate, or are we good with Jitsi as an alternative?

[Corenat Rovarnus]

Jitsi Meet lacks some customization options and has some UI visibility issues, but in the area of convenience it can't be beat, as rooms can be created and joined in a matter of seconds. What are your thoughts of how it rates on the security and privacy front?

[Interovegas]

I think the history of linking we've done to outright illegal downloads and sharing of games is plenty more concerning than any personal details we've discussed.

I do very little typing on discord. And it's true some disgruntled person could share discord voice recordings before they are deleted. But it's also true that I drive a car every day to work because it's convenient despite the notorious risks. If anything I almost value my ease of communication with my friends and family over transportation and it makes sense that I would take on some level of risk to sustain that easy connection.

But there's really no conclusion if someone values privacy at the cost of convenience and community.

Jitsi works for me as long as its as easy as pestering someone on steam for a quick link. Convenient.

[SilkScarf]

> What are your thoughts of how it rates on the security and privacy front?

It's not really ideal, especially with the way we're using it (passing links around). You could greatly increase privacy by putting a password on the room at creation, but you'd have to share the password separately from the room link, which makes it a chicken-and-egg problem.

Alternatively, Jitsi has a desktop client, but I haven't checked it out yet.

> I think the history of linking we've done to outright illegal downloads and sharing of games is plenty more concerning than any personal details we've discussed.

1. We've already agreed that it's a valid argument to increase privacy regardless of any linking done in the past.

2. That depends on your threat model. If copyright trolls were the only party that would possibly spy on you, then sure. Otherwise, sharing a narrow slice of your interests is much less harmful than sharing widely, like what naturally happens on Riot/Discord.

> But it's also true that I drive a car every day to work because it's convenient despite the notorious risks. If anything I almost value my ease of communication with my friends and family over transportation and it makes sense that I would take on some level of risk to sustain that easy connection.

There's a fundamental difference when it comes to data: you can choose to stop driving your car at any time if you decide that public transportation has become more convenient/safer. You cannot choose to delete your data at any time. Once you give it up, you no longer have the option to judge that trade-off; the organization chooses for you.

> But there's really no conclusion if someone values privacy at the cost of convenience and community.

"This is too much to worry about! It's hypocritical to talk about privacy unless you live in a cave."

Privacy and community are clearly a porque no los dos; that's why we're here today.

Convenience is also rapidly becoming easier to achieve (see the Whatsapp example above). Also, like with the movement for HTTPS, pushing the needle towards privacy benefits everyone.