Comment 41 for bug 1073114

FIX:

I have begun advocating alternate distributions after mr shuttleworth's most recent statements on the direction of the "fix".

to date, there has been no public announcement (by ubuntu) on the dangers presented to users by the addition of the lens which has been done for many other applications not directly produced by ubuntu. if i were to put my cynical hat on i might believe that this shyness might be due to some financial incentive provided by the lens (or the consumers of its data).. but to date no one has confirmed or denied that the lens functions primarily as a fund raising mechanism.. instead this feature is pitched as something the community wants.. Instead the fixes seem to be centered around sneaky legal maneuvers like implied consent; and temporary disablement of the plugin for "any given session" rather then opt-in or easy, permanent, removal.

frankly, i think it shows a lack of respect for the community and i'm deeply concerned that this is the direction being taken from the top of the organization; I'm moving on. maybe you should too.

-mike

On Feb 8, 2013, at 7:42 AM, ctvoigt <email address hidden> wrote:

> a cool feature, but should not be activated by default.
>
> or: the lens perhaps could be implemented the way, that result query
> (privacy lag) is sent when the shopping area is clicked the first time
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to a
> duplicate bug report (1074780).
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1073114
>
> Title:
> Shopping Lens Does Not Respect User Privacy
>
> Status in “libunity” package in Ubuntu:
> Confirmed
> Status in “unity-lens-shopping” package in Ubuntu:
> Confirmed
> Status in “libunity” source package in Quantal:
> Confirmed
> Status in “unity-lens-shopping” source package in Quantal:
> Confirmed
> Status in “libunity” source package in Raring:
> Confirmed
> Status in “unity-lens-shopping” source package in Raring:
> Confirmed
>
> Bug description:
> See this from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a well
> respected "international non-profit digital rights advocacy and legal
> organization" (as described on Wikipedia):
> https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/10/privacy-ubuntu-1210-amazon-ads-
> and-data-leaks
>
> Obviously, despite some improvements that have came late in the 12.10
> development cycle, there are still serious privacy concerns with the
> unity shopping lens. To be more precise, here are the main problems
> to be fixed according to EFF:
>
> - Disable "Include online search results" by default.
>
> - Explain in detail what Canonical does with search queries and IP
> addresses, how long it stores them, and in what circumstances it gives
> them to third parties.
>
> - Make the Search Results tab of the Privacy settings let users toggle
> on and off specific online search results, as some users might want
> Amazon products in their search results, but never anything from
> Facebook.
>
> Here is another related bug:
>
> #1055952 Direct data leaking to Amazon:
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unity-lens-
> shopping/+bug/1055952
>
> ProblemType: Bug
> DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.10
> Package: unity-lens-shopping 6.8.0-0ubuntu1
> Uname: Linux 3.5.6-030506-generic x86_64
> NonfreeKernelModules: wl
> ApportVersion: 2.6.1-0ubuntu6
> Architecture: amd64
> Date: Tue Oct 30 06:35:38 2012
> InstallationDate: Installed on 2012-02-12 (260 days ago)
> InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.10 "Oneiric Ocelot" - Release amd64 (20111012)
> MarkForUpload: True
> SourcePackage: unity-lens-shopping
> UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to quantal on 2012-09-28 (31 days ago)
>
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