
Google's software mistreats or harms the user - eddyg
https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-google.html
======
Ajedi32
Almost all of this is heavily exaggerated, presenting relatively innocuous
features as if they were harmful, or calling out simple bugs as if they were
intentional and actively malicious. None of it is flat-out wrong per-se (at
least as far as I can tell), and I can certainly see where GNU is coming from,
but I think for the average user most of the features they're criticizing
actually do a lot more good than harm.

Just a few examples, to demonstrate my point:

\- They describe Google's demonstrated ability to remove malware from user's
devices as a "backdoor"

\- They describe parental controls as "censorship"

\- They consider the fact that Android supports DRM "malware"

\- They cite the fact that Android malware exists as a security flaw.
(Ignoring the fact that there is basically no OS in existence that _can 't_ be
infected with malware.)

\- They consider the ability for users to remotely reset their Android
lockscreen combo if they know their Google account password a "back door"

\- They describe a bug where Google Assistant incorrectly identified the "Okay
Google" hotword as "Google Assistant recording users' conversations"

\- They describe the fact that a Google message app doesn't delete
conversations until the user asks it to as "surveillance"

Again, I'm not saying this point of view is necessarily wrong. From a certain
point of view, all of the claims I described above are actually quite logical.
(I even find myself agreeing with some of them.) But from the perspective of
the average user, the vast majority of this stuff simply isn't worth worrying
about, and I think it's a little extreme to characterize it as "malware". Just
something to keep in mind.

~~~
whatshisface
If you come at it from the perspective that Google is your friend, as in not
like a real friend (who I wouldn't let change my passwords), but a friend
that's even better than a real friend, then sure, these points are paranoid.
The GNU perspective is very distrustful of the idea that anyone else should be
administrating their devices, and refuses to trust any corporation more than
they would a friend.

~~~
henryfjordan
The GNU completely ignores the value that you get from Google. For instance
this point:

> Google Chrome contains a key logger that sends Google every URL typed in,
> one key at a time

They are describing the auto complete feature...

I get that people should be making informed choices about what data they
share, but for the FSF to so intentionally mis-describe what is going on does
not help inform anyone.

~~~
ChrisSD
Wait but that's literally what the auto complete feature does. Most users
understand the value of the feature (they use it!) but there's a good reason
to spell out the cost too.

I agree with the criticism that they should draw a clearer line between the
cost and the benefit but there's nothing to be gained by softening the
language used to describe the cost.

~~~
chucksmash
I'd naively consider a keylogger to be software that captures your keypresses
universally.

I use Firefox and have search suggestions disabled there so I am somewhat
sympathetic to their point.

That said, calling server-side autocomplete on a field you explicitly are
typing in strikes me as about as sensible and forthright as calling an Amazon
text field that takes my credit card number a card skimmer.

~~~
davvolun
> calling server-side autocomplete on a field you explicitly are typing in
> strikes me as about as sensible and forthright as calling an Amazon text
> field that takes my credit card number a card skimmer

Exactly, and waters down the impact of the termminology. If "card skimmer" is
anything that can read a credit card, than the term is meaningless for
security.

If "keylogger" is anything connected to the web that responds to a keypress...

GNU is risking turning into the boy who cried wolf here.

~~~
gregknicholson
> GNU is risking turning into the boy who cried wolf here.

As with a lot of the FSF's messaging, I think the substance of the message may
be correct, but the way they convey it just isn't effective.

If this is for a general audience(!), no-one was ever convinced by the 48th
item in a list who wasn't already convinced by the 47th. You don't persuade
people just by being right, and certainly not by banging on about the very
many subtly-different ways in which you're right. Pick few strong examples and
prosecute those decisively.

If this is a resource for campaigners, set out the audience and intent before
you start. Preface it with something like “Here are various ways that certain
aspects of Google's software can be seen as indistinguishable from malware.
They may be useful counterarguments if someone suggests Google's software is
trustworthy.”

~~~
c0vfefe
There's a lot to appreciate about Stallman, but as an ideologue, he's never
going to prioritize a gentle & incremental articulation of his ideas. We could
call it a failure to empathize, but you see ideologues all over undermining
their communication by making it as distilled & radical as possible. But
that's not what tends to convince other humans they're wrong about something.

------
esotericn
All of this is trivially and obviously true to power users of GNU/Linux
systems.

My machine does precisely what I want, when I want it, in the way that I want
it. If it doesn't, within reasonable constraints like physical possibility, I
can open a text editor, and make it do so. Sure, that might take me a long
time.

I can add almost all of this configuration to stuff like git repos; back it
up; transfer it between completely different machines; I can have a very high
degree of certainty that any laptop or desktop I pick up off the shelf will
just work and that within 30mins - 1hour I can have it working _identically_
to the old one.

By contrast, right now I am using my phone for USB tethering. There is
literally no way for me to make this automatic because it's a black box. I
have to enable it every time; if the cable moves a bit and disconnects; etc.

Trivial, basic example? Sure. The fact that even this most basic behaviour is
completely unfixable proves the point.

I'm really looking forward to stuff like the Librem, pinephone, etc.

The IBM-compatible PC might well be the greatest contributor to the progress
of technology in the last few decades. It's heart-breaking that smartphones
are this custom random locked down mess of nonsense.

Hell, this article has reminded me I was meaning to set up a donation to the
FSF. Off it goes. A small impact but an impact nonetheless. I really
appreciate the work you guys are doing for those who can't.

~~~
lima
Even worse: tethering uses a different APN, which allows providers to rate
limit tethered traffic, and without root access, you can't bypass it.

~~~
mfontani
I'm fairly sure tethering can also be trivially detected by inspecting the TTL
of packets, as a device sitting "behind" the tethering device will increase
the TTL by one.

[https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/47819/how-can-
ph...](https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/47819/how-can-phone-
companies-detect-tethering-incl-wifi-hotspot) seems to have more on the
matter.

~~~
ben7799
This can be spoofed/hidden extremely easily if both devices are open source
and you want to change it though. It's not like TTL can't be changed.

The tethering device can just rewrite the packets to hide the tethered device.

~~~
lima
Even better - you only need root on either device. Just set a higher initial
TTL on your tethered device, or rewrite the TTL on the phone.

But carriers don't use that anymore, too easy to bypass.

------
TheIronYuppie
The "censorship software" point is extremely dumb.

I have kids. I want them to have a phone for communication purposes when they
move from place to place (come back from school). I also want the to lock down
the phone so if they sneak it out or something, they can't watch it for 12
straight hours.

That's it. That's what this does.

~~~
dantondwa
I am not commenting on you directly, but, in general, I find the kind of
control that the Google parental control app gives to be excessive. It makes
talking unnecessary and gives a direct window to a personal dimension of the
kid. You really have a total power over the kids phone and activity. I get the
reasons to install this on the phone of a child, but at the same time I'm
afraid that it might be too much and that it might give to the kids the
sensation of being watched by the parent _all the time_. Respecting their
spaces, having their own dimensions that is out of the eye of the parent is
also important, in my opinion.

~~~
dantondwa
To further specify: go read the user reviews of the kids in Google Play Store
for the app. Apart from being hilarious, they are actually quite sad and I
understand, in part, their points.

~~~
metabagel
Sorry, for which app?

~~~
dantondwa
Sorry, I didn't specify it. It's "Google Family link for children and teens"
(and not the similarly named app for the parents).

~~~
ben7799
Thanks, the reviews were entertaining.

------
summerlight
[https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/proprietary.html](https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/proprietary.html)

Actually, they listed most of software companies in their set of malware.
While I don't necessarily agree with them, but their stance have been at least
consistent.

------
holy_city
I feel like DRM is basically the prisoner's dilemma at this point where it's
in everyone's interest to give it up, but no one wants to be the first person
to do it.

But honestly it's weird for GNU to fault the person being held at gunpoint for
the situation, not the person holding the gun.

~~~
dredmorbius
If you have a choice between doing the right thing, and the wrong thing, and
you choose to do the wrong thing, you've chosen poorly.

I'm increasing _not_ a fan of naked individual initiative as the _sole_
response to abuses of power; that itself is and long has been a tool of power,
to skirt its own responsibilities. Annie Leonard's essay on the "Crying
Indian" anti-littering (that is: pro-disposable packaging) advertising
campaign is a key case in point: [http://www.pfree.co.uk/wp-
content/uploads/2018/04/Moving-fro...](http://www.pfree.co.uk/wp-
content/uploads/2018/04/Moving-from-Individual-Change-to-Societal-Change-
Annie-Leonard-2013.pdf) (PDF)

But raising awareness and consciousness _can_ help us get to a collective
action promoting the common weal, which is the goal here.

------
decoyworker
[https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-
apple.html](https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-apple.html)

Apple's Operating Systems are Malware

Is there anything these guys like? Stallman and Gnu are extremists

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _Is there anything these guys like?_

Free (as in freedom) Software.

> _Stallman and Gnu are extremists_

The word you're looking for is "radicals"; "extremists" carries connotations
with violence and illegal behavior, which is the exact opposite of what
Stallman/FSF stand for.

Are these views radical? Yes. But are they _wrong_?

The way I see it, RMS has been writing about what's wrong with the software
world for decades and predicting the consequences. The industry has been
ignoring this for just as long, and then people keep complaining about
consequences materializing as predicted. Makes you wonder whether it's RMS
that's really radical, or whether our Overton window has shifted so much that
doing the right thing fell off it?

~~~
notyourday
Look, I like RMS. I casually know him. We had dinner a few times, mostly with
other people at the table. He is very interesting to talk to.

It pains me to say it but he is a Luddite. He would be quite happy in the
world of late 1980s because that's where him and his quaint way of technology,
society and progress fits in swimmingly. And maybe he is right.

But here's the thing: he simply outsourced his need for modern communications
to others -- he does not call restaurants to make reservations, his hosts do.
He does not use GPS and maps -- drivers that his hosts use do. He does not
need to use a banking app/deal with payments/scheduling/etc that are needed
for him to appear at conferences -- those that invite him do.

I wish I could have a life like that. Probably a lot of us would. All the
advantages and none of the inconveniences.

~~~
plttn
I think it's one of those situations where he has the ability to wax poetic
from his ivory tower simply because he doesn't have to exist in the real world
in terms of technology.

If he had to exist in the real world, he would find it a lot harder to stick
to those principles.

~~~
decoyworker
I think it's also that his entire livelihood depends on him continuing to do
so.

~~~
plttn
It's the problem with leaning into a niche viewpoint. You have to continue to
lean harder and harder into that viewpoint as the times change in order to
keep the people who also believe in that viewpoint supporting you.

I genuinely think the FSF/RMS level hate of non-free software will continue to
die out as everyone starts to die/retire from public eye. Whether or not
that's a good thing overall is not something I'm going to touch, but it seems
like there's not enough being this aggressive to keep this viewpoint
sustainable.

------
jeromebaek
There's one each for Microsoft, Google, Apple, and Amazon at
[https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-
microsoft.html](https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-microsoft.html),
[https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-
google.html](https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-google.html),
[https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-
apple.html](https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-apple.html), and
[https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-
amazon.html](https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-amazon.html).

Funny there's no [https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-
facebook.html](https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-facebook.html).

------
robertheadley
This is purposely written in a foreboding way. A lot of this stuff is standard
SaaS procedure. Google does tend to make some boneheaded moves though and
Transparency is constant struggle for them.

I personally stopped using chrome due to manifest V3. Not because of the
tracking, the tracking makes my life easier. Just keep things secure, ok?

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _This is purposely written in a foreboding way. A lot of this stuff is
> standard SaaS procedure._

Just because it's _standard_ , doesn't mean it's _moral_. FSF has been
speaking about immorality of these practices for decades now. Their point is
essentially that as a software creator, you _shouldn 't_ do it, and as a user,
you _shouldn 't_ (for both ethical and practical reasons) subject yourself to
these practices.

~~~
robertheadley
I just want to avoid technology becoming the boogeyman to normal people that
don't necessary understand this kind of thing. Then again, I suppose the odds
of a normie going to FSF is probably moderately low.

They aren't wrong. I would just appreciate a bit more finesse in their
wording.

~~~
pessimizer
The FSF's goal is to make technology not a boogeyman, modern tech culture has
a goal of making the inside of every device opaque enough that a boogeyman
could hide there.

------
kd3
We need the Librem phone today. It is long overdue.

~~~
jasonvorhe
We? Pardon me, I'll rather wait for the next Pixel.

~~~
jazoom
We = kd3 + jazoom + whoever else kd3 was referring to.

"We" doesn't have to include all 7 billion human inhabitants of Earth. You
were not included.

------
19ylram49
As an Android user, what are some ways that I can deal with the problems
addressed here? (I already do a number of things, but I’m curious what
everyone else does.)

~~~
saagarjha
Ignore this list and find a better one that actually represents the issues
fairly.

------
judge2020
> Google/Alphabet intentionally broke Revolv home automatic control products
> that depended on a server to function, by shutting down the server. The
> lesson is, reject all such products. Insist on self-contained computers that
> run free software!

The last two sentences seem a little pretentious. The people who bought these
products don't know (or want to take the time to learn) how to use git or edit
config files or install docker. A consumer IoT product that provided an easy
GUI, uses device discovery, and of course was only LAN would be a big win for
privacy conscious people, but I'm not aware of something like that existing.

~~~
wvenable
One technical person could make this work for everyone else.

I have a few pieces of hardware right now that are "broken" because the
companies that made them went of business. These products have millions of
owners. With the source code and encryption keys I could personally make this
hardware work for those users indefinitely. And there are hundreds (if not
thousands) of users just like me.

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _One technical person could make this work for everyone else._

Yup. An oft-missed but crucial point.

The benefit of software freedoms isn't that everyone has to do everything
themselves. The benefit is that everyone _can_ do it themselves if they like,
but they can also delegate the job to anyone else that wants to take it, like
someone's friendly neighbourhood techie, or a small local business. In this
way, free software actually promotes free markets, by enabling unrestricted
competition on _adding value_ on top of what free software offers (vs. locking
it down and making money by rent seeking).

------
riazrizvi
The DRM stance is ambiguous IMO. Property rights of content creators are
generally considered worth protecting in a good society. The issue is with
locked down software which 1) abuses this privacy to violate user privacy, and
2) takes the creative freedoms that the software publishers enjoyed when they
wrote their software and creates a contract which denies those freedoms to
their users. I feel like we would better highlight the core complaint by
calling the issue Digital Rights Reciprocity.

~~~
yarrel
DRM (Digital Restrictions Machinations) being an ineffective and harmful
measure isn't ambiguous. There is no reciprocity to them, and they are
generally neither imposed by nor respectful of creators.

~~~
spookthesunset
Don't consume that content then! You don't own the content!

Does DRM work against businesses who implement it? I'd say hell yes it does.
It drives people to piracy.

But I don't think inventing childish, misleading names is going to fix
anything. Much better to point out how it causes people pain (unstoppable
commercials, inability to play content on all the devices you own, etc).

------
Causality1
I used to hate all this FSF stuff. That, though, was back in the day when
taking back control of your devices was as simple as changing a couple of
settings, uninstalling a few things, and flipping a couple of switches in a
registry. Now that I've been screwed a few times by this "we know better than
you" tech culture my opinion has changed. Richard Stallman is still a lunatic
with poor personal hygiene but he makes some excellent points.

------
titzer
People should be more concerned about the location tracking inserted into
Android in the form of Google Play Services.

Generally those who know the technical details of these systems are bound, as
current or former employees, not to reveal confidential information that
includes technical details about how these systems work, how they could be
corrupted or manipulated, how auditing works, and how far they are subject to
warrants, subpoenas and national security letters for law enforcement and
intelligence agencies. For a layperson and an outsider, if you don't fully
trust Google, you should probably uninstall all Google-bundled software,
principally Google Play Services and maps. Some settings can reduce the
tracking but it is mercurial and often opaque, and informed user consent is
specious here, since the technical details are so secret.

Location data is the next goldmine of advertising. There is already an economy
springing up around it. Even if it is banal today, it won't be tomorrow.
Pervasive location tracking is the backbone of a terrifying technological
dystopia. Fight it.

------
elamje
This article claims that Netflix is malware. I don’t have an opinion about
Netflix, but would like to hear why someone considers it malware.

~~~
favorited
I know Stallman hates Netflix because they use DRM, but I don't know what part
makes it "malware."

~~~
elamje
Yeah, that makes sense why it’s in the article. As much as people hate DRM, I
can’t see a way for Netflix to be offered for the same price and content
selection if the users were able to own the content indefinitely. It seems
like it would just devolve into the iTunes Store where you purchase each
episode/movie.

Am I misunderstanding what DRM accomplishes?

~~~
favorited
They _could_ just stream unencrypted movies in the browser, but that would
make it trivial for people to save copies of the stream, and no big film
distributer would go for that.

Even moves you buy from the iTunes Store have DRM so they only play on
authorized devices (to keep one person from buying it, and giving all of their
friends a copy).

------
jonstaab
Ironically, I opened this in a new tab just before going on a two hour saga of
fighting Chrome's autocomplete behavior and losing. That particular decision
of Google's is so painful to deal with, and I'm not alone, this issue is well
worth skimming through, just for fun:
[https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=587466](https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=587466)

It's been three years since they broke autocomplete="off", and in the meantime
forms are less secure (for multi-user computers), user-friendly (e.g. when the
web app provides its own autocomplete, which then gets hidden by Chrome's),
and error-prone (when the same field means different things in different
contexts, like when filling out a customer's address rather than your own).

~~~
bromuro
My Safari iOS is crashing opening that link :(

------
greyhair
Such screaming! The issue I perceive is that Google and FSF are both at
opposite ends of a spectrum. I know that Google has a commercial agenda, and I
know that Google uses my data. Maybe the headline should be that Google harms
clueless ignorant users. The rest of us have made a partial deal with the
devil, and we live with it.

FSF has its own screeching issues in any case. I understand much of where
Stallman comes from, and how this influences the FSF, but I don't necessarily
agree with Stallmaan or the FSF on every point. In particular, I think that
GPLv3 is useful for some individuals, but a hindrance to others, who are free
to use GPLv2 (or BSD/MIT/...) as they wish.

The screeching, at times, comes across like that of PETA.

Also: a lot of this post is _old_ and needs to be updated. Android 5.0 anyone?

------
jonstaab
Honest question: in many cases, how can you _not_ have a backdoor? Obviously,
it depends on what kind of software you're writing, but pieces like this seem
to have this utopian goal of software that "just works", independent of any
human except its user. In reality though, other humans are always necessary —
whether to explain how to use the technology, to do something that can't be
done through the software, to fix the software (after isolating the problem
using your data).

If there's trust between the user and the software provider, why not leverage
it to fill in the gaps that software leaves in functionality. If there's no
trust, how do you use software without giving the provider the keys to the
kingdom?

~~~
TeMPOraL
All your questions have a single answer, which FSF is arguing for: Free
Software. No, seriously:

> _In reality though, other humans are always necessary — whether to explain
> how to use the technology,_

You can do that through good UI design, manuals, tutorials and support
(possibly paid support).

> _to do something that can 't be done through the software, to fix the
> software_

This doesn't mean the people doing this have to be the vendors selling the
software. You should be able to do it yourself, or hire a third party.

> _(after isolating the problem using your data)._

Doesn't justify getting that data without consent.

> _If there 's trust between the user and the software provider, why not
> leverage it to fill in the gaps that software leaves in functionality._

One of the point of Free Software is that this shouldn't be a two-party
relationship. The relationship should include all other users of the software,
and put them all in similar positions of power.

(Personal aside: maybe this is because I'm past my 20s, but I start to hate
this growing trend where buying a product forces you to establish a
relationship with a vendor. I don't want a relationship, I want the product.)

> _If there 's no trust, how do you use software without giving the provider
> the keys to the kingdom?_

Open source.

~~~
jonstaab
Maybe it has something to do with the domain I work in, or maybe it's just a
problem with how software is done, but the expectation in my industry that
there ought to be a relationship that comes along with the software.

Also, Open Source is not an answer to the last question. The majority of
software users don't have the technical expertise to evaluate the safety of a
given OSS, even if there's a community established around making
recommendations — but even then, that's a trust relationship too.

Edit: maybe I should be more open minded. How is OSS a substitute for trust?
Is it a redirection of trust to a group whose interests are aligned with
yours? How do you facilitate that network without putting too much burden on
the user? Are there any good examples of working OSS that involves non-
technical end users?

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _Maybe it has something to do with the domain I work in, or maybe it 's just
> a problem with how software is done, but the expectation in my industry that
> there ought to be a relationship that comes along with the software._

It absolutely is a problem with how software is done. A decade or more ago,
back before everything turned from a product into a SaaS subscription, you
could _buy_ software, and any relationship was strictly optional.

> _How is OSS a substitute for trust? Is it a redirection of trust to a group
> whose interests are aligned with yours?_

I should have said more and not just dropped a term, sorry. OSS is not a
substitute for trust in general; trust is a desirable quality. But it is a
refinement of trust (per the usual "trust but verify" approach), and also
potentially a redirection - you have an option to base your trust not just on
promises of the software provider, but also on the opinions of other people
who looked into it, and who give you more reasons to trust them.

> _How do you facilitate that network without putting too much burden on the
> user?_

Open Source helps with that by allowing communities of users with knowledge
about the inner workings to form. These communities naturally connect to other
communities. It's not effortless, but humans in general are good at navigating
this. OSS isn't a necessary thing here, but it's very helpful.

------
freakynit
Glad someone is pointing these out. All may not be true, but, it certainly
shows what all is going on

------
scarejunba
Haha, privacy advocates love this sort of sensationalism. They run around
saying the world is ending.

Then, when they spend all their time yelling that autocomplete is
surveillance, they wonder why no on is listening.

I, for one, am fully informed of all this and choose to share my info. Even
better, when Google gets "My Timeline" wrong, I correct it. For free. That's
right. For free.

Because there's no nuance to their arguments, they end up looking like the
crazy guy with the sign about contrails on Market St. Then when MKULTRA comes
out, they act like they predicted it when the f-score of their predictions is
near zero.

------
omgtehlion
I would like to add to the list software_reporter_tool.exe which spontaneously
consumes 100% CPU on windows machines

------
zaat
> Updated: $Date: 2019/08/17 09:55:24 $

Are those $ signs an Emacs limitation?

~~~
TeMPOraL
It looks more like automatic interpolation of values in version control
systems from the times of CVS and SVN.

------
tcd
I mean, anyone who bothers to take the time to do a Google Takeout and
actually looks at the data in the JSON files can see just how much information
they are storing, and it is quite alarming.

Thing is, companies keep data about you even if you don't have an account,
which is impossible to GDPR.

Some of the sources here are questionable; there's a sun.co.uk URL which is
obviously tabloid trash, so please apply critical thought, the article
presents what appears to be a convincing piece but some of the "sources" are
not to be trusted.

But even on Linux you can't escape Google's web, even if you really really
tried, some developers use Google's APIs for fonts, jQuery/scripts etc, so
it's really hard to use the web without Google knowing about it and building
up their knowledge graph.

------
nolok
Given this thread and the one about Apple, I can't help but notice that
Microsoft feels, to me, much better on that front. Far from perfect or even
good enough for the (very sane) criterias GNU aims for, but I feel very much
more in control of my Microsoft box that I am of my Apple or Google one.

Of course there are dozen of areas where Microsoft fails as bad as the other
two, but I notice there are a couple dozen where they let me while the others
don't, while the reverse is not quite true.

~~~
tcd
> but I feel very much more in control of my Microsoft box that I am of my
> Apple or Google one.

Hahaha, you haven't seen the data MS collects on Windows 10 users? Try enable
full telemetry and download their tool, every damn URL gets logged and even
some of the "basic" data might reveal trends when combined with other data
sets.

NO "big tech" company is to be trusted. Cambridge Analytica and co taught us
that.

Data and information is being weaponized, the 2016 election proved that, go
read the Mueller report for more information on this.

~~~
nolok
You may have missed my point, which was not about the default or intent, but
about the amount of _control_ they let me have on my actual computer; the
ability to change its behavior to make it do what I want.

I have done what you say about having a look at the telemetry feeds, and as
such I know that a simple run of 0&0 ShutUp 10 allows me to stop it. Not a
complex kernel thing or whatever, just a simple user land application that has
like 3 buttons to click and doesn't even require an install.

So I stand by my opinion, which again is not intent or what they do by
default, but how much they allow me to change it on my own hardware.

~~~
wyre
>0&0 ShutUp 10

What is this?

~~~
DHPersonal
[https://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10](https://www.oo-
software.com/en/shutup10)

------
joeblau
What is interesting about this and the Apple post[1] is that no one is
actually taking responsibility or signing their name. It's just a generic blog
post with a list of issues. Where is the GNU's "open" log of who is publishing
this info? Without a source, I can't really verify if the author has some
ulterior motive.

[1] [https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-
apple.html](https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-apple.html)

~~~
GuiA
The author has an ulterior motive, which is that to advance the agenda of the
FSF*.

~~~
klez
Sorry to nitpick: GNU is a project, the foundation is the Free Software
Foundation. There's no GNU Foundation.

~~~
GuiA
Indeed, thanks!

