Texting apps=stalkers?

[NeoSupaMario]

Hello, I heard a sort of disturbing rumor that some texting apps track you and that the people who run them read all of your texts and stalk you. Have you guys heard this? Which apps do this? And finally, does TextNow not do this? (I'm thinking of getting it- the one by enflick)

 

[Hells Malice]

I can't imagine anyone being bored enough to read texts. Fuck that would be the most boring thing in the history of mankind.

 

[Rydian]

I'd take rumors like this with a grain of salt. If that was being done it'd be rather akin to keylogging (unless mentioned in the EULA), so authorities would smack down on them if it was true... and if it was in the EULA it'd be easy to show that it's in the EULA. As for if it's being done or not, simply log where your stuff's going (assuming it's not all going through a third-party gateway).

Anyways without any actual info these rumors sound like shit. Like "school lunches have razor blades". If this was serious there'd be a real issue and somebody woyuld have some info about it.

 

[NeoSupaMario]

Well it was.... TextFree was doing it. (at least I think it was textfree) they would read ur txts, then sell the info to other companies and put ads on the app based on ur texts.

 

[DinohScene]

If you're concerned about your privacy then just don't get it.

Also someone can install a keylogger on your PC and read everything what you're doing.
It doesn't even have to be software.
There are hardware devices for keylogging.

 

[NeoSupaMario]

..… idk. From what I've heard textnow has a good privacy policy; but the txts still go through their servers.

 

[DinohScene]

MSN convo's go through the servers of MSN.
Normal text messages go through the operators servers.
Facebook shit goes through the facebook servers.
GBATemp stuff goes through the GBATemp servers.
Your mail goes through your providers servers.

Hell even I can make a stupid messaging service and read out every message that was coming through my server and yet I can read out everything and still don't tell anyone about it.
So that you think your messages are passing through privately.

It only takes 1 flaw in the security and everybody has access to your private data basically.

tl;dr If you don't trust it then don't register/use it.
Simple as that imho.

 

[Mangofett]

Well it was.... TextFree was doing it. (at least I think it was textfree) they would read ur txts, then sell the info to other companies and put ads on the app based on ur texts.

Virtually every company offering free services with advertising does this, directly or indirectly. They don't actually have humans who "read" your texts, they have bots who scan texts based on keywords. The biggest culprit of doing this is Google.

 

[Rydian]

Yeah that's not people reading your texts, it's scripts that do targeted advertising, and that's not unique to that service at all, tons of sites and services all over the world have been doing it for years.