Comment by grahamj
1 month ago
> I didn't consent to any of this!
Yes you did. You purchased a computer, put this software on it and executed it. If you didn't want it to do whatever it's doing you should have determined what it would do beforehand and chose not to do it.
> whatever it's doing
Even assuming that running the software implies my consent (which I would dispute), how do I make the decision about whether I should execute the software if I don't know what it is doing?
This all-or-nothing approach is also problematic. I should not have to allow the developer free rein to do whatever he wants, as a condition of using the software. This is why operating systems are slowly building granular permissions and consent checks.
Installing and booting Linux absolutely implies consent to let it do what it does. It's open source, you can evaluate what it does before booting it. You know it's comprised of many processes, you know it has a networking stack, you connected it to a network. You can't then ask OMG why didn't it ask before sending something?
I agree that all-or-nothing is problematic but even with a flexible permission system the best you can hope for is for all the things apps do to be itemized and set to sane defaults. But even then sanity is subjective. For every person like you (and me fwiw) who values privacy there are 1000 people who will never find the settings, don't care about privacy, and will wonder why stuff isn't working.
Ultimately privacy is similar to security in that it comes down to trust. If you don't trust your OS you're screwed. Your choices are try to exert as much control over it as possible, or don't use it.
That's not how informed consent works.