this post was submitted on 21 Dec 2024
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[–] [email protected] 60 points 17 hours ago* (last edited 17 hours ago) (2 children)

I’d probably be paying for YouTube, if it were run by a normal media company instead of the world’s largest spy network and personal data broker. There’s no way in hell I’m giving them my credit card information.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago) (2 children)

Yeah I don't really care about value when it comes to giving money to the guys who work with the NSA and CIA to find ways to more thoroughly spy on every user 24/7, and turned every search into "You asked for x, here's a dozen pages of what the State Department thinks you should have searched for instead"

Not to mention their genocide profiteering: https://www.mintpressnews.com/project-nimbus-billion-google-amazon-partners-israel/280087/

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago)

https://www.mintpressnews.com/national-security-search-engine-google-ranks-cia-agents/281490/

I'd like to think they're advising on how to keep ISIS propaganda, gore / executions, child endangerment, etc, from popping up on clearnet results....

...but * sigh * , former (not ex, let's be honest lol) spooks...so, why wouldn't it include some kind of pro-employer propaganda plan, right?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 16 hours ago (3 children)

It’s not even about the money, it’s literally about the credit card information, and the massive amount of data linked to it.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 14 hours ago

I would pay for a lot more things if I could do it anonymously

[–] [email protected] 5 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Do they not already know who you are and what you purchase anyway? I'm wondering how much of a difference it makes.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Whether they do or not, Google doesn’t know that that person is the same person as the one who is using YouTube.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

Except....

They do already. That's info you can just buy.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 13 hours ago

As I just said, whether they already do or not is beside the point.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

They already have your information, bud. Sorry.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

They quite literally don't have my credit card information. What are you even trying to say here?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

how can you be so sure about that?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 hours ago

I exaggerated for effect, in the way that 99% sure might as well be a fact in this case:

I have never given them to YouTube, and they have no financial incentive to acquire them AFAIK - holding that kind of PI is a liability so if anything they wouldn't want it without having a need for it. YouTube can't even know what countries I live in, my digital identity from the POV of their servers is too fluid and non-unique for my viewing habits to meaningfully correlate; I blend in with many other people also trying to stay hidden from them.

As for other Alphabet companies, like those engaged in surveillance capitalism who want to scoop up all of the datas, it's theoretically possible they've illegally acquired them from third parties and found a use for it, but there's just no feasible way they could associate that with most of my online activities, say, this account I'm using. The only people who have a chance at that are certain state intelligence agencies who are eavesdropping the wires, and they have much bigger problems they're paid to worry about. Hell, unless things have gotten better for them since Snowden, even they might struggle - most of their super cool hacker shit is only really useful if someone's worth active targeting.