Facebook Secretly Killed Users' Batteries, Former Engineer Claims (nypost.com) 130
The New York Post reports:
Facebook can secretly drain its users' cellphone batteries, a former employee contends in a lawsuit.
The practice, known as "negative testing," allows tech companies to "surreptitiously" run down someone's mobile juice in the name of testing features or issues such as how fast their app runs or how an image might load, according to data scientist George Hayward. "I said to the manager, 'This can harm somebody,' and she said by harming a few we can help the greater masses," said Hayward, 33, who claims in a Manhattan Federal Court lawsuit that he was fired in November for refusing to participate in negative testing....
Killing someone's cellphone battery puts people at risk, especially "in circumstances where they need to communicate with others, including but not limited to police or other rescue workers," according to the litigation filed against Facebook's parent company, Meta Platforms. "I refused to do this test," he said, adding, "It turns out if you tell your boss, 'No, that's illegal,' it doesn't go over very well." Hayward was hired in October 2019 for a six-figure gig.
He said he doesn't know how many people have been impacted by Facebook's negative testing but believes the company has engaged in the practice because he was given an internal training document titled, "How to run thoughtful negative tests," which included examples of such experiments being carried out. "I have never seen a more horrible document in my career," he said....
The lawsuit, which sought unspecified damages, has since been withdrawn because Hayward is required to go to arbitration, said the lawyer, who said Hayward stands by the allegations.
Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader WankerWeasel for sharing the article.
The practice, known as "negative testing," allows tech companies to "surreptitiously" run down someone's mobile juice in the name of testing features or issues such as how fast their app runs or how an image might load, according to data scientist George Hayward. "I said to the manager, 'This can harm somebody,' and she said by harming a few we can help the greater masses," said Hayward, 33, who claims in a Manhattan Federal Court lawsuit that he was fired in November for refusing to participate in negative testing....
Killing someone's cellphone battery puts people at risk, especially "in circumstances where they need to communicate with others, including but not limited to police or other rescue workers," according to the litigation filed against Facebook's parent company, Meta Platforms. "I refused to do this test," he said, adding, "It turns out if you tell your boss, 'No, that's illegal,' it doesn't go over very well." Hayward was hired in October 2019 for a six-figure gig.
He said he doesn't know how many people have been impacted by Facebook's negative testing but believes the company has engaged in the practice because he was given an internal training document titled, "How to run thoughtful negative tests," which included examples of such experiments being carried out. "I have never seen a more horrible document in my career," he said....
The lawsuit, which sought unspecified damages, has since been withdrawn because Hayward is required to go to arbitration, said the lawyer, who said Hayward stands by the allegations.
Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader WankerWeasel for sharing the article.
Mistake (Score:2, Insightful)
"I said to the manager, 'This can harm somebody,' and she said by harming a few we can help the greater masses" said Hayward, former employee
Always say "Yes" if you want to have a job in corporate environment and when you are asked to do something.
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Be proactive and start sucking up before they ask.
Re:Mistake (Score:5, Insightful)
Always say "Yes" if you want to have a job in corporate environment and when you are asked to do something.
You're an idiot if you really do that. Every engineer should be looking at things with a keen eye for ways to improve the product and then bringing that to the discussion table. If you're just being a "Yes" man, you'll never bring anything of value and be stuck pounding out useless code forever.
There were countless times in my career where someone told me to do X and I said, "Whoa, that sucks. How about we do Y instead?" I never got fired and instead I was promoted.
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There were countless times in my career where someone told me to do X and I said, "Whoa, that sucks. How about we do Y instead?" I never got fired and instead I was promoted.
This - so much this. I suppose it might be difficult for some to understand, but "yes" people are 100 percent redundant, and not missed at all when they are shitcanned or leave.
There is a huge difference between trying to suck up and saying everything that comes your way is the greatest idea evah!, and the concept of wanting your project to succeed so much that you point out flaws that might keep it from evah working.
Anyhow, where I was before my present employ, people who weren't even in my field ca
Re:Mistake (Score:5, Informative)
Always say "Yes" if you want to have a job in corporate environment and when you are asked to do something.
only if you don't care about any potential legal liability issues you may find yourself in if anything ever does go wrong. It will also make you unemployable by any corporate post the incident.
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He already mentioned "if you have a job in corporate environment"
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You're not only an asshole, but a blinkered moron, if you think people in a corporate environment are automatically immoral and don't care about their own futures.
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Probably not if you simply are in a corporate environment, but this is a gain an example that it's those people who can make a career there.
Re: Mistake (Score:2)
No, but it's enough to get immunity if you talk.
Re:Mistake (Score:5, Informative)
I'd rather preserve my dignity and find a job that doesnt require me to be evil.
I've walked out of bosses offices and called the police before (Boss demanded that I break into a competitors database after I noticed a security flaw).
I've written to investors and told them the company I was working at is intentionally stealing from them.
I've told the boss I morally refuse to do a certain job and gotten fired.
And I regret nothing and would do it again in a heart beat. Because I'm not a criminal and I would rather be unemployed than do something I consider morally reprehensible.
Re: Mistake (Score:5, Interesting)
At one former employer, I started carrying a voice activated recorder to capture such requests.
And, I kept notes and related emails.
If they fire you for subordination (for not doing something they ask), they can deny you unemployment compensation . Always good to have a backup plan with evidence.
Re: Mistake (Score:5, Informative)
Too bad that in many many states recording a conversation without the explicit and stated consent of all parties is illegal and would result in your evidence being thrown out and with you charged with a crime. There's a reason powerful people are powerful.
And in other [mwl-law.com] states it is not illegal.
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Not quite. The laws are basically No-party-consent (You can secretly record other people talking to each other), One-party-consent (You can secretly record yourself talking to another) and Two-party-consent (everyone in the convo must consent).
No-party is rare. Its basically wiretapping, and usually requires a court order. However there are exceptions to this involving public spaces and situations where an expectation of no privacy is expected (usually) simply because the alternative effectivvely bans a lar
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Further its highly likely that signing an NDA may well override it, if your in a place where the courts assert an NDA is strong enough to preclude talking to the cops, although thats rare (and very much uniquelly american. The rest of the worlds judicial systems dont let contracts override laws)
I know - My one employer was killing little kids and making skin suits out of them - but that NDA - I had to keep my yap shut. I had no recourse! 8^/
An NDA does not give the issuer the unbridled right to commit crimes. That isn't what they are for.
Illegal acts - murder is a good example of something a NDA doesn't cover
Public safety - You can't release cyanide into the environment, and demand that employees stay silent
Weird how people seem to think that once an NDA is signed, the person who gave i
Re:Mistake (Score:5, Interesting)
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> Always say "Yes" if you are amoral subhuman automaton who prefers drinking the semen of corporate entities for over being a protector of actual flesh and blood entities
Fixed that for you, you amoral subhuman automaton.
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and then this happens
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Re:Mistake (Score:5, Insightful)
Can we launch safely despite the very cold weather and a few busted O-rings in the past? You shout NO, make very sure you said NO on record.
Been in a few situations where the shit hit the fan. Thank god I keep these kinds of things on record. I am always surprised how they storm into the office shouting, trying to put the blame on some low level worker. It is pure intimidation. The contrast cannot be bigger. It is mindblowing how quiet it gets after you send a report of your actions to management. All of the sudden, it is no longer an issue. Just a minor mistake of some manager. It happens let's not be childish about it.
Be prepared. Keep em in touch with reality. Keep the shit they throw at you on a plate and present it close to their nose when needed.
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Always say "Yes" if you want to have a job in corporate environment and when you are asked to do something.
No I'm a professional engineer. Doing what is right comes first or I risk potentially losing my license. And yes I have said "no" to many requests. No I won't do it because that won't work (discussing someone insisting on a weird way to measure something). No I won't do it because it's unethical (discussing how we talk to a regulator). No, doing that will get someone killed (discussing a specific maintenance routine someone asked me to sign off).
If all you are is a yes man then I hope you don't do anything
Re: Mistake (Score:2)
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A very long time ago I was fired for refusing to sign a false document about the MTBF of some thermocouple modules. Years later I found that a previous batch of these parts was probably part of the reason the Fermi reactor melted down. (The modules had failed prematurely.)
To this day I don't think there is any remedy for the situation I found myself in.
How to Get Even (Score:5, Insightful)
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Are you somehow under the impression that the law protects workers from employer abuses?
The law does protect workers from employer abuses, and in particular protects them from "whistlblowing" retaliation: being fired for reporting illegal activity. But the laws vary by state.
I think what you mean to say is, the law is only going to be enforced if you have access to powerful lawyers, since corporations will fight like demons.
https://www.paycor.com/resourc... [paycor.com]
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Yep.
Turns out that "what does happen" is often strongly dependent on how good a lawyer you can afford.
Re:How to Get Even (Score:4, Interesting)
Being fired for refusing to partake in illegal activity should be a slam dunk.
Your username is that of an Australian city. You should know that what you understand about employee protection laws is not relevant everywhere. In many places in America unfair dismissal isn't a thing and you can be fired literally for any reason or in some cases no reason what so ever.
In Australia it would be a slam dunk, in America it would be a very solid "well ... it's complicated".
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>" I cannot understand how anybody in the US thinks they should take a job without being in a union, or how anyone thinks they can get by with negotiating terms of employment alone."
Unions tend to protect mostly the lower-skilled type positions. But also can have the effect of forcing retention of poor performers. Believe it or not, businesses do want to hire people who are productive and effective... even if there is no union.
There is a balance with unions- when the union has too much power, a busines
Re:How to Get Even (Score:5, Informative)
But also can have the effect of forcing retention of poor performers.
a business can end up with greatly overpaid and unproductive workers.
This is a pretty common trope about unions but really is there any evidence to back it up?
How Unions Work for the Economy [tcf.org]
In what is probably the leading study on the issue, Richard B. Freeman, a Harvard labor economist, joined Hristos Doucouliagos and Patrice Laroche to examine more than 300 studies on the effects of unionization on productivity. They concluded that unions do not, overall, reduce productivity, although there are variations in different countries and industries according to specific circumstances. Freeman and his coauthors found that in the United States, unionization appears to be associated with higher productivity in the education and construction sectors, while making no overall difference on productivity in manufacturing.
Unions do hurt profits, but not productivity, and they remain a bulwark against a widening wealth gap [theconversation.com]
Strong unions, strong productivity [epi.org]
The dramatic drop in unionization in the United States from 1979 to 2005 did not lead to faster productivity growth than in the seven largest European countries with union density greater than 60%. In fact, those countries’ average annual labor productivity growth of 1.7% equaled productivity growth in the United States. Output per hour worked is higher in the Netherlands, France, and Belgium, where more than 80% of employees have union contracts (compared to the United States’ 12% unionization).
Now, I am sure there are anecdotes about the lazy union worker who can't get fired but we need more than anecdotes to form policy decisions and right-to-work as a policy is frankly anti-choice and really just anti-union laws packaged with a palatable name to provide cover to the politicians voting for it.
Re:How to Get Even (Score:5, Interesting)
This is a pretty common trope about unions but really is there any evidence to back it up?
I've worked plenty of union companies before. I have plenty of anecdotes of exactly that behaviour. Some unions make their members untouchable. Some unions are good. All kinds exist. Calling one kind a "trope" is just stupid.
In one factory I worked a union covered guy actually punched (yes physically assaulted) someone during an argument and the union threatened a strike if the guy got fired. Funny enough the company actually hit back first. They initiated a lockout the day after and said no union members are coming back on site until they withdraw their intention to strike and agree the guy is fired. Funny enough the union quickly turned on the union rep.
Now that same union defended me (a non union guy) against HR one day regarding my work hours. So they aren't all bad.
But collective power in either case leads to the ability to make some really fucking stupid decisions, and that very much includes a long history of corruption in various unions, almost as common as the distain we have generally for corporations.
Anyway rant over. It's irrelevant in this case. The USA can't save itself. It needs unions. No party in power is capable of passing wide reaching employee protection laws, there's too many vested interests against it so unions in the USA are the only option.
I live in a country with actual employee protection laws that prevent corporate abuse, we don't need them here... anymore... it's undeniable they had a hand in crafting these laws.
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I think the USA will eventually get unions again, but only after some time figuring out what exactly we want the unions to do.
Re:How to Get Even (Score:5, Informative)
>"This is a pretty common trope about unions but really is there any evidence to back it up?"
Plenty. Since you cited tcf, a left-wing source, I will cite some non left-leaning sources...
Heritage:
https://www.heritage.org/jobs-... [heritage.org]
"finds that unionization decreases productivity in non-manufacturing firms"
"Consequently, unions compress wages within firms, raising wages for less productive workers but lowering them for more productive workers"
Hoover:
https://www.hoover.org/researc... [hoover.org]
"lowers overall productivity and often prevents entry-level employees from rising through the ranks."
FEE:
https://fee.org/articles/labor... [fee.org]
"To the extent that organized labor has been successful in these restrictive activities, the economic competition and mobility that is a major source of increased productivity has been reduced."
"The best way to increase productivity,[...] is to allow competition in free and open markets. Unfortunately we can expect little support in this direction from organized labor."
MISES:
https://mises.org/library/how-... [mises.org]
"From the perspective of most of those lucky enough to keep their jobs, the most serious consequence of the unions is the holding down or outright reduction of the productivity of labor. With few exceptions, the labor unions openly combat the rise in the productivity of labor"
"They [unions] reduce the supply and productivity of labor and so reduce the supply and raise the prices of the goods and services their members help to produce, thereby reducing real wages throughout the economic system."
It is not ALWAYS the case that productivity will suffer with union labor, but it is not uncommon. Unions, or the threat thereof, have a valuable place in helping to prevent employee abuse and raising wages and working conditions. But they can also hurt productivity, increase consumer costs, and reduce competitiveness.
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A company is no required to follow the will of a union.
Every company simply can do as it wishes.
You completely exaggerate the power of unions.
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I cannot understand how anybody in the US thinks they should take a job without being in a union
Because unions in America were co-opted by the mafia.
That was a long time ago, and unions are starting to make a comeback.
Re: How to Get Even (Score:1)
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For most there is more to life than money
Maybe so. But a bunch of money sure does get, or help pursue, most of the rest.
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In many, if not all states in the USofA, that would be called reckless endangerment [wikipedia.org], even if nobody was actually harmed, and if they were, it would be added on to whatever felony charges were otherwise appropriate. If nothing else, it would increase both the minimum and maximum sentences, keeping the perps in a cage for a considerably longer time.
Re: How to Get Even (Score:2)
Re: How to Get Even (Score:4, Funny)
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That can't be right! I was sure that was the exact paragraph they used to assassinate me on Facebook.
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Ooh boy, I'm looking forward to the class action lawsuit where I get a settlement check for 37 cents and the law firm who organized it gets 50 million dollars.
That's what goes for justice against corporate America nowadays.
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You really think you're going to stand a chance with legal action against organizations so big they make Too Big To Fail companies look small?
Two words for you regarding "illegal"; Donor Class.
nothing will come of this (Score:2)
I'll bet there's something in the TOS that let's them do it to the people they did it to. And after all, it's industry standard practice - everyone does it!
One way or another, you can be sure nothing will come of this.
Re:nothing will come of this (Score:4, Interesting)
I'll bet there's something in the TOS that let's them do it to the people they did it to.
I don't think there even needs to be. You're running someone else's code on your phone. The battery drain which may result is entirely arbitrary depending on the app.
But it does go a long way to explain the random mentions of "My phone only lasted a few hours with Facebook installed" often met with the response of "It's working just fine here".
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What we need is discovery.
How did they pick who they would do this to? Did they have something against the people they targeted?
Knowingly causing intentional damage to someone's property is a crime.
Re: nothing will come of this (Score:2)
In an unrelated turn, some dude known as Wanker Weasel had himself promoted to reliable news source and will retain all rights and privileges accordingly, to keeping his identity intact, and can be henceforth referred or addressed as THE Wanker Weasel (There can be only one, and all that entails)
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>"One way or another, you can be sure nothing will come of this."
Maybe, maybe not. This is where the power of free communication comes into play. If the news of this happening gets out (like it did in this case) and spreads, you can bet it will cause negative things for Facebook.
Even if something is in a TOS, if it is crappy, it can lead to negative PR. And in a case where you don't have monopolies (which is why busting and preventing monopolies is so important) consumers can simply move to one of the
Keep digging that hole (Score:2)
Hayward may have to go to arbitration so we won't get to hear the details, but by him coming forth and telling people about this will make it that much easier for Congress to haul these people into open hearings for an investigation.
If FB thought they had issues before, this will compound things since they will have to deny the very thing everyone now knows about, including a specifically named document.
Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Corporations are psychopathic by definition, and this one is run by a notoriously callous psychopath. There's nothing good to be expected from Facebook. In fact, it would be surprising if anything good came out of it.
Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
>"Corporations are psychopathic by definition"
This is pretty much true. But it is also how it works. It isn't the role of corporations to be kind, empathetic and "feeling." It is their job to be as productive and profitable as possible, bringing the widest range of products and services to the market as possible.
Consumers are the check on that. They want the lowest prices and best service/products they can get. Competition is key- as long as there aren't monopolies ruining the field, you can bet that bad practices (like crappy service and bad or overprices products) will be punished when they lose customers.
wtf arbitration ?? (Score:5, Insightful)
it's time to make this forced arbitration stuff illegal, period.
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> it's time to make this forced arbitration stuff illegal, period.
If there's fraud (or other illegal activity) involved a judge will find the clause non-binding. Arbitration doesn't excuse lawlessness.
I find it hard to denounce this (Score:3)
she said by harming a few we can help the greater masses
That's a considerable improvement over business as usual: harming the greater masses to help the few.
How utilitarian of her. (Score:2)
Hopefully she's not a medical doctor... Can't wait to see her solution to The Trolley Problem.
Also, not sure that's what Spock meant by "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few."
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Non sequitur. In the case at hand, there's the choice to not harm anyone.
Re: How utilitarian of her. (Score:3)
is required to go to arbitration (Score:2)
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Written for lawyers, by lawyers, to be self-serving.
Translation (for the greed-impaired): The fuck did you expect.
I used to run a Facebook mod (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: I used to run a Facebook mod (Score:2)
Facebook will come to the table, with a proposal equivalent to "coming in clean"
You know what, esteemed members of the congressional inquiry panel. I will make one phone call--one phone call-- and your phones flashlights will turn on. And all this noise about so-called killing phones, etc can be brought into focus in a different light (See what I did there?)
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I'd be more concerned with what the app was doing than the fact it was draining battery. The OS at least gives you some inbuilt way to monitor battery usage and disable an app. (Hopefully, I've seen some phones locked down to where Facebook couldn't be entirely deleted.)
Do you have any idea of what these "tests" were actually doing?
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If the Facebook app can't be deleted from your phone, then the most secure solution is not to fee it any data: simply don't enter your credentials in it. And if you need to access Facebook, do it with a 3rd part app, like FaceSlim, this way you make sure Facebook can't run such things on your device.
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this manager (Score:5, Insightful)
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should be arrested, nobody should be draining people's phone batteries
At no point does software give any guarantees as to how much battery it may consume. Unethical, yeah. But arrested? Jesus fucking Christ you idiots are so insanely prison happy it makes me wonder how you function as a society at all. What next, the HOA writing you a letter should get someone arrested as well? Maybe if someone passed wind walking near you we should have them arrested as well?
What's the word to describe the Slashdot version of a Karen?
Wanker Weasel (Score:2)
Wanker weasel?
Shrug (Score:3, Interesting)
I don't remember ever seeing fb, or any app manufacturer say they'd do their best to *not* run down my battery. If someone writes a crappy app that inadvertently drains my battery, I'm not going to sue them because they could've done better. FB is at least gaining new information from my battery draining. All apps slowly drain the battery, if a particular one is draining it faster than it should, I probably won't notice. They're also not required to make sure your battery stays alive in the case of emergency, that's the user's job.
This is a different story if the battery draining causes damage to the phone, or makes it so hot that it's dangerous.
On a related note, does this imply that the app has access to my battery level? Is that information most apps can access?
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I don't remember ever seeing fb, or any app manufacturer say they'd do their best to *not* run down my battery. If someone writes a crappy app that inadvertently drains my battery, I'm not going to sue them because they could've done better. FB is at least gaining new information from my battery draining. All apps slowly drain the battery, if a particular one is draining it faster than it should, I probably won't notice. They're also not required to make sure your battery stays alive in the case of emergency, that's the user's job.
This is a different story if the battery draining causes damage to the phone, or makes it so hot that it's dangerous.
On a related note, does this imply that the app has access to my battery level? Is that information most apps can access?
Thanks for the explanation, Zuck!
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On a related note, does this imply that the app has access to my battery level? Is that information most apps can access?
Yes.
I think that's a standard bit of information from an API on both phones.
Uh oh. (Score:3, Interesting)
If this guy sticks by bis principles this could easily spell a bazillion dollars in fees and damages for Facebook. Not only for this guy but for regular users and for other regulative bodies. I can already see the EU regulators piping their ears.
Easily explained away... (Score:2)
The TOS is worded in such a vague way in places, that if pressed to legally defend their position, FB could easily, after the fact, argue that A/B power testing is covered by
The real issue at hand is whether JUST because something is mentioned in a TOS, is it legal?
IMHO, we are all being royally fscked by all our service providers. I've read
Facebook just fired a ton of contractors (Score:5, Insightful)
All I'm saying is if I was a journalist looking for something juicy now would be a good time to go looking for bitter angry people who got screwed when they were fired and have dirt to dish
Never install apps when there's a browser alternat (Score:2)
I've always avoided apps as much as possible, to the extent I even use crap like Facebook at all. It's much safer to access them by the browser of my choice, with the browser's native security plus well known security plugins.
The primary reason these companies even create apps is an app's ability to hook more deeply into the device OS. Occasionally to provide enhanced user service. But more importantly to enhance their ability to collect data and run in the background even when I'm not "using" the app.
I have no sympathy... (Score:3)
Re:I have no sympathy... (Score:4, Informative)
Is very simple, go to Settings -> Battery -> Battery usage and you can easily learn what is sucking the power from your battery. Then decide which of those apps are worth keeping.
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I use my phone all day long and end the day with over 30% battery, still.
So do I and I have all of the above listed apps installed. The trick is to not be involved in this tiny insignificant number of people affected by this and in no way representative of every idiot who complains about their phone battery.
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I read all of these complaints about certain phones, with the usual whine about "battery doesn't last". "I can't get all day battery, it drains so fast!". Yet, these idiots have their phones loaded up with crap like Facebook, Messenger, Tiktok, Instagram, Snapchat, etc. And all the "games". They're walking spyware factories complaining they're being spied on.
Your complaint was valid, right up to that point where you started suggesting that spoiled social media and gaming addicts actually care about being spied on.
They don't, and you know this. Not caring is exactly how they get so addicted. They're only complaining about a shitty battery that can't keep up with their addictions. Spying is never a concern.
The app is _supposed to_ harm the user (Score:2, Insightful)
The entire purpose of the app is to harm the user. The user knows this. Every single user of the Facebook app knows that it is deliberately intended to work against that user's interest.
It shows ads. It shows Facebook. That's what it's for! The whole reason you're running that app, is to make bad things happen to you!
IMHO, the users opted in. If battery draining can harm someone, well, isn't being harmed the whole fucking point of the app? If you didn't want bad things to happen to you, you wouldn't have i
Lots of hyperbole in this article (Score:2)
Yep, "negative testing" is bad, but if unreasonable battery usage was so bad as to warrant a lawsuit and win, then it would wipe the majority of the app/play store (not a bad thing if you ask me...)
The Facebook and Messenger app is bloated, like thousands of other apps, it eats way too much battery. I don't know how much "negative testing" contribute to that, but I suspect that 90% of it is just bloat and sloppy coding in its normal function. Personally, I think it is unacceptable, megawatts of power are wa
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It is not "unreasonable battery usage". It is intentionally switching on an unreasonable battery usage mode, fully knowing it will drain the battery a lot faster. So "intentional sabotage of a potential safety device" comes to mind. If anybody was hurt or killed as a result, Farcebook could well have committed a criminal act there.
Expect to see the manager fired very soon (Score:2)
Facebook is the most evil tech company (Score:2)
come on, people (Score:2)
Never download an app for anything that can be done reasonably well in a web browser...
Facebook is the fungus (Score:2)
Facebook is the definition of unethical and parasitic.
Illegal? (Score:2)
I don't get how running down someone's battery is "illegal". It just makes it a crappy app that is equivalent to a virus. Not necessarily illegal. Who in their right mind would run the Facebook app on their phone anyway?
Likely normal analytics (Score:2)
If Facebook literally had app run an idle loop on all CPU cores as long as it could get scheduled, I would change my mind. But say they developed a new rendering engine. It's not unreasonable to run 5 minute benchmarks on randomly selected phones, even though benchmarks would consume some battery charge without providing any service requested by the user.
The alternative is Facebook manually testing everything only in the lab or on employee devices. Then good luck if you are stuck with an $20 chinese phone t
Don't Install Anything Made By Meta/Facebook (Score:2)
I use Facebook on my phone periodically; through a mobile browser. If someone said they sent me a Facebook message, I tell the mobile browser to go into desktop mode and check. But normally I tell people to just fucking text me. Why does anyone need any other messaging app? In fact I prefer if people phone me. I'm not abnormally antisocial that I get hives and 'triggered' by actual normal human conversation. But if you have to message me, I'm most available in that medium by just normal text messages. And y
Re: Don't Install Anything Made By Meta/Facebook (Score:2)
This is nothing. Facebook used to watch you. (Score:3, Informative)
In 2015, I worked at Shopify, and we'd occasionally have guest speakers come into our office for our weekly "Engineering Talks".
One day a Facebook engineer came in and was doing a talk on how they did A/B testing, as well as how they tracked user engagement with certain features and whatnot. It's what he told us in this talk that made me refuse to ever install Facebook on my phone again.
He let us know about several things, some of which were more mundane and are now common practice, like how if they used the iOS (or built in system) spinner when loading, people would think it was their phone that was slow and not Facebook, and how they would fill in blocks that looked like text right away before the content was finished loading to make things look like they are happening faster. Everyone does these things now, so not too surprising.
But the other things he said were truly shocking. Two in particular stood out:
Facebook uploads (or at least did at the time) all your photos to their servers in the background, all the time. Then when you choose to "upload" them, they show you a fake loading indicator, and simply mark the photo as now visible on their servers, since they were already uploaded in the background.
Facebook turned on and used the front facing camera on your phone to record and watch you, to track your eye movements to see what part of the page you were looking at the most. All of which would get uploaded to their servers in the background.
Stunned, I rose my hand and asked for clarification: "This isn't in production right? This is just with your testers, correct?"
Nope, it was in production. This was in the app for every user of Facebook.
Remember that Instagram "glitch" a few years back where people could see their camera was on even when they weren't using their camera, after iOS and Android added the camera indicator into their OS? Yeah, that wasn't a glitch...
Whistleblower laws? (Score:2)
Re:"Killed"? (Score:5, Insightful)
Batteries are only good for so many recharge cycles, so besides running it down, it'll make the battery die a lot sooner.
Re: (Score:2)
Batteries are only good for so many recharge cycles, so besides running it down, it'll make the battery die a lot sooner.
You are in control of your device and can see in detail what app uses what battery life. Running your battery down once won't kill it. Running your battery down every day may, but then the fault of that happening doesn't lie with Facebook but rather the idiot user who just accepts that an app is draining his battery and proceeds to do nothing about it.