Is web scraping ok?

[rogue06]

His rum. And his bacon.

certain not all of his marbles.

[firstfloor]

Stuff like this tells us where we are on the road to disaster. Feel free to touch the brakes.

The Colorado River’s average annual flow has declined by nearly 20 percent compared to the last century, and researchers have identified one of the main culprits: climate change is causing mountain snowpack to disappear, leading to increased evaporation.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/clima...t-vital-river/

[Juvenal]

From the transcript:

Kashmir Hill
So I’ve been covering privacy for 10 years, and I know that a technology like this in public hands is the nightmare scenario.

[Music]
This has been a tool that was too taboo for Silicon Valley giants who were capable of building it. Google in 2011 said that they could release a tool like this, but it was the one technology they were holding back because it could be used in a very bad way.

Annie Brown
And why exactly is this kind of technology this line in the sand that no one will cross? What makes it so dangerous?

Kashmir Hill
So imagine this technology in public hands. It would mean that if you were at a bar and someone saw you and was interested in you, they could take your photo, run your face through the app, and then it pulls up all these photos of you from the internet. It probably takes them back to your Facebook page. So now they know your name, they know who you’re friends with, they can Google your name, they can see where you live, where you work, maybe how much money you make. Let’s say you’re a parent and you’re walking down the street with your three-year-old. Somebody can take a photo of you and know where the two of you live. Imagine you’re a protester in the U.S. or in a more authoritarian regime. All of a sudden they know everything about you, and you can face repercussions for just trying to exercise your political opinions. If this app were made publicly available, it would be the end of being anonymous in public. You would have to assume anyone can know who you are any time they’re able to take a photo of your face.

This thing is a stalker's wet dream, and the tech needed to build it is off-the-shelf. If China didn't have it before it hit the NY Times, it does now.

This guy is barely a nerd, with a programming background as deep as needed to build a facebook app to add Trump's hair to your profile pic. Add a pic webscraper to an AI learning algorithm, and this will pop out. It doesn't need full face profiles. It doesn't need high res. And it's got VC backers who want to release it to the public, big guys, like Peter Thiel, the guy who backed Hulk Hogan in taking down Gawker.

[Sparko]

From the transcript:

Kashmir Hill
So I’ve been covering privacy for 10 years, and I know that a technology like this in public hands is the nightmare scenario.

[Music]
This has been a tool that was too taboo for Silicon Valley giants who were capable of building it. Google in 2011 said that they could release a tool like this, but it was the one technology they were holding back because it could be used in a very bad way.

Annie Brown
And why exactly is this kind of technology this line in the sand that no one will cross? What makes it so dangerous?

Kashmir Hill
So imagine this technology in public hands. It would mean that if you were at a bar and someone saw you and was interested in you, they could take your photo, run your face through the app, and then it pulls up all these photos of you from the internet. It probably takes them back to your Facebook page. So now they know your name, they know who you’re friends with, they can Google your name, they can see where you live, where you work, maybe how much money you make. Let’s say you’re a parent and you’re walking down the street with your three-year-old. Somebody can take a photo of you and know where the two of you live. Imagine you’re a protester in the U.S. or in a more authoritarian regime. All of a sudden they know everything about you, and you can face repercussions for just trying to exercise your political opinions. If this app were made publicly available, it would be the end of being anonymous in public. You would have to assume anyone can know who you are any time they’re able to take a photo of your face.

This thing is a stalker's wet dream, and the tech needed to build it is off-the-shelf. If China didn't have it before it hit the NY Times, it does now.

This guy is barely a nerd, with a programming background as deep as needed to build a facebook app to add Trump's hair to your profile pic. Add a pic webscraper to an AI learning algorithm, and this will pop out. It doesn't need full face profiles. It doesn't need high res. And it's got VC backers who want to release it to the public, big guys, like Peter Thiel, the guy who backed Hulk Hogan in taking down Gawker.

The really scary thing is you can pretty much do this now, albeit without the facial recognition. You can buy background checks on people, All you need is a name or email address. It will come back with their address, previous addresses, relatives, any arrests, social media links, etc.

And most people are idiots when it comes to security. Rather than locking down their facebook/instagram pages so only friends can view their posts (or even a list of their friends) people post everything to "public" even their most private stuff. Not sure if it is because they are just ignorant, or because they want to be famous and go viral with one of their posts or videos.