Some people are convinced that Meta is eavesdropping on them through the Facebook app.

Rumors like these bother me and not because I’m a supporter of Meta. Rather, it’s because it delivers Meta way more power than they deserve and leads to despondent sentiments like this:

  • What’s the point? They have all my data anyway.
  • I’ll just accept that they’re listening to everything I say.

It’s like collapsing in defeat upon meeting Darth Vader before realizing that his lightsaber is a plastic prop.

Meta, like most of Big Tech, acquires their power mostly by exploiting money and the law. Not necessarily because they’re super geniuses with out-of-this-world technology1.

Why eavesdropping would be hilariously difficult to get away with

When most people think of the Facebook app accessing the microphone, they probably have an image like this in their heads:

fb-to-internet-1

The Facebook app grabs every single sound wave and shuttles it all to the cloud!

Even if this were true, there are weaknesses. We can eavesdrop on the Facebook app when it tries to communicate with Meta servers, as researchers have done already2.

fb-to-internet-packet-sniff

But let’s look at the other side. Can the Facebook app actually access the microphone like that and conceal that it’s doing so?

If you make electronics, you probably use Digikey. A quick look at their microphone selection shows 1,821 results spread across 31 manufacturers.

This would be more realistic:

fb-app-microphone-chaos

That’s a ridiculous amount of work, even for Meta. Android and Apple, to make things easier on app developers, abstract away those details.

fb-to-app-platform-to-mic

And this is why it’s insanely difficult for Meta to pull this off. They have to go through the middleman that is Google or Apple’s phone operating system.

For one, it’s possible to swap the middleman for a modified one that exposes more information about what the apps are getting up to3.

Second, Google and Apple frequently regulate what apps are allowed to do.

If you don’t trust their motivations, know that they’re not regulating apps only out of the kindness of their hearts. That user data is valuable: Google and Apple both use it to sell targeted ads. Why would they let a third party app take it for free?

Not pessimistic or optimistic

Does this mean we have nothing to worry about? No: the USA does have a problem with monopolies. It’s suffocating competition and innovation4 and sucking the fun out of software engineering.

What I am saying is: don’t engage in criti-hype and become paralyzed and awestruck by power that they don’t have.

Notes

Updated 2024-09-22

References

  1. Cory Doctorow’s ordinary mediocrities tag links to a ton of great posts on this subject. ↩

  2. Here’s a news report featuring an EFF researcher demonstrating packet sniffing and an article tallying up data usage ↩

  3. See TaintDroid ↩

  4. RIP diapers.com , their product was better and Amazon didn’t like that. ↩