kahn

I just mentioned to a friend that if The Phone Company raised the cost of Caller ID to $300/month or maybe weekly, I would pay it. That so helps me screen the calls although they still come in too frequently.

msu2001la

There was a lot of click-bait style reporting and hyperbole on this topic that seems to go unchecked. These stories all made it seem like Strava was secretly tracking military members without their permission and then publishing a map of their movements, but the reality is a bit different.

First, there is very little chance that military members with top-secret security clearance were somehow dumb enough to actively track their movements or operations that would reveal sensitive information, AND upload that info to a website that publicly shares it. This would be a huge violation of security protocols on a number of levels.

Second - the locations of the bases that show up on Strava's Global Heat Map were not actually a secret. Yes, it's possible that activities occurring on those bases are secret, but the locations themsleves were all already known and can be easily seen on sites like Google Maps. Learning that people living and working on known military bases sometimes run and bike on them isn't exactly breaking news. All of the GPS data Strava publishes to their heat map is willingly uploaded by users who know they are publicly sharing it. It is very simple to opt-out on having your data included in the Global Heat Map.

Is it a potential problem that military members are tracking their activities with GPS and uploading that information to a publicly viewable website platform that also contains personal information like names, DOB, etc? Maybe. I'm sure the military has tightened their policies on this type of thing in recent years, but it seems incredibly unlikely that any actual secret information was revealed by Strava's Global Heat Map.

ZHVelo

Ads are the money. A lot of things would not work without them.

Sy Reene

I wish The Phone Company could just figure out how these callers are able to spoof pretty much any number in any area and put a stop to it.

jadocs

I don't think so. I think you unknowingly gave Strava access to your contacts when you signed up and created your account. Go into settings on Strava and see if it is enabled.

MinnMan

I didn't read any stories that stated or insinuated that.

Milton Keynes

The problem is that they're calling from overseas using VOIP via the internet, and are able to spoof their caller ID by putting in whatever number they want. The FCC and the phone industry has been slow to act to put a stop to these nuisance calls. I think the FCC recently stated that caller ID spoofing is a naughty thing to do and makes them really mad, but actually putting a stop to it seems to be beyond their capability.

GhostRider62

If I am paying 200 per month for phone service, why? I don't think a hospital or any private entity should be able to sell or give my phone number. I went to a specialist for a sprained ankle and now I get ads for orthotics? Creepy.

Koyote

Unless you have some family plan with a bunch of people on it, I don't understand how you can be paying $200/month for phone service.

GhostRider62

What is your point?

Koyote

My point is that, unless you have a family plan with a bunch of people, I don't understand how you can be paying $200/month for phone service.

Do you want me to state it less clearly?

GhostRider62

So, at what price would you consider it appropriate for my privacy to be compromised? $100 a month? $50?

My monthly bill is $200. Where I live or how many phones I have quite frankly is none of your business.

rsbob 

Sorry but no. This is the location. NE 42nd St. See the red dot.

Koyote

I'm just amazed that anyone would be paying that much for phone service. But it's beside the point.

You don't seem to understand why spam phone calls occur. It doesn't have anything to do with your phone fees, nor with your phone service provider.

canklecat

If you're not using Strava as a social network it really doesn't offer much that can't be done better by other apps. I mostly use it to keep up with meatspace local friends for encouragement and organizing group rides.

I used to set my Strava to public but as I've gotten older and slower there's no chance of snagging another KOM or top ten so I set everything to friends only now. My errand rides and walks are set to "me only." Some friends post everything they do, even stuff that's only a few minutes or less than a mile. I'd rather not clutter the place with that stuff so I post only more significant activities.

If you prefer privacy but still want plenty of data to track your progress, try Cyclemeter. If I'm recalling correctly all data is stored only on your phone, unless you specifically choose to share it elsewhere. Lots of customizable features and plenty of data. However the trial version is so badly hobbled you won't really get a fair idea of its capabilities. The annual subscription is reasonable

The Wahoo Fitness app is free, very good and won't share data unless you authorize it. While the app doesn't show complete data it does record everything. The data file can be synced with another app or software that can read all the recorded data.

The various MapMy apps (MapMyRide, etc.) also have plenty of data and won't share data unless you authorize it. However it does put users on email lists that seem to generate a lot of spam from unrelated companies.

Regarding tracking across platforms -- Facebook, Strava, Google, Amazon, etc -- that's just how the web works. You can minimize it to some extent by using only a personal computer and adding browser extensions that control ads, cookies and scripts. Firefox is a bit less intrusive than Chrome, and there are other customized browsers with more privacy by default.

If you're using your phone the options for privacy are limited. Just the nature of the beast. You can still use privacy browsers (DuckDuckGo, etc.) but it's difficult to use the desktop version of Strava from a browser on a phone unless it has a really large screen.

And Google is notorious for burying the defaults that control privacy, and resetting our privacy back to public without notice. YouTube does that routinely, particularly features like auto-play. Every time I reboot my PC and log out of Chrome, when I start up again and log back in, YouTube resets everything to public, auto-play, etc. It's not a bug or oversight. They're hoping to force people into sharing data for revenue generation.

So pretty much any Android phone that's locked into the Google universe is a data harvesting/sharing surveillance device. Just the way things are. Apple/iPhone are constantly wrangling with the Googleverse over this issue, since most iPhone users expect more control over privacy.

My 2020 Android phone just updated from Android 10 to 11 and while some of the new features are good, it's annoying that they reset all my privacy settings to their preferred defaults of enabling all tracking, etc. And they tend to bury the options to enable users to choose their preferences.

I do enable some tracking that benefits me. For example, by enabling Amazon tracking in conjunction with Google, I'll get notifications of discounts on items I've been shopping for. So recently I snagged a pair of adidas SL20 running shoes for around $30. Immediately after buying that pair every option in that model jumped back up to around $100, with some fluctuations down to $75 or so. That same kind of one-day/one-time discount has benefited me a few times on bike tires and other gear, so it's worth enabling *some* tracking.

terrymorse 

The hospital almost certainly didn’t sell your phone number. You had your phone with you when you went to the doctor, and the ad folks tracked your phone’s location.

canklecat

^This^

Any phone with Google apps installed usually defaults to tracking everything. So they'll push the phone owner user (we don't really own our phones -- our phones own us) to post a review for every store we visit or pass, and push related ads.

It's possible to set our phones to minimize this stuff, but Google tries to make it as difficult as possible to avoid being tracked.

But there are potential upsides to tracking.

I've enabled Google Maps Timeline tracking of all my activities. This provides a reasonably objective account of my whereabouts if I'm struck by a car, etc. The Google Timeline log can be downloaded or deleted, but we cannot modify it to falsify the log. So it *might* be admissible as evidence for an insurance settlement, etc. It confirmed my version of events when I was hit by a car three years ago. The police report wording was muddled and unclear about my direction of travel. But my Google Maps Timeline log confirmed my version, including the timestamp, etc.

It's a trade off. Just be fully informed about the pros and cons.

However if I was still a journalist, active duty military or working for the government, I might be wary of carrying a surveillance device on some assignments. For example, if I was still a reporter conducting a confidential interview and wanted to protect my source, I might leave my smartphone home or the office. Ditto, if I was still active duty military on some assignments, it would not be a good idea to log my PT routines to Strava and create a record of my daily movement patterns and habits.

Lazyass

I don't have facebook, my space, snap face, instant chat, tweeter, nothing. That stuff is creepy. I just look at my daughters facebook thingy every morning to see the pictures she posts. And I don't have strava friends. I just use it mainly to keep track of my mileage.

ZHVelo

I said a lot of things, not every thing.

Who pays 200 for a monthly phone service though...

cjenrick

just use a watch. eddy merckx was the greatest racer of all time, all he used was a watch.

you know your route. you keep track of the time it takes you to complete the route.
you then divide miles by time to get average speed.

if your average speed was low one day, then you did not eat enuff carbs.
if your average speed was high but your legs were sore for three days, you need to eat more protein.

contacts? that's what i wear to see.
contacts? they are also the people i actually encounter in the real word, the physical universe, the bike riders on the trail. which whom i communicate with face to face, without a smart phone.
as soon as i worry about my contacts, i may as well stock up at Cabellas and move off the grid somewhere near the canadian border and hide in a rabbit hole, having taken too much LSD as a youth or been beaten by my father which causes me to be a paranoid conservative anti-social trump supporting survivalist who refuses to get vaccinated because he does not trust the goverment. and thus jepordizes(sp-sorry alex!) the general public with selfish and delusional behavior cause by too many psyche meds and a nagging wife.

Leinster

Call me crazy, but I don't think it's Strava's problem that personnel on a secret military base are voluntarily sharing their location data on a social media site. Are Facebook going to get in trouble next time someone posts a photo with some prisoners and "Chad was with 3 others in Abu Graib Secret Interrogation Site"?

Kapusta

If you have any facebook or facebook-owned apps on your phone, you have been basically giving out all your data to whoever wants it. I think things have tightened up a little recently, but it was like that for a while.

I am sure FB is not the only one, just among the most effective. If you use anything Google, assume they knew everything about you as well.

It is all the price of free.

And yes, is is very creepy IMO. It being ubiquitous, and largely unavoidable does not make it any less so.

The commentor above who mentionsd Orwell (1984), echos my thoughts. Who would have thought we would happily install the surveillance trackers on ourselves?

Kapusta

Heat maps have been a great tool for land managers to keep up on where the illegal trails are without even leaving the office.

PeteHski

But he didn't have any other choice. If he was racing today, he would be using all of the modern tech to track his performance.

ronf100

Login in to your Strava account and go to this link to adjust your privacy settings https://www.strava.com/settings/privacy