Quote:
Originally Posted by oldtimes
Not really. Much of what they store on their phone is also on their computer or tablet.
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I thought the comparison was between use of an unencrypted email (almost all are) and allowing an app permission to access much of the data stored on the phone. The text of an email contains only what I type while the telemetry data sent from an app back to the developer could contain anything the app has permission to access.
A Google or Gmail *app* on your computer could request permission to access the data on your computer. The gmail tool running in a web browser is much more restricted. Yes, a malicious web application can reach out and access data it isn't supposed to, which is why we don't click on random links in emails or text messages, but it is unlikely that the gmail web page would risk doing that.
I trust Google, Gmail, Facebook, and others to spy on my in every legal way that they can. If I use Gmail, Google Contacts, and Google maps then I'm not surprised at all when I see a "Pin" on the map showing the upcoming reservations that I made through Gmail. I trust them all to collect marketing information and show me targeted adds that I skip past. But I also trust them not to be foolish enough to bypass normal Windows security to access files they did not create.
On the other hand, if I load an app and give it permissions to access files it didn't create then I recognized I am taking a risk. I still trust Google and Facebook in that case but I haven't trusted updates for games and other apps.