Re:The undocumented Android change that led to aCropalypse w...
by neilv on Friday March 31, 2023 @08:29PM
(#35395674)
The unquoted sentence after that was "Some of those costs might eventually come back to the company." Which I distinguish from "costs to the world" in the quoted sentence.
By costs to the world I'm thinking all the things that happen because something a user cropped out was revealed because it wasn't really cropped.
Hypotheticals to illustrate costs to the world:
* A company loses a big business deal because IP/plans leaked to competition in reverted-crop.
* A medical provider and personnel get hit by lawsuit and/or HIPPA for patient data de-anonymized due to reverted-crop of an image.
* Someone gets harassed at their workplace when a reverted-crop adult photo revealed their identity and gets circulated among colleagues.
* Semi-automated extortion rackets, going through troves of images, looking for revertible cropping.
Maybe luck is with us, and not a single instance of harm to the world actually happens. Or maybe there are many such instances of harm to the world.
Regarding costs to the world eventually coming back to a company -- speaking in general, not of this particular situation -- I think that could come in forms including: brand damage, lost business, lawsuits from those harmed, undesirable turns in legislation, regulatory fines, etc.
By costs to the world I'm thinking all the things that happen because something a user cropped out was revealed because it wasn't really cropped.
Hypotheticals to illustrate costs to the world:
* A company loses a big business deal because IP/plans leaked to competition in reverted-crop.
* A medical provider and personnel get hit by lawsuit and/or HIPPA for patient data de-anonymized due to reverted-crop of an image.
* Someone gets harassed at their workplace when a reverted-crop adult photo revealed their identity and gets circulated among colleagues.
* Semi-automated extortion rackets, going through troves of images, looking for revertible cropping.
Maybe luck is with us, and not a single instance of harm to the world actually happens. Or maybe there are many such instances of harm to the world.
Regarding costs to the world eventually coming back to a company -- speaking in general, not of this particular situation -- I think that could come in forms including: brand damage, lost business, lawsuits from those harmed, undesirable turns in legislation, regulatory fines, etc.