Because I have root access to my iOS device, I can browse the filesystem along with apps and their contents. While doing so, I have found some interesting stuff that proves that Microsoft collects data about your device without permission while playing the game. You can see where the data is temporarily stored before it is uploaded to Microsoft's servers by looking at the images below. It may be different if you are on Android due to filesystem differences.
Personally, I find this absolutely disgusting knowing that whenever I open Minecraft on my tablet, information about my tablet gets uploaded to Microsoft's servers for them to use for whatever purpose. It is even worse that we were never told by Mojang or Microsoft that data about our devices would be uploaded and used without our consent, along with them not allowing us to opt-out of this data-collecting.
I am going to be dwelving deeper into the application to see if I can uncover anymore controversial junk. Also, please share this if you feel that more people should know about this.
EDIT: To clear any confusion, the folder name 3198D4CC-CAE9-486E-9262-79F510A28CAB is the App-ID for Minecraft on my iOS device. It may be the same or it may be different in your own devices.
Altough i am wondering this is still not mentioned in the EULA, i never heard of any law that would force companies to explicitly tell users that they are collecting anonymous data.
Sure, we all know about the snooper in Minecraft PC. But this is new for the Pocket Edition, as it has never collected anonymous data before(iOS would do that job, but only if you tell it to).
Telemetry data was always collected, you use it to find the cause of crashes or too see usage. Its anonymous and most apps do it, the com.microsoft.hockeyapp thing is just the package name. Also, by guessing by the dates and that is repeated inside those dates, it might been crashing and sending that report
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Op in #minecrafthelp, JIRA Helper in bugs.mojang.com, Chat moderator in Minecraft Forums, Twitch/Mixer mod
Telemetry data was always collected, you use it to find the cause of crashes or too see usage. Its anonymous and most apps do it, the com.microsoft.hockeyapp thing is just the package name. Also, by guessing by the dates and that is repeated inside those dates, it might been crashing and sending that report
Except if ws never crashing. Plus, even if its collected for diagnostics and usage, I am still disgusted because of the sheer fact that we were never told about how it would automatically collect it's own crash reports. Also, the so called crash report's contained personal information about my device when I opened it with a text editor.
Also, iOS would send crash reports to the developers if you would allow it to, so there is no need for the app to do it by itself.
Except if ws never crashing. Plus, even if its collected for diagnostics and usage, I am still disgusted because of the sheer fact that we were never told about how it would automatically collect it's own crash reports. Also, the so called crash report's contained personal information about my device when I opened it with a text editor.
Also, iOS would send crash reports to the developers if you would allow it to, so there is no need for the app to do it by itself.
Crashes in iOS just closes the app instead of telling you so, and if it was not in the gui thread it just closes that thread and continues as normal(android does the same but warns you atleast).
Also, from experience, the data that iOS and android give you about crash reports its worthless without knowing what the user was actually doing.
Also, you are warned of it, when you accept the TOS
Crashes in iOS just closes the app instead of telling you so, and if it was not in the gui thread it just closes that thread and continues as normal(android does the same but warns you atleast).
Also, from experience, the data that iOS and android give you about crash reports its worthless without knowing what the user was actually doing.
Also, you are warned of it, when you accept the TOS
I never accepted any TOS when I bought the app from the App Store. And sure, the crash reports from iOS may be useless, but that doesn't give a developer permission to take personal information and upload it without the user's permission.
Yesh, I have read the file. No way I am going to upload an image of it because it contained a lot of personal information which no one here needs to know or see.
Yesh, I have read the file. No way I am going to upload an image of it because it contained a lot of personal information which no one here needs to know or see.
HockeyApp is used for in-house beta testing. The public release of the game doesn't use HockeyApp at all. The only reason it remains in the app is because they don't keep track of to separate versions of the app for in-house beta-testing and public release.
So put your tinfoil hat away, Microsoft isn't using Minecraft to spy on you.
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I am not going to show a file with personal information included in it just so people can steal the info from it. Also, seems like you WANT that file so you can steal the info from it.
HockeyApp is used for in-house beta testing. The public release of the game doesn't use HockeyApp at all. The only reason it remains in the app is because they don't keep track of to separate versions of the app for in-house beta-testing and public release.
So put your tinfoil hat away, Microsoft isn't using Minecraft to spy on you.
It isn't that hard to remove a simple library or function from an app. Also, beta versions are never released on iOS, so there is no need to include this HockeyApp library or something.
It isn't that hard to remove a simple library or function from an app. Also, beta versions are never released on iOS, so there is no need to include this HockeyApp library or something.
They have iOS beta's for in-house testing. Shoghicp (one of the PE developers at Mojang) posted a screenshot of the iOS beta for iPhone in the past on his Twitter.
According to a Mojang developer: they use HockeyApp to log iOS crash reports to their JIRA database. On Android they use Google's Breakpad. HockeyApp is only used to report crash logs and device information, and not track any personal user data.
Second, saying "I have evidence it's spying on you but I'm not going to show you it" sounds ridiculous. "I'm not going to post a screenshot because it contains personal info" sounds equally ridiculous; just strip out or blur the personal information enough so that it's not identifiable. If you're going to make a claim, you need to show evidence of your claim; no one's going to blindly believe your word for such an outrageous claim.
Also, of course a crash log is going to contain device information and a device identifier; that information hints to developers about device-specific bugs and crashes as well as helps them exclude duplicate crashes stemming from the same device. And Depending on the way they setup crash reporting, the app may not have to fully crash in-order for it to report something; it could be that an important component failed, but that it's failure wasn't enough to crash the app itself. If it's sending email addresses, account names, etc., then that might be a cause for some concern. But if it's just device information/identifier, then that isn't so much "personal information" since they can't find out who you are from that information.
Finally, Mojang is still in-charge of development of Minecraft Pocket Edition, and anything that gets added to the game would've gone through the Mojang devs at some point. From the way you single out Microsoft as the main offender instead of partially blaming Mojang: it sounds more like you're trying to find reasons to blame Microsoft for anything and everything, regardless of whether your concerns are valid or true.
Well as soon as I see "Microsoft" in the name of the offending files, then I have every right to assume it is Microsoft. Also, even if the data isn't personal, I still don't want it to be upload data to a huge database. Either way, here is an image of the file: http://imgur.com/2GHEILR
If what you say about the crash reports doesn't contain personal info, then I should not have to blur anything out. This is the most recent file I found in the folder. My User, Device, and Session ID is listed, which is unique to my Device. Which means they can find out more info about my device if they wanted to.
And like I said before, it is not hard to remove a small little development feature from the public release.
The whole point of having automatic crash reporting is so that they don't have to rely on poorly worded bug reports to fix issues, and so they can see if a fix they applied for a previous issue actually worked on all devices. The device ID generated by HockeyApp is randomly generated and don't mean anything; same with the session and user ID's. They don't identify who you are in any way. On top of that, none of the data being sent would contain account info, emails, or other data that would actually be considered personal data, so what's the problem? The data sent is completely useless for any purpose other than to get performance and crash reports.
Any website you visit can find out more information about you than what's listed in Mojang's crash reports; for example, a website can know: what device you're using, what OS you use, whether or not your battery is charging, how long it's been charging for, and what percentage it's at, what city you live in, how often you visit the site, and more, all without your knowledge or consent. So to worry about something as tame as crash reporting is completely misplaced.
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Did you know I make music? Just click my logo to listen to my awesome Electronic beats!
The whole point of having automatic crash reporting is so that they don't have to rely on poorly worded bug reports to fix issues, and so they can see if a fix they applied for a previous issue actually worked on all devices. The device ID generated by HockeyApp is randomly generated and don't mean anything; same with the session and user ID's. They don't identify who you are in any way. On top of that, none of the data being sent would contain account info, emails, or other data that would actually be considered personal data, so what's the problem? The data sent is completely useless for any purpose other than to get performance and crash reports.
Any website you visit can find out more information about you than what's listed in Mojang's crash reports; for example, a website can know: what device you're using, what OS you use, whether or not your battery is charging, how long it's been charging for, and what percentage it's at, what city you live in, how often you visit the site, and more, all without your knowledge or consent. So to worry about something as tame as crash reporting is completely misplaced.
And that is why I use extensions like AdBlock Plus and Ghostly with them set to block everything. I still don't like how these crash reports are being sent withoyt my knowledge at all, and why they never put in an option to turn off the automated crash reporting like in the PC edition of the Minecraft.
Because I have root access to my iOS device, I can browse the filesystem along with apps and their contents. While doing so, I have found some interesting stuff that proves that Microsoft collects data about your device without permission while playing the game. You can see where the data is temporarily stored before it is uploaded to Microsoft's servers by looking at the images below. It may be different if you are on Android due to filesystem differences.
Personally, I find this absolutely disgusting knowing that whenever I open Minecraft on my tablet, information about my tablet gets uploaded to Microsoft's servers for them to use for whatever purpose. It is even worse that we were never told by Mojang or Microsoft that data about our devices would be uploaded and used without our consent, along with them not allowing us to opt-out of this data-collecting.
I am going to be dwelving deeper into the application to see if I can uncover anymore controversial junk. Also, please share this if you feel that more people should know about this.
EDIT: To clear any confusion, the folder name 3198D4CC-CAE9-486E-9262-79F510A28CAB is the App-ID for Minecraft on my iOS device. It may be the same or it may be different in your own devices.
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.You do realize you can shut off snooper settings right?
You do realize that Pocket Edition does not have that option without hacking, right?
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.Sure, we all know about the snooper in Minecraft PC. But this is new for the Pocket Edition, as it has never collected anonymous data before(iOS would do that job, but only if you tell it to).
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.Telemetry data was always collected, you use it to find the cause of crashes or too see usage. Its anonymous and most apps do it, the com.microsoft.hockeyapp thing is just the package name. Also, by guessing by the dates and that is repeated inside those dates, it might been crashing and sending that report
Op in #minecrafthelp, JIRA Helper in bugs.mojang.com, Chat moderator in Minecraft Forums, Twitch/Mixer mod
How to get a dxdiag
If I helped you, dont forget to click the thanks arrow!
Except if ws never crashing. Plus, even if its collected for diagnostics and usage, I am still disgusted because of the sheer fact that we were never told about how it would automatically collect it's own crash reports. Also, the so called crash report's contained personal information about my device when I opened it with a text editor.
Also, iOS would send crash reports to the developers if you would allow it to, so there is no need for the app to do it by itself.
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.Crashes in iOS just closes the app instead of telling you so, and if it was not in the gui thread it just closes that thread and continues as normal(android does the same but warns you atleast).
Also, from experience, the data that iOS and android give you about crash reports its worthless without knowing what the user was actually doing.
Also, you are warned of it, when you accept the TOS
Op in #minecrafthelp, JIRA Helper in bugs.mojang.com, Chat moderator in Minecraft Forums, Twitch/Mixer mod
How to get a dxdiag
If I helped you, dont forget to click the thanks arrow!
I never accepted any TOS when I bought the app from the App Store. And sure, the crash reports from iOS may be useless, but that doesn't give a developer permission to take personal information and upload it without the user's permission.
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.have you read the file ???
Yesh, I have read the file. No way I am going to upload an image of it because it contained a lot of personal information which no one here needs to know or see.
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.sounds like you gonna have to show it
HockeyApp is used for in-house beta testing. The public release of the game doesn't use HockeyApp at all. The only reason it remains in the app is because they don't keep track of to separate versions of the app for in-house beta-testing and public release.
So put your tinfoil hat away, Microsoft isn't using Minecraft to spy on you.
I am not going to show a file with personal information included in it just so people can steal the info from it. Also, seems like you WANT that file so you can steal the info from it.
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.It isn't that hard to remove a simple library or function from an app. Also, beta versions are never released on iOS, so there is no need to include this HockeyApp library or something.
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.They have iOS beta's for in-house testing. Shoghicp (one of the PE developers at Mojang) posted a screenshot of the iOS beta for iPhone in the past on his Twitter.
According to a Mojang developer: they use HockeyApp to log iOS crash reports to their JIRA database. On Android they use Google's Breakpad. HockeyApp is only used to report crash logs and device information, and not track any personal user data.
Second, saying "I have evidence it's spying on you but I'm not going to show you it" sounds ridiculous. "I'm not going to post a screenshot because it contains personal info" sounds equally ridiculous; just strip out or blur the personal information enough so that it's not identifiable. If you're going to make a claim, you need to show evidence of your claim; no one's going to blindly believe your word for such an outrageous claim.
Also, of course a crash log is going to contain device information and a device identifier; that information hints to developers about device-specific bugs and crashes as well as helps them exclude duplicate crashes stemming from the same device. And Depending on the way they setup crash reporting, the app may not have to fully crash in-order for it to report something; it could be that an important component failed, but that it's failure wasn't enough to crash the app itself. If it's sending email addresses, account names, etc., then that might be a cause for some concern. But if it's just device information/identifier, then that isn't so much "personal information" since they can't find out who you are from that information.
Finally, Mojang is still in-charge of development of Minecraft Pocket Edition, and anything that gets added to the game would've gone through the Mojang devs at some point. From the way you single out Microsoft as the main offender instead of partially blaming Mojang: it sounds more like you're trying to find reasons to blame Microsoft for anything and everything, regardless of whether your concerns are valid or true.
Well as soon as I see "Microsoft" in the name of the offending files, then I have every right to assume it is Microsoft. Also, even if the data isn't personal, I still don't want it to be upload data to a huge database. Either way, here is an image of the file: http://imgur.com/2GHEILR
If what you say about the crash reports doesn't contain personal info, then I should not have to blur anything out. This is the most recent file I found in the folder. My User, Device, and Session ID is listed, which is unique to my Device. Which means they can find out more info about my device if they wanted to.
And like I said before, it is not hard to remove a small little development feature from the public release.
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.The whole point of having automatic crash reporting is so that they don't have to rely on poorly worded bug reports to fix issues, and so they can see if a fix they applied for a previous issue actually worked on all devices. The device ID generated by HockeyApp is randomly generated and don't mean anything; same with the session and user ID's. They don't identify who you are in any way. On top of that, none of the data being sent would contain account info, emails, or other data that would actually be considered personal data, so what's the problem? The data sent is completely useless for any purpose other than to get performance and crash reports.
Any website you visit can find out more information about you than what's listed in Mojang's crash reports; for example, a website can know: what device you're using, what OS you use, whether or not your battery is charging, how long it's been charging for, and what percentage it's at, what city you live in, how often you visit the site, and more, all without your knowledge or consent. So to worry about something as tame as crash reporting is completely misplaced.
And that is why I use extensions like AdBlock Plus and Ghostly with them set to block everything. I still don't like how these crash reports are being sent withoyt my knowledge at all, and why they never put in an option to turn off the automated crash reporting like in the PC edition of the Minecraft.
Check out my PvP map Here!
Check out my website Here!Website is down until further notice.