[News post discussion thread] Access your Niantic Profile from Ingress

RostwoldRostwold ✭✭✭✭✭
edited September 2020 in General

I find it worrying that the roll out of this feature that nobody seems to want has continued after the offence it caused in Pokémon Go.

Many players raised privacy and GDPR concerns there, and I've not seen any evidence that these concerns have been addressed.

Given the more secretive nature of Ingress, let's hope it defaults to off.

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Comments

  • EvilSuperHerosEvilSuperHeros ✭✭✭✭✭

    Why are people upset about it? Because it shows you are online in a certain app?


    Their twitter post is semi odd. Screen shots of a non-existent badge on a profile. A tester email account exposed in the wild.


    Attaching the image used in case they change it... What is that thumb print looking medal? Upcoming feature?


  • mortuusmortuus ✭✭✭✭✭

    Looks like a verification badge.

  • let's hope it defaults to off.

    It likely will not, and from a business perspective, should not. But you can turn it off. Most people with PoGo accounts and Ingress accounts already have.

  • EngrishEngrish ✭✭✭✭

    @NianticBrian there anyway we can get the stats from our Ingress profile instead of pokemon go on the Niantic Profile?


  • RostwoldRostwold ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited September 2020

    People are upset about it because it breaks the law. Usernames are personally identifiable information, which means they are legally protected in many jurisdictions. In Europe, a company would have to obtain an explicit opt-in before they can reveal that sort of information to an additional section of the public, which Niantic didn't do. Revealing personal information without explicit permission is a GDPR and possibly PECR violation. Under UK law, Niantic has a statutory obligation to report this data breach to the UK regulator within 72 hours of it occurring, and there are probably similar requirements in the other 26 GDPR countries. Avoiding all this would have been easy, just make it opt in not opt out.

  • HosetteHosette ✭✭✭✭✭

    @NianticBrian How do I opt out of this? I have different usernames in Ingress/PoGo/HPWU, and I don't want names to cross-contaminate. I have to pick one username that is associated with the account but I can't do that without sharing information that I don't want to share.

  • You have the option of hiding usernames from other Niantic games.

  • HosetteHosette ✭✭✭✭✭

    @Ineras But different games still see the profile name. If I name my profile after my PoGo username then HPWU friends would be able to associate the two names, and vice versa. If I name my profile after my Ingress username then PoGo friends can see that.

  • @Hosette You're right about that. Players shouldn't have to change their privacy settings for each game. The current iteration feels invasive. Having said that, I hope more trainers and wizards will choose to become agents.

  • Currently as Ingress can't show the profile to anyone, you should set it to the other game's name since that's where they can see you.

    However, in time, that may change based on what @NianticBrian said.

  • I agree. People who never played Ingress won't even know what recursion means in this game.

  • GrogyanGrogyan ✭✭✭✭✭

    @Perringaiden I suppose realistically the profile should show XP/AP gain.

    But yeah, I'd like to also see L16 on my Niantic Profile, even though I'm going through my 3rd Recursion.

  • Yeah with all that's going on, when i get back to 16 again, I think I'm going to stay there. My 'displayed AP' is already 130,000,000 short of my lifetime AP.

  • GrogyanGrogyan ✭✭✭✭✭

    https://community.ingress.com/en/discussion/12148/access-your-niantic-profile-from-ingress#latest

    @NianticBrian the other problem I see with this announcement, is it makes out that you have no friends in Ingress, only in HPWU and pogo.


    Unless the statement is meant to suggest that Ingress Prime in the next version will have a Friends list, and have gifting.

    Whereby gifting is the extension of Friends.

    I honestly don't know if gifting in Ingress would be a good thing or not.


    Please advise the meaning about Friends @NianticBrian

  • PkmnTrainerJPkmnTrainerJ ✭✭✭✭✭

    The notification I got for Ingress mentioned I should see what my Pokémon GO friends are doing on Ingress. Only without a friend feature on Ingress I can’t.

    I would think that’s probably coming soon but what kind of gifts would you be sending. Keys for portals? Low level resonators? Stickers?

    Add a medal for sending gifts and I’m sure people will do it.

  • Seriously concerned with the default opted-in approach Niantic have taken here. As others have stated, it's not clear how this complies with GDPR in Europe. Also there is no definition of "friend" in the privacy controls.


    As a privacy advocate, this really grinds my gears at a time that technology companies should be more aware of the privacy rules than ever before. @NianticBrian

  • Unless the statement is meant to suggest that Ingress Prime in the next version will have a Friends list

    This is definitely the ultimate goal so...

    Soon™

  • I don't know what all the fuss is about. Agent names and Trainer names are in-game user names. I don't see this breaking any privacy laws unless your real name and location is shown. If you are worried about it, just change the settings in the game.

    It's nice to be able to search through your list of Pokemon Go friends to see if some are active in Ingress or Wizards. I would vote to have the same ability in Ingress.

  • 1valdis1valdis ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited September 2020

    I would vote to have the same ability in Ingress.

    @CyHusker And you would only have intra-faction Friends. Consider your friend from the other Ingress faction seeing in Pogo that you are online in Ingress in the middle of the night of a weekday.

  • As it is right now in Pokemon Go, the information displayed is "Last Played Today". There is no time stamp or location. You can see your Ingress/PoGo friend's Agent name and level. No faction is shown, although you can find the faction info elsewhere.

  • GrogyanGrogyan ✭✭✭✭✭

    The information on their web pages suggests that they have complied with GDPR. They do need to make it clearer with a GDPR statement on that page

    However

    It is a violation of the Australian COPPA law

  • While I'm not one of those people, there are plenty of people who care that their Ingress identity is kept separate from others. There is not the same level of competition and opsec rivalry in PoGo, WU and other more PVE games.

    The alternative is to screen your PoGo friends by their Ingress affiliation (or lack thereof).

  • Presents always disclose places that you have gone, and a pattern can be read from multiple presents.

  • grendelwulfgrendelwulf ✭✭✭✭✭

    So I quit HPWU and my Ingress and pogo accounts use two seperate unconnected google emails, so I guess I don't have to worry about anything.

  • I have a 15000+km trekker stat. I feel like I've walked more than 21km.

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