We caught technicians at Best Buy, Mobile Klinik, Canada Computers and others snooping on our personal devices
We caught technicians at Best Buy, Mobile Klinik, Canada Computers and others snooping on our personal devices
Hopefully stuff like the upcoming Android Repair Mode / Samsung Maintenance Mode becomes the norm and more awareness is made about the feature.
Several things come to mind:
- by giving your password to someone, you are essentially consenting to them accessing your data
- your data should be backed up before you bring a device in so it can be wiped off if they need to access the OS
- certified technologists exist and they have to adhere to a code of conduct
- best buy and the ilk do not hire technologists... you get what you pay for
- if a technician is paid to back up your data, then they need access to your data, if they find porn and if it's bad, they will report you
I agree with all you said but
“Views an album called bikinis as extra large icons to avoid displaying them as recently open files” “ after fixing the tech problem, copying the photos to a personal usb stick”
Its disgusting and inexcusable behavior no matter how naive or dumb the client may be.
What were they expecting? Geek squad techs with no real IT background paid 11$/hour. Almost the same as trusting the employee at the gas station to fix your computer.
I don't think it's unreasonable to expect people to not go through personal data regardless of pay rate? I'd more so expect a subpar repair but not looking at someone's personal data is a basic human decency.
I bought a 'brand new' laptop from Canada Computers years ago and it was filled with some one else's documents. I'm not surprised at all.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
For the Marketplace investigation, Khan, along with graduate students Angela Tran and Brandon Lit, loaded four smartphones and six laptops with the kind of private data many users would have on their devices: financial information, social media and email accounts, as well as browser history.
For the smartphone test, Prof. Mohammad Mannan from Concordia University and his Ph.D. student Sajjad Pourali created a repair issue — a flickering screen — and installed logging software that screen-recorded the technicians' actions.
However, at a location in Woodbridge, the team documented that a Mobile Klinik technician scrolled through the Facebook account on the device, and looked through photos stored on the phone, including intimate selfies.
After Marketplace dropped off a laptop at a Markham location of the electronics and tech repair chain Best Buy, which has 164 stores across Canada, Khan's team found a technician had browsed through several photo folders, including ones with names like "Bikinis," "Date Fits" and "Nightwear."
At the Markham location, a technician viewed intimate photos as extra large icons, which makes them easier to see without actually opening them, meaning they wouldn't turn up as recently accessed files.
In an emailed statement, Canada Computers said it takes "its obligation to respect its customers' personal information very seriously" and that its own investigation of the incident indicated it was an isolated event where one technician at one location violated its privacy policy.
The original article contains 1,561 words, the summary contains 232 words. Saved 85%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
I’m more surprised that there are people that don’t expect this and that there are some who don’t
You’re supposed to back up and wipe any device that you give to someone else/for maintenance