Join the discussion
Write your take first — we'll ask for email only when you're ready to publish.
- Hacker News
- This strikes me as somewhat like the old stories about people being reported by photographic film processors to authorities for submitting negatives of their own naked or partially clothed little children. That is to say that it seems like an overreaction.by metabagel
- Google automated that years ago: https://www.businessinsider.com/google-reported-dad-police-p...by janice1999
- Is it possible to write a custom android keyboard that would let you use these compromised messenger apps by transmitting encrypted base64 text (plaintext to aes binary to base64 and back) and opaquely decrypting it? Could the app act like a translator app, but really provide encryption instead?by gosub100
- what would the benefit of this be over using something built for purpose like signal?
- Story aside, I'm most concerned with how closing a laptop "deleted" the lesson plan! It's hard to imagine how that could occur, and I've worked with a lot of people who aren't very technical.by teach
- I've had cases where I'm writing some long text in certain apps on my phone, screen goes off, and when I turn it back on that text is gone. Could be something similar, though I can't imagine any desktop app being that crappy.by skeledrew
- I just spent an hour this morning talking with a friend who had an important saved draft email disappear after closing her laptop. Software is shit these days.by cwillu
- Edu saas is some of the worst crap I've ever had to deal with. It's one of those unfortunate cases of procurement not involving anyone who actually has to use it.
I could absolutely see a combo of a super short session timeout when the browser tab isn't active anymore combined with not actually saving drafts anywhere except in that session that gets deleted with prejudice.
by monocasa - Most likely a SaaS app that auto-saves, but didn’t save properly. Then closing the laptop caused a network disconnect, and the in-browser app did not recover gracefully while awaiting reconnect on wake-up and lost all unsaved data.
This would have been unbelievable to me before this year. Then I used PowerPoint via the browser and found this level of data loss is a regular occurrence.
by computomatic - When after an actual shooting, it its found that the shooter has, at some point in his life, made a post on social media that one could - if so inclined - interpret as an announcement of what he was about to do, people will go absolutely mad screaming: "Why did they not arrest him beforehand???!?!?!?!!!"
This must be exactly what those screamers are envisioning...
by zzril - That's a quick way to lose all of their customers. Inappropriate messages offering the illusion of privacy was the entire point of Snapchat.by Onavo
- Is this article written by AI? The story telling seems distinctly AIby smusamashah
- The linked sources exist, so who cares?by cwillu
- Yup.
> The pipeline no one told you about
> No student reported her. No parent. No coworker. The flag was entirely automated. Snapchat’s policy permits voluntary emergency disclosures to law enforcement — no warrant required — when the platform determines imminent harm exists. The algorithm makes that initial call. Think of it like your Ring doorbell deciding to call 911 on its own, except the doorbell is reading your text messages.
I had to stop reading after that.
Everything about this is so fatiguing that I can’t choose what irks me the most: - that it’s 2026 and Snapchat doesn’t E2E encrypt - that Snapchat automatically dispatches to LE without a human reviewer or any checks - that the story itself was automated
by thekiptxt - > She meant it as a frustrated joke. Snapchat’s algorithm didn’t get the humor.
While humans do write this way, it starts to get unbearable when you put it next to all the other AI patterns, including the very first sentence.
I closed the article after painfully completing the first paragraph.
by fg137 - 100%
>Your Snapchat DMs feel like a locked apartment — but the building management reportedly kept a spare key.
by snapcaster - > "Snapchat’s algorithm didn’t get the humor."
Presumably, the actual text of the message was reviewed by a human? So the human(s) didn't get the humor either?
EDIT: by "humans" I mean the FBI / cops.
by djoldman - Why would a human review it? That only drives up costs for the company. Easier to use algorithms for everything and maybe pay the occasional fine when something goes seriously wrong and legal proceedings result.by skeledrew
- That's a really generous presumption. The direction this industry is moving towards is to use AI to avoid human involvement.
At best, their algorithm flagged it, and a human rubber-stamped it.
by LocalH - How is that not considered libel or slander? That seems like a home-run case to sue the hell out of Snapchat for damaging her reputation for a joke made in a private conversation.by freediddy
- What part of this was lying about what she had said?
I think the entire thing is absurd but libel usually requires falsehoods to be published. Slander is similar. It isn't just "damaged reputation"
by cheeze - This is instant uninstall for me.
Anyway, looking forward to see EU version of this thank to chat control :( :(
by throwa356262 - I hate to break it to you, but this is not the first time snapchat has done this
Example:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68099669
and there were many more
by thehamkercat - If you're looking for an alternative: I'm currently developing an open-source alternative to Snapchat :)by tsmr
- Thou shalt not vent to another. Thou shalt keep thine frustrations within, until thou hadst a mental breakdown and art permanently locked in a padded room.by skeledrew
- i think the lesson is to just not do it on snapchat, rather than bottle it up until breakdown.
(face to face > signal > .... > snapchat)
- We need a society-wide rude awakening to the terrible realities of these attractive nuisances pushed by the tech^wsurveillance industry. People get lured into using insecure garbage software because "works for me" and "everyone else is doing it", completely oblivious to the fact that party to every interaction is an uninvited guest.
When things like this happen, it puts the products' deliberate security vulnerabilities (and in this case, outright hostility) in stark relief. But then people think "I wouldn't be that stupid" or "what can I even do about it" as they go right back to continue relying on these products.
It's certainly understandable how we all have to compromise and suffer insecure systems simply in order to get things done, especially when interfacing with strangers. But for our most intimate communications and personal relationships, we should insist on secure software! This wouldn't have happened with Matrix, this wouldn't have happened with XMPP, this wouldn't have even happened with Signal. And to that reflexive thought of "that takes too much time and effort, especially for non-techies" - I'm pretty sure the person in the article sure wishes she had spend that effort now!
by mindslight - This is completely wrong. I can get behind "think before you post" warnings where you have the chance to not send a threatening message and you only get reported if you do it anyway, but that's only for strangers.
Messages to a friend should be completely off limits and never shared unless they report it. Not even the police should be able access it unless they have a court order, and then the user has to be notified before it happens so they can respond and have the order revoked if it's illegal. Even if the charge is terrorism or child abuse.
by tancop