[HN Gopher] Open Terms Archive - Follow changes to terms of service
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Open Terms Archive - Follow changes to terms of service
Author : Reventlov
Score : 159 points
Date : 2021-07-30 09:49 UTC (13 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.opentermsarchive.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.opentermsarchive.org)
| cryvate1284 wrote:
| It seems this is run by the "Office of the French Ambassador for
| Digital Affairs": cool initiative, see their readme on GitHub:
|
| https://github.com/ambanum/OpenTermsArchive-versions
| tcmb wrote:
| I was trying to add a service that wasn't included yet and the
| preview of the ToS document was overlaid by huge versions of the
| graphic assets found on the original URL, so that the document
| was unreadable and it was impossible for me to mark the salient
| parts.
|
| Edit: opened an issue on their Github, adding another document
| from a different site worked very well
| [deleted]
| remram wrote:
| Maybe they should join forces with https://tldrlegal.com/
| xPaw wrote:
| Looks like you can browse the changes without subscribing here:
| https://github.com/ambanum/OpenTermsArchive-versions
| cdubzzz wrote:
| I did something like this as an excuse to play around with "git
| scraping" but it had weird frequent issues with character
| encodings or something on many requests. I never had the time to
| dig in to that so eventually just archived it.
|
| https://github.com/cdubz/legal-copy-histories
| stared wrote:
| I kind of expected a GitHub repo, so that one can see changes
| with diffs.
|
| EDIT: They are (thx to comment by xPaw). Wasn't obvious from the
| landing page prompting to sign up for email updates.
|
| Emails are not that tempting. I am getting them from service
| providers anyway - and it is practically impossible to see what
| are the CHANGES and which changes do matter.
| baliex wrote:
| Setting something like this up has been an idea of mine for a
| while. Glad someone's done it.
|
| Being able to get simple plain-text diffs of documents
| (preferably through git) that you've agreed to or signed should
| be the expected standard. Not just for privacy policies online,
| but for any contractual change in our personal and work lives.
|
| Here's Facebook's Privacy Policy from the Open Terms Archive:
| https://github.com/ambanum/OpenTermsArchive-versions/commits....
| knob wrote:
| Same! I am happy somebody built this.
|
| What I would add to this project is a highlight/alert of
| Warrant Canaries.
|
| If the Warrant Canarie changes an alert can be brought up.
| barredo wrote:
| They should offer just the diffs online first instead of
| collecting email addresses
| baliex wrote:
| You can get them in the Github repo. Here's Facebook's privacy
| policy: https://github.com/ambanum/OpenTermsArchive-
| versions/commits...
| hansvm wrote:
| Could somebody ELI5 the legal basis for terms that automatically
| change without your consent being binding? What keeps a ToS
| update from promising an extra month of service for a paltry $1M
| each? Are those waters tested much in court yet?
| petargyurov wrote:
| I was expecting this to show me a pretty timeline of diffs but
| instead it emails you the diff (I presume) when a change occurs.
| Kind of useful I guess, but I don't really fancy signing up to
| it.
| jvolkman wrote:
| Google actually provides history and diffs for its own terms,
| although I don't think there's a way to get notifications.
|
| https://policies.google.com/terms/archive
| csomar wrote:
| Great website collecting emails with no Terms of Service
| (https://www.opentermsarchive.org/en/terms-of-service) and an
| almost empty privacy policy
| (https://www.opentermsarchive.org/en/privacy-policy)
| wdb wrote:
| "The tracking opt-out feature requires cookies to be enabled."
|
| Why not opt-in via cookies?
| jpjuni0r wrote:
| That way the site can hide the cookie banner for you and
| continue to show it for new visitors (which have no cookies
| set)
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| But it should still be not-tracking until you agree (i.e.
| if you have no cookies set).
| helsinkiandrew wrote:
| > Great website collecting emails with no Terms of Service
|
| That is quite ironic.
|
| From the website: "Large digital companies today occupy a
| central position which ... However, they communicate in an
| insufficiently clear, readable and continuous manner on these
| ToS"
|
| It's not just large digital companies that need a decent ToS
| and privacy policy. They are collecting emails and could be
| spamming everyone with junk mail, selling them along with the
| companies people are interested in. Probably not but they don't
| say so.
| aesh2Xa1 wrote:
| The GitHub says you can use RSS. Perhaps open an issue about
| the email collection and privacy policy concerns.
|
| https://github.com/ambanum/OpenTermsArchive#by-rss
| indus wrote:
| In my startup, we added our tos and privacy policy in source
| control from early on.
|
| https://github.com/Quolum/quolum.github.io/commits/master/pr...
|
| I think more startups could do this, and make the changes
| publicly viewable. And maybe tag each other using a universal
| moniker.
| Ndymium wrote:
| I also do this. I realise it being in the git repo isn't
| possible for many companies, but there really should be a diff
| view.
|
| In my project I actually use git to generate a diff (at compile
| time) that is shown to the user. They can either view the diff
| to the last version of the terms they accepted, or the whole
| terms. In that view they can also directly export their data
| and delete their user account if they deem the new terms to be
| unacceptable.
|
| I think this should be a standard everywhere, but of course
| it's a futile dream and people don't seem to mind the status
| quo.
| sunsetonsaturn wrote:
| Diffing texts is not the way to go, because sometimes they can
| change the wording without changing the meaning - yet, the diff
| will give you a lot to sift through in order to answer the
| question "what has changed?"
|
| A better approach is proposed in this paper:
| https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-76663-4_...
|
| It discusses a formal notation of privacy terms, which enables
| you to treat them like tuples and perform all sorts of set
| algebra operations with them, making it easy to answer questions
| such as "what has changed?", "what has been removed?" or "what
| was added?"
|
| This would make it possible not only to compare a policy with
| another version of itself, but also compare it with policies of
| competing services and products.
|
| Consumers would be better off if regulators mandated the storage
| of policies in a format like this one. An ecosystem of utilities
| could be built around them (change trackers, search engines,
| recommendation systems, etc.).
| chirau wrote:
| While the solution proposed in that paper is theoretically
| better, its feasibility is super low given how fragmented and
| disparate these companies make the documents and how tough it
| would be to lobby for a standard. As such, for now, the diff
| route is the most realistic way to go.
|
| We cannot dismiss a solution to status quo for a solution that
| assumes an imaginary state of affairs.
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(page generated 2021-07-30 23:01 UTC)