[HN Gopher] Tell HN: Duolingo (NYSE: DUOL) disrepects your priva...
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       Tell HN: Duolingo (NYSE: DUOL) disrepects your privacy and dislikes
       questions
        
       After a mandatory signup for a Duolingo account, _anyone_ using
       their iPhone and Android (and possibly web) apps can add you as a
       'friend', without requiring any confirmation from you whatsoever.
       This is mostly just annoying and might be considered 'typical
       growth hacking', but also constitutes a privacy risk: your
       'friends' are notified whenever you are online, have completed a
       number of lessons, or whatever. The Duolingo privacy policy
       (https://store.duolingo.com/pages/privacy-policy) is obviously a
       cut-and-paste job (for a NYSE-listed-company, really?) that doesn't
       address concerns like this at all.  In the Duolingo app, you get
       notifications like 'your friends congratulated you on 14 days of
       being online' and, more worryingly, 'XXX congratulated you on
       completing 10 lessons today'. Nevermind that you don't know who XXX
       is, and can't do anything about notifications about your online
       state being sent to them. Even if you have removed XXX as a
       'friend' from your in-app Duolingo profile aeons ago.  So, there is
       a 'privacy' option in the Duolingo app. This apparently (again,
       pretty much without notification, much less consent) requests a ZIP
       export of all your data (FYI: I'm in the EU, US experiences may
       differ). Which takes up to 30 days (Sure, ZIP is not the most
       efficient file format, but _that_ slow?)  But, at least there is an
       email address: privacy@duolingo.com (pretty much the only contact
       details you'll get as a fully paid up Duolingo customer). Sending a
       _very_ polite email reply to the minders of this account about the
       continuous harassment by  'friends', however, is a mistake.  You
       will not receive a reply, but your paid Duolingo account will be
       disabled pretty much immediately. Leaving you, I guess, to sort
       things out with Google/Apple/your credit card company.  'Typical
       growth hacking'... Oh, joy...
        
       Author : PreInternet01
       Score  : 15 points
       Date   : 2023-03-04 20:10 UTC (2 hours ago)
        
       | AnnoyedComment wrote:
       | [dead]
        
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       (page generated 2023-03-04 23:01 UTC)