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Twitter Privacy Python The Almighty Buck

Bot Tweeted Names And Photos Of Venmo Users Who Bought Drugs (mercurynews.com) 86

Posted by EditorDavid from the for-the-lolz dept.
Since Venmo's transactions are "public" by default and broadcast on Venmo's API, a Python programmer decided to publicize a few of them, reports the Mercury News: The creator of the bot named "Who's buying drugs on Venmo" under the Twitter handle @venmodrugs says he wanted users to consider their privacy settings before using Venmo. The bot finds Venmo transactions that include words such as heroin, marijuana, cocaine, meth, speed or emojis that denote drugs and tweets the transaction with the names of the sender and receiver and the sender's photo, if there is one... "I wanted to demonstrate how much data Venmo was making publicly available with their open API and their public by default settings and encourage people to consider their privacy settings," Joel Guerra, the creator of the bot, told Motherboard, a technology news outlet run by Vice.
He shut the bot after 24 hours, according to a Medium essay titled "Why I blasted your 'drug' deals on Twitter": I chose drugs, sex and alcohol keywords as the trigger for the bot because because they were funny and shocking. I removed the last names of users because I didn't want to actually contribute to the problem of lack of privacy... I braced myself for backlash but the response was overwhelmingly positive. People understood my point and I had sparked a lot of discussion about online privacy and the need for users to do a better job of understanding the terms of software they were using -- and a lot of discussion about how companies need to do a better job of informing customers how their data was being used...

After about 24 hours of tweeting everyone's drug laden Venmo transactions I shut down the bot (Python script!!) and deleted all the tweets. I had successfully made my point and gotten more attention than I had imagined possible. Thousands of people were reading tweets and articles about the bot and discussing data privacy. I saw no further value in tweeting out anyone's personal transactions anymore. However, all I ever did was format the data and automate a Twitter account -- the data is still readily available.
His closure of the bot drew some interesting reactions on Twitter.

"booooooooo. I was so entertained by this."

"I remember I had a dealer take my phone and set venmo to private lol."

"we're looking to add a Python developer to our team and I think you'd be a good fit."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Bot Tweeted Names And Photos Of Venmo Users Who Bought Drugs More

Bot Tweeted Names And Photos Of Venmo Users Who Bought Drugs

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  • I must be old (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 22, 2018 @06:15AM (#56989154)

    I must be old because I had never heard of venmo until now. Fucking mellinials.

    • Old people don't need venmo in general.

      - Young people rarely have enough denominations of cash on them (prefer credit cards). To pay anyone back exactly.

      - Young people don't have the money just to 'buy everyone dinner', or "I'll get you next time". So they split the bill. But not all restaurants or hotels etc make that easy. So Venmo did. Also, at one point in time Paypal didn't make it as easy as it does now (probably because of competition from venmo)

      • Easy to split bills exactly in cash as well -- restaurants are ecstatic to make change if they know they'll be paid in cash :D

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Cederic ( 9623 )

        not all restaurants or hotels etc make that easy

        Sure they do. They provide a bill for X, you know Y people ate/stayed, you divide X by Y and just fucking get on with life.

        In my experience the person eating the expensive steak voluntarily chucks a little extra in anyway, usually before the rest even find out the bill's total.

        • not all restaurants or hotels etc make that easy

          Sure they do. They provide a bill for X, you know Y people ate/stayed, you divide X by Y and just fucking get on with life.

          In my experience the person eating the expensive steak voluntarily chucks a little extra in anyway, usually before the rest even find out the bill's total.

          Sure - when you have cash to spare the rough split is fine. When you're on a tight budget and are picking from the menu partly based on price, but would still like to go out with friends, not so much. Surely you've had a time in your life when you didn't have much cash to spend, and this sort of thing was a stress? Or have you always been wealthy?

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by Cederic ( 9623 )

            When I couldn't afford to eat out, I didn't eat out.

            Then again my friends know who's not earning, who just had a snack and not three courses, who drank all the wine. We adjust, we don't need to discuss it, we don't dive through each item on the receipt.

            We stop going out with people that do. Life's too short, fucking get on with it.

            • We stop going out with people that do. Life's too short, fucking get on with it.

              You know what I think life's too short for? Cutting people out of parts of your life because you can't flex for their financial needs. A couple of minutes faffing with the bill in a way you don't like, is more important to you to avoid than their entire presence. I for one don't shun people due to fucking trivialities. God knows what you do to people when you have a disagreement that actually matters.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by Cederic ( 9623 )

                Going through a receipt line item by line item has fuck all to do with financial needs and everything to do with being an obnoxious twat.

                We resolve our differences because we don't have to deal with obnoxious twats.

    • I must be old because I had never heard of venmo until now. Fucking mellinials.

      So do we put you down in favor of fucking millenials or against fucking millenials? :p

      Sounds like this Joel Guerra is just another little shitlord who jizzes himself at the idea of disrupting anything he can get his Cheeto dust encrusted hands on.

    • I'm 72 years old and when God said, "Let there be light." I threw the fucking switch.

      That was the precursor to Venmo.

      Fucking Luddite.

  • Black Market and Taboo Industries. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Sunday July 22, 2018 @06:33AM (#56989206)

    In short if there is demand for a product there will be a market for it. You can try to setup social rules or actual laws, but just as long people want it, it will be available.

    However if such a product/service is Black Market, or just Taboo for that culture, there rarely is a formal entry to entry. It isn't like a Drug dealer will need at least 2 years of business school, or a Sex Worker will need an art degree, or places that offer formal training... So the reason why a lot of these people get caught is because they don't know what they are doing. So Venmo is an easy way to send them money, they will take it. Not realizing how insecure it is. Because they didn't think on how insecure it is, and neither does the consumer (even for more normal purchases) realize how publicly displaying the purchases is risky.

    Now Black Market and even Taboo markets have the biggest problem of not being able to fight against bad service or products. You as a consumer isn't willing to sue Venmo because it posted your purchases of an Illegal or Embarrassing item, because all it will do is bring more attention to themselves. Sure some people are willing to take the Embarrassment of a Taboo item, just to get their point across, but for Black Market stuff your risking punishment as well, for getting ripped off.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by inking ( 2869053 )
      TL;DR: Criminals are by and large compete and utter idiots. So are many of their customers.

      This bot post has just saved you a minute of reading. Praise Jobs.

      • Re:Black Market and Taboo Industries. (Score:5, Insightful)

        by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Sunday July 22, 2018 @06:55AM (#56989260)

        The largest Black Market in New York State isn't drugs, but unpasteurized milk. You can drive across Upstate NY and find signs saying Raw Milk this way. I say this because calling people dealing in the Black Market Criminals is a harsh statement. It is the sale of anything that isn't allowed to be sold in the area.

        A low bar of entry makes it easier for stupid people to get into it. However they are also a lot of extremely smart people in the Black Market too, which is why the "War on Drugs" is so hard to fight, Because you are fighting Market Demand and Creative individuals who work all the time to work around the system, yet make themselves known to actually sell to people.

        Black Market is a very inconsistent area. You can get top notch quality or crap that will kill you. Because for that Raw Milk the producer can make sure the Cows are in wonderful living conditions, clean happy and healthy. Or sleeping in their own waste, eating garbage food.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by inking ( 2869053 )
          It is not a harsh statement. People selling things that aren’t allowed to be sold are criminals. Extremely smart people can make a killing without living under a constant fear of having to spend several decades of their life in prison.

          • Re:Black Market and Taboo Industries. (Score:4, Insightful)

            by Archangel Michael ( 180766 ) on Sunday July 22, 2018 @09:34AM (#56989784) Journal

            People selling things that aren’t allowed to be sold are criminals.

            I would suggest to you that your view is simplistic to say the least, and doesn't reflect reality. There are plenty of things that are now illegal, that once were legal. And things that were once illegal that are currently legal, and a few things that were once legal, then made illegal, but are legal again. Alcohol is a great example.

            Drinking alcohol doesn't make one a criminal either before, during or after prohibition. Just because there is a law doesn't mean it is a good one. And thus, we have the ability to judge not only the facts of a case, but also the law (jury nullification). This is the last refuge of liberty.

            • Re:Black Market and Taboo Industries. (Score:4, Insightful)

              by BenFranske ( 646563 ) on Sunday July 22, 2018 @09:57AM (#56989886) Homepage

              Actually that's exactly what criminal means. We can (and should) absolutely have a debate about what things should be unlawful today and be continually updating laws. Make no mistake though that if something is unlawful when you do it you are a criminal. That's the definition of criminal.

              Yes, that means that everyone who speeds is a criminal. Yes, that means that people who drank (well actually only people who produced, sold, or transported intoxicating liquors) during the prohibition era were criminals. There are many examples of things which should not be, or are not anymore, unlawful but it is clearly the case that people who did those things while they were unlawful are in fact criminals. Yes, almost everyone is a criminal because we have a lot of laws on the books.

              • Re: (Score:3)

                by inking ( 2869053 )
                Actually, criminals are usually individuals falling under the penal code, whereas speeding typically falls under ordinances or the transportation code. Tax evasion and selling prohibited goods is almost universally treated by the penal code and is thus criminal.

                • Agreed by (at least some) legal definitions, but I was working more from a dictionary definition which is usually anyone committing a crime which is anything unlawful by dictionary definition.

            • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

              by Anonymous Coward

              You are trying to make the point that buying and selling on the black market is not immoral. However you keep saying it is not criminal. It absolutely is criminal. Legality and morality are often not the same thing.

              • No. That's NOT what I am saying. I'm saying that just because something is illegal doesn't make it "wrong". Is selling Lemonade on the corner wrong? We did that a lot when I was a kid 50 years ago. Yet that is illegal enough that police are called (code enforcement) and it is stopped.

                Or how about Immigration?

                Or how about alcohol?

                Or how about smoking?

                Or how about Prostitution?

                Or .....

                I'm arguing for a libertarian viewpoint, which is apart from the current Nanny State proponents of protecting everyone from ev

        • The largest Black Market in New York State isn't drugs, but unpasteurized milk. You can drive across Upstate NY...

          ... and find 1/3 the population of the state. While it may be spread over a greater physical area, the actual population is pretty small. Hence, unless raw milk is twice as popular as drugs, it's still a smaller market. (Where we're just talking about units consumed. To say nothing of raw milk being cheap compared to, say, cocaine.)

        • Raw milk is perfectly legal in NY State as long as the producer is licensed. It just can't be sold across state lines.

        • because calling people dealing in the Black Market Criminals is a harsh statement. It is the sale of anything that isn't allowed to be sold in the area.

          Allowed to be sold ... by laws. Which, if you break, you are a criminal.

          So, literally black market criminals.

      • TL;DR: Criminals are by and large compete and utter idiots. So are many of their customers. This bot post has just saved you a minute of reading. Praise Jobs.

        You may want to reconsider that statement. Yes there are plenty of dumb criminals but there are also plenty of people who think it is funny to put silly things in Venmo. It's no different that someone putting "Sensual Massage" in the memo field of a check they write to their roommate, except that nobody ever looks at the memo field on a check. Most of those are probably jokes. Unless people are buying these drugs by mail why would they use Venmo instead of cold hard cash? And we all know that people pr

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by inking ( 2869053 )
          I don’t think it is a very productive exercise to ask “why” in most cases involving stupidy relating to use of electronics. I am certain anyone who has ever been in corporate cyber security will eagerly confirm this statement. Mind you, we are talking about people with degrees that attended security policy orientations and still manage to send confidential data over unsecured channels. Now imagine the guy whose main skill is selling meth in a night club. I would not be surprised if he kept

          • I don’t think it is a very productive exercise to ask “why” in most cases involving stupidy relating to use of electronics. I am certain anyone who has ever been in corporate cyber security will eagerly confirm this statement. Mind you, we are talking about people with degrees that attended security policy orientations and still manage to send confidential data over unsecured channels. Now imagine the guy whose main skill is selling meth in a night club. I would not be surprised if he kept a log of his transactions on his Facebook wall or something.

            But in this case it is very productive to ask why someone would add an electronic layer to a cash business. There's no justification for it, and a great way to get busted by the IRS or whatever tax agency rules your country. So I have to ask why would that night club meth dealer accept VenMo? If one buyer doesn't have the cash, the next will. And anyone who goes to a night club to buy drugs always has cash.

    • In short: I agree with you, particularly on a point that is dear to my research.

      They best way to stop behaviour deemed undesirable is to remove the desire.

      The war on drugs: Stop addiction.

      Influx of undocumented humans: Make America a shot hole country.

      Sex trafficking, toy sales, pornography, workers, etc.: Make people unhorny.

      Gun control: Make ownership unnecessary.

      The solid solution to many issues is on the demand side.

      Make the demand go away, and the problem is solved.

      The only way to win is not to play.

      • So in short he want to make people not human.

      • There are other ways to lower demand.
        However these require a lot of work that we just don’t have the leadership to manage.

        For Drugs you need to find out why someone starts in the beginning. There could be thousands of different reasons. The issue is to find people who would be tempted and offer alternatives.

        It isn’t easy it isn’t cheap and it would be messy. But if it is really considered a problem then they are solution but it is going to be hard.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by f3rret ( 1776822 )

        Add Haloperidol to the water supply, gonna take right care of al those things.
        Maybe a bit of Diazepam.

  • I have had occasion to send money to two relatives who are "unbanked," and because I could only talk one of them into using Square Cash, I had to install Venmo. Yesterday Venmo emailed its users to say they are getting out of the personal payments business, so I saw that as good reason to delete my long-inactive account.

  • and how much did the DEA pay for them to snitch?

  • He could have used another way to show the vulnerability without having people named and shamed. But nooooo. let us name and shame. Anti social idiot.

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