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Infura Collecting MetaMask Users' IP, Ethereum Addresses After Privacy Policy Update (decrypt.co) 14

Posted by msmash from the privacy-woes dept.
ConsenSys has informed users that it is set to collect additional data from those using its popular Infrura tool, attracting criticism on social media in the process. From a report: Infura is an API-based tool that allows users to connect their application to the Ethereum network, which provides the basis for many key Web3 projects, such as Aragon, Gnosis, OpenZeppelin, and ConsenSys's own flagship wallet service MetaMask. After Infrura was first acquired by the New York-based blockchain firm in late 2019, the tool now boasts around 350,000 developers and also includes support for other blockchains like Polygon and Filecoin.

As per updates to ConsenSys' privacy policy, when you use Infura as your default remote procedure call (RPC) provider in MetaMask, it will collect your IP address and your Ethereum wallet address whenever you make a transaction. However, if you're using your own Ethereum node or a third-party RPC provider with MetaMask, ConsenSys says that "neither Infura nor MetaMask will collect your IP address or Ethereum wallet address." Alternative RPCs which can be utilized by Ethereum developers include Alchemy, QuickNode, Moralis, and Tatum. These tools have their own data collection policies, too, which could also be subject to change in the future.
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Infura Collecting MetaMask Users' IP, Ethereum Addresses After Privacy Policy Update More

Infura Collecting MetaMask Users' IP, Ethereum Addresses After Privacy Policy Update

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  • So, then... (Score:3)

    by Sebby ( 238625 ) on Friday November 25, 2022 @10:05AM (#63078848)

    it will collect your IP address and your Ethereum wallet address whenever you make a transaction

    So then, they've become Privacy Rapists.

    That's so Infura-ting!

  • Shows where their priorities are (Score:3)

    by Editorial Failure ( 7475146 ) on Friday November 25, 2022 @10:07AM (#63078852)

    Their business model is selling you out, while providing you unverified, even unsigned, "results" through their ethereum-access-APIs. As does the competition.

    Or at least so tells me Moxie Marlinspike [moxie.org]. I have not verified his claims.

    • I don't agree with Moxie's view that people don't want to run their own servers. What they don't want is to be hassled, they don't give a shit if they run their own server or not. If you make it painless people will use it, as proven by Bittorrent or other P2P downloaders. People don't have to think about being a server when they use it, it simply happens.

      A system like the web that let people share data without having to think about running a server would be groovy. However, it would also have to have some

      • "If you make it painless people will use it ..."

        You got that part right. Apple. That is what most people *think* is painless.

        Gonna have to push back on torrents though. I never met a non-techie that ever even heard of it, let alone was using it. Also, the ecosystem has become pretty toxic, with side ads for porn and gambling mostly... so finding sites and torrents that aren't malware infection vectors is not easy.

        • Gonna have to push back on torrents though. I never met a non-techie that ever even heard of it, let alone was using it.

          Every WoW player uses Bittorrent whether they know it or not. There are lots of other examples in gaming, but I guess that's the biggest one.

  • More than one way to exploit a crypto sucker (Score:4)

    by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Friday November 25, 2022 @11:18AM (#63078938)

    First siphon off their real money then disappear it in a crypto scandal or a crypto crash.

    For those sucker still in the game, steal their private data too.

  • I haven't tried operating a full geth instance in years, but if you want to, it's not hard. You can do so just running geth from the command line. It does chew up a fair amount of bandwidth, and it's storage-intensive - you aren't going to want to do this with anything less than 2TB of space. You can use spinning rust, but you're going to want a huge -cache setting (which will chew up a bunch of RAM). Last time I did it, using ~10-12GB of RAM mostly eliminated excess drive activity. If you use the defa

  • You know that 'crypto' is really going well when actually interacting with it is enough of a pain that people are just lining up to surrender all the features it is supposed to provide in favor of just trusting some random outfit's web server.

  • ... metamask I did'nt like.

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