Today after an update from gasbuddy, every time I open the app, it shows that “gasbuddy pasted from safari” on my ios14 beta. Does anyone know how I can stop that? Or I have to delete it because I don’t like they steal my clipboard info.
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How to stop “Gasbuddy pasted my safari?”
- Thread starter vanasian
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There is no way to stop that specific behavior. Until and unless the developer updates the app to prevent that behavior, you probably should delete the app, given your concerns.
I would also suggest you contact the developer to let him or her know about what you have seen and the concerns you have.
I would also suggest you contact the developer to let him or her know about what you have seen and the concerns you have.
Thank u for your reply. I will leave them the comments and delete it for now. Too bad, it’s a very handy app to have.
This shows how insidious this behavior is. Apps that have absolutely no business copying your clipboard are copying your clipboard. I’m reasonably sure most are doing it non-maliciously as a way of moving data from one app to theirs. But I suspect it captures far more than the gas station you looked up in Safari a few moments ago.
what's more surprising is just how apps are doing it. The cynic in me says they've been doing it for a very long time and I wonder what they've been doing with the data they collect. They will tell you it's a "bug" that they will fix, but a bug is undesirable behavior in an app, not something that you specifically coded to occur and then got caught doing.
How do you know it’s being “collected”? It’s probably not.
Before iOS 14, Apple provided no way for apps to pattern-match the clipboard’s contents without reading it directly. None. There’s now an API for pattern-matching clipboard contents without reading the clipboard directly in iOS 14, but App Store apps can’t use it until iOS 14 is publicly available.
In most cases, pattern-matching is what’s happening (on-device) when these alerts are presented — the app is pattern-matching the clipboard contents against a format they expect to be relevant to the app. That could be an email app looking for an email address that you’ve recently copied, a delivery tracking app looking for a tracking number, etc. Apps that do this more often than they should (for example, with every keystroke) are more guilty of sloppy code than anything. Clipboard data is...pretty useless for tracking, to put it lightly, and your clipboard’s contents probably shouldn’t be changing with every keystroke anyway.
Apple should have introduced the aforementioned pattern-matching API last year with the alerts introduced this year, or introduced the API this year with the alerts coming next year. That would have allowed developers a year-plus to migrate their pattern-matching logic to the new API on their own time and, if the alerts caused alarm with users as they’re doing now, they would be able to update their apps immediately to use the new API rather than having to wait months. It’d lessen user confusion and hopefully keep people from jumping to the worst possible conclusion when they see this alert.
I have been using an app called "Fuelly" for about 5 years with no problems other that the occasional prompt to upgrade to the "Deluxe" version. I can track my SUV and two motorcycles for gas and maintenance. Handy for checking milage on my bikes tires, they wear much faster that auto tires.
Gasbuddy has been getting increasingly invasive for a couple of years at least. I finally deleted the app when you couldn’t use it without sharing your location all the time.
there should be a sticky for the apps the are abusing the clipboard.
And frankly, I can think of no good reason that app needs clipboard information.
there should be a sticky for the apps the are abusing the clipboard.
And frankly, I can think of no good reason that app needs clipboard information.
The app asks iOS if the contents of the clipboard match an expected pattern(s) and they receive a pass/fail
Result object. If there’s a match, iOS returns which of those patterns matched so that the app can check for those, at which time you’d see the paste alert. If there’s no match, the app is informed by iOS with an error and doesn’t need to check the clipboard at all.
And this is one big downside to the "free app" model. Developers generally want to monetize their apps. People scream about advertising, so what do they do? They sell location and other usage data.
There isn't such thing a free lunch. But selling what most people would consider to be private data about their location and browsing tendencies is not the way to solve this issue.
I don’t know if you are right in how that’s working or how you know, but if so, to me the check shouldn’t even be a paste of the info as you describe it... but it sounds like you are suggesting that it’s alerting people to the check even if it isn’t pasting by saying it’s pasting? How do we know this?
I understand people wanting and needing to make money. And I was willing to give them access to my location while I am using the app. They crossed the line when they insisted on having access to my location all the time whether I am using the app or not. That's going way too far. They are an incredibly popular app and they've done a lot to monetize it in creative ways. It seems like now they're just being greedy.
Apple has done a good job in heading this off. Last year with the notifications of apps that were using your location for prolonged periods and now this clipboard behavior. Some don’t care about this but others care a great deal. I’m closer to the former (right now) but I do want the option to keep it from happening...and not in a one time notice or buried deep in some settings.