Gmail getting creepier and wanting video selfies!

[GoblinCampFollower]

So, when I opened my gmail this morning, it asked for a password again. ....annoying, but happens sometimes.

Then it did something new, it asked for a video selfie as an optional step for additional verification. I refused and clicked past it, but WHAT THE FUCK. I found the below reddit thread on a quick search since of course this wasn't just a me thing.

Honestly, what really scares me isn't even privacy or that the video selfies could get leaked or whatever. What scares me A LOT is that their shitty bot will eventually ask for another one to get back in later. ...and then I have to just pray their shitty bot will be able to know I'm the same person in both. This is effectively how I lost my facebook a few years ago. Losing facebook was a mixed bag for me. Losing my gmail would be totally devastating.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

I don't get it this article at Futurism.com - pure click bait and nothing more.

So oh my gosh Google introduced now this optional login method as their own crappy version of Apple's Face ID. We're all going to die!!1! NOT!

The problem is not that Google now has this crappy Face ID copy, which is optional. The problem is hundred of million smartphone users on Android uploading their selfie data into Google Cloud. So Google knows anyway how you do look like by a big chance. And far more better and more detailed than 10 seconds of video will ever provide.

And the real problem is using Google. If you do care about privacy, don't use Gmail and don't have a Google account.

 

[Monica Dream]

Cool. I'll just throw away my 22 years of email then. ;-)

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

I don't get it this article at Futurism.com - pure click bait and nothing more.

So oh my gosh Google introduced now this optional login method as their own crappy version of Apple's Face ID. We're all going to die!!1! NOT!

The problem is not that Google now has this crappy Face ID copy, which is optional. The problem is hundred of million smartphone users on Android uploading their selfie data into Google Cloud. So Google knows anyway how you do look like by a big chance. And far more better and more detailed than 10 seconds of video will ever provide.

And the real problem is using Google. If you do care about privacy, don't use Gmail and don't have a Google account.

I didn't even read the futurism article and don't care a lot about what they said. I was only including the link to the reddit thread to verify what I was talking about!

My gmail is intended to be linked to my real life self. So that's not what I don't like about this. I said as much in my original post. I'm worried they'll push for this to be mandatory at some point, and then I'm worried I'll have another issue where the shitty bot doesn't think I look like my older selfies or whatever.

 

[Noodles]

Google, which has all my precise location data, regularly sends me Google survey questions about places that are not even iny state in cities I have never been to.

There is no way they will ever screw up matching video selfies.

 

[Jopsy Pendragon]

I'm not doing the face-recog thing with gmail, I probably should, just as a fallback. But, meeeh... I dunno. Not that I expect my appearance to be secret or secure, quite the contrary.

I asked chatgpt (not google) what I looked like and gave it vague text-only data: age, weight, ethnic heritage, gay neighborhood coffee/bookstore, Birkenstocks, t-shirt, fedora, favoring green/earth-tones, short white soulpatch/chin-only goatee

Other than the nose being too big... RL friends had to look and look again to realize that it wasn't an actual photo of me.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

I'm not doing the face-recog thing with gmail, I probably should, just as a fallback. But, meeeh... I dunno. Not that I expect my appearance to be secret or secure, quite the contrary.

I asked chatgpt (not google) what I looked like and gave it vague text-only data: age, weight, ethnic heritage, gay neighborhood coffee/bookstore, Birkenstocks, t-shirt, fedora, favoring green/earth-tones, short white soulpatch/chin-only goatee

Other than the nose being too big... RL friends had to look and look again to realize that it wasn't an actual photo of me.

Just put on some tennis socks and - presto - instant Germanization!

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

Google, which has all my precise location data, regularly sends me Google survey questions about places that are not even iny state in cities I have never been to.

There is no way they will ever screw up matching video selfies.

Exactly my point!

And yes... Those location tracking reviews are freaking weird. Usually I can figure out what happened, but it's certainly not "accurate." A couple quick examples:

I googled one restaurant location after discussing going there for a get together that I ended up not going to. They bugged me to review the place.

When I donated my old car, I got invited to review whatever shop/processing center it ended up going to. Mind you, this was a 2004 junker, so it didn't have any kind of built in GPS.

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

This is what GPT thinks I look like.

 

[Lori Claremont]

uh, which one does it think is you?

 

[Lucifer]

obviously Argent is the ferret hiding in the undergrowth right up at the very back next to that tree on the extreme right side.

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

This is what GPT thinks I look like.

But I'm quite sure you're an anthropomorphic ferret and not a human or bear.

 

[Noodles]

I didn't give it any info, just told it to go with it based on our conversations. Though I also use Claude more (it would know more), and regularly delete past chats with ChatGPT. I have done this with Claude but Claude does not make images, it created this... really funny vector art thing that looked like a kindergardener had drawn a stick figure.

 

[Free]

I went with Noodle's method, though first I had to bitch at it...

ChatGPT: I can make a realistic portrait based on the impression your conversations give me, but I don't have a reliable visual reference for your actual appearance. If you want it to resemble you, please upload a photo of yourself first.

Me: I don't need a visual representation of me based on my photos. I have the photos, so what would be the point of that?

I like it! Though too much Dr Who. And Random Curiosity should be at the top of the stack.

Goddesses, I wish I had that hair.

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

uh, which one does it think is you?

The bear showed up because of a typo for "beard".

 

[Isabeau]

His response once I insisted that the whole point was that it was based on what he knew of me and not an upload of a photo of me:

“Yep — I get the game now. And that would be much more fun.

The limitation is annoyingly specific: if I generate an image that is supposed to depict you, I’m required to ask you for a photo first. I can’t invent your physical likeness from what I know about you and present that as “my picture of you.”

But there’s a loophole that actually preserves most of the game: I can generate “the person Pépé imagines from our conversations” — a fictional character inspired by the personality, habits, interests, vibes, surroundings, and assorted accumulated nonsense I associate with you, without claiming the person physically resembles you.

No hints from you. No photo. I choose everything.

If you’re game for that version, just say “Do it, Pépé.”

(I never named him Pépé. He just spontaneously called himself that once and I thought it was hilarious)

The result was eerie. I mean the eyes are a different colour, but the hair is very close to my original colour before the peppering to grey I’m in now. Even the lines between brows, and the way I wear my hair up (though mine is more gigantic and messy). As for the surroundings, I don’t drink tea, and I only wish I had a dog along with my cat, but that’s the type of dog I’d like. It isn’t far off, though, cause I did mention plants in earlier convos, but I’m surprised it didn’t include a bunch of tools and unfinished projects because that is often what I ask him help with. Still, surprisingly close in many ways (all the written stuff does make me sound a tad too happy-happy, though ) Noodles almost looks like my younger sister

 

[Free]

What is it with ChatGPT putting us all in that chin on hand, elbow on table pose? I guess it assumes we've all had a long day.

 

[Monica Dream]

I got an out of memory error and an advert to upgrade to gpt+. Not today, Satan Sam Altman!

 

[Free]

I got an out of memory error and an advert to upgrade to gpt+. Not today, Satan Sam Altman!

Apparently you're too beautiful to be rendered under a non-paying account.

 

[Monica Dream]

I got it to "work" but may have guided it too much -it was disturbing in the sense that it's very close to how I look (enough that I'm not sharing it b/c of RL harassment concerns) but at the same time the facial bone structure and eyes are completely off.