In our technological age, we are at the mercy of many different companies that provide us with the many various technical services.
While some of these companies have an excellent reputation for delivering a stellar service, maintaining great company-consumer relations, and remaining highly transparent and ethical, the same cannot be said for other, less reputable companies.
Within this article, we will shed some light on some of these companies with a bad reputation, letting you know of some of their misdeeds, and perhaps opening your eyes about some of the companies you thought you could trust.
This is one company that has been under fire for years for a few reasons. Started by CEO Mark Zuckerberg, it was meant to revolutionize communications and social media, and it was a great thing for some time. Many people used it to keep in touch with friends and family, stay updated on the news.
The would make use of the many features that soon started to be integrated to allow people to almost live their daily lives on the platform with various forms of entertainment.
In the past few years, however, popularity has declined as other social media platforms have taken over, like Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat. The company hasn't precisely maintained a good social standing either.
It came to light that the company had numerous privacy concerns, was a platform for hate speech and fake news, and was selling users information to third party companies.
Vigilant Solutions
Like with most of these companies, the ideas and ventures are sound enough to provide a great service to make life easier for the consumer. In this instance, the consumer is the American police force. Vigilant Solutions sells the various police departments surveillance tools, which help circumvent the Fourth Amendment. With the help of their artificial intelligence and analytics, the company assists in a variety of ways.
While this, in theory, is a great idea, as it will help track down criminals and lawbreakers and improve security in various other places such as public parks, shopping malls, and so forth, it is a power that can be much abused.
Every month, Vigilant Solutions does automated scans of anywhere between 150 million and 200 million photographs of license plates that their tools have taken in the various places they keep a watch.
ACLU sued the Immigration and Customs Enforcement for their abuse of Vigilant Solutions databases to track undocumented immigrants. This is but one way that they were involved in an abuse of surveillance power.
Cloudflare
Cloudflare is a company focused on internet infrastructure, assisting websites with cybersecurity. Their services are great for protecting your sites against DDoS attacks and hacks, among other forms of cyberattacks. While this is generally a good thing, it is very easy for this kind of service to be taken advantage of by others.
An example of this would be the case where three websites were found to contain more than 18 000 images depicting child pornography. These websites were found to be using Cloudflare to protect and mask themselves from any kind of detection.
While the company has claimed to not be in support of this activity and cuts ties with users they detect to be using their service for criminal activity, they have been pointed out and accused in the past of being slow to act and in some instances complicit with these websites that have bred less reputable content.
Huawei
As one of the biggest smartphone manufacturers globally, Huawei has been involved in a few dubious schemes in the past. As a Chinese company, many are worried about the potential for the Chinese government using this company as a method for spying on the users of their smartphones, which is entirely possible given past events.
For instance, Huawei has been found to be a tool for at least two African countries to spy on their citizens and political competitors, helping the government track down and arrest those who were critical of their regimes and president.
Amazon
The most famous brand on this list is also probably one of the shadiest. Amazon is involved in various services, such as online retail, video and movie streaming, cloud computing, and home technology. As one of the world's largest companies, it is also one of the most evil in the eyes of many.
This is because of the various forms of malpractice which the company uses to get ahead, such as mistreatment of employees that has even resulted in injury and death, use of child labor in foreign countries, a negative tax bill, spying using their home technology, and much more. While this is undoubtedly a very convenient service, there are many things we think you should be aware of.
8kun
Formerly known as 8chan, this is essentially a far worse version of 4chan. Anyone who has come into contact or has heard of these websites can attest that these are by far some of the worst forums to be a part of should you be an ethical and morally good person.
This is because these forums are 'anything goes' as for whatever their users can post. This makes it a pit of some of the vilest content you can think of on the internet being shared around.
It was taken down back when it was still known as 8chan because of the numerous times that a mass shooter used the site to post their racist and violent intentions before carrying out the act.
Summary
There are various pros and cons of our technological advances. While the services that many of these companies provide are convenient and great, we need to be aware that they aren't always transparent and have a shady background. Do your research if you are cautious, and decide for yourself if you support them.
