This may lead to unintended consequences.

Passwords are "protected content" that may be hidden in a web form, but usernames are not. Your username won't be routinely hidden by any ordinary password manager.

You may have difficulty when the need arises to share a long string of random digits with another human, or in writing. This may not ordinarily be a thing if more LLMs and chatbots are doing customer service, but if it's a government service, one day we find ourselves at a field office speaking with a civil servant at a window that is armored with Plexiglas, and nobody has a pen to write with, or scratch paper.

One of my colleagues said he was so clever that all his "security question" answers were random hex strings. So I imitated him, and it was very easy with the KeePassXC password generator parameters to generate a hex string of 32 characters, and so "my first grade teacher" was 0xf7a83392b12b1029ac3be7e029acbe7e; my "favorite color" was 0xa83392ac3be7e029acbe7f7a83392b17, etc.

This turned comical because security questions are particularly designed to be asked and answered in human conversations. Over the phone, the pharmacy CSR was not amused, and I lost a few accounts thanks to this ultra-paranoiac attitude and activity.

Is it really insane? That is less than 200 per day, in a city of 15 million people.. a single gang of 20 thieves could likely manage that! The real question is, how does this compare to other cities of this size and demographics?

The number is too high, but dropping: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cdx4762znr6o

Even the CBC thinks of London, England before London, Ontario.

There's also a scam where they contact the owner from abroad, offering to return it, claiming they're an innocent trying to activate a used phone they spent their last dollar on, or threatening the original user into unlocking it. They will say that they're hackers, connected to criminals in your home city, using your name and recent photos to say that they're going to expose your text messages. Anything to get an unlock.

They send them to countries where they aren't locked or break it down for parts.

You can send them to Chinese chop-shops and still turn a decent buck.

The email is what most people miss. Unlocked phone = SMS and email for most people.

Android Private Space https://support.google.com/android/answer/15341885?hl=en

If I have your unlocked iPhone, I could probably reset your Apple ID because I have access to your email and your texts so I can reset your Apple ID password unlock your phone unlock. Remove it from Find My and reset it.

It makes me wonder if there’s some way to put a third lock on there that’s not normally unlocked.

Activation Lock now extends to the serials of the parts inside every iPhone since Apple knows the S/N of everything. If you pull the battery off an Activation Locked phone and put it in another phone it's going to freak out and complain the part is pairing-locked and won't pair to your device but it'll be baseline usable. You'll just keep getting nasty nags in the Settings letting you know you're using stolen parts.

https://support.apple.com/guide/security/activation-lock-sec...

As of iOS 27 beta, there's now an additional "partner finance lock" status that will also be an available parts-lock status (to prevent a 'leased' device from being parted out).

https://9to5mac.com/2026/07/21/ios-27-code-suggests-apple-co...

After you install it you cana "safe contact" or do the reporting on a website which will blocklist the phone's IMEI on all phone companies, block any banking app sessions and remotely wipe the phone.

It also functions as a public searchable database of stolen phones, allowing a prospective buyer of a second hand device to check it.

RTFM

Ha. I was in London for work and had my phone snatched on a work trip the second day. Kings Cross area. Massive pain to get insurance to figure it out and I had to buy a burner.

Two guys hopped a wide sidewalk, never stopped and were back into traffic in an instant.

Everyone gave me the "you should't have been dressed that way" response. Police did nothing dispite certainly plenty of evidence (video, from apple, etc. etc).

it is one way to enter the feedback screen, not the only way

9/10 runs I leave my phone at home, but when I do bring it for some reason, I'm very happy with my "Flipbelt(tm)". It carries a 250g phone with no slipping, sliding or bounce.

My Flipbelt has lost some tightness after three years and many laundry cycles, but it still manages a Pixel 10a with no problems.

The belt rests over the hip and I usually have the phone flat on my backside. I don't really notice it after a few steps.

Fair - I have an iPhone 13 mini, which works well, but I can imagine anything bigger getting quite annoying.

Do please link to leggings with pockets, I'll pass the info to some ladies I know...

For men, part of my "hiking pants" have zipped pockets that are big enough and placed well enough that the phone doesn't bother you when running or climbing or whatever. (Don't get me started on women's hiking pants, the missus buys hers from the men's section.)

leggings.

I vote for a "lock it in" feature for motorbike riding.

I set up the route, clip the phone onto the quadlock mount, ride down the street and it auto changes the route because of something motorbikes don't care about.

Or it rains and that counts as pressing buttons.

And now I am riding and with gloves on so I can't fix it.

Just "do what I told you" and don't mess with it.

But "chill" feature is unavailable in New York city unfortunately.

All maps need to have an extra time penalty for turns, merging, etc. Even if the data is taken with an average driver, average driver probably isn't there for the first time, and for someone unfamiliar with the area any extra turn adds an extra chance to take a wrong turn.

You can do this already. Leave the map up, but silence all direction corrections. Then try to make your own way. If you already have the time to chill, you can take a little more time to think ahead about the route you’ll try. Make a wrong turn or exit and the map will still point you in the right direction.

This has driven me so crazy it’s about to push me off Google maps. If I’m driving upstate, I want to choose a nice straightforward highway route and stay on it. No, I don’t care if I need to sit in a little bit of traffic. No, Google, I don’t want you take it upon yourself to change my route to a bunch of back roads through Bear Mountain to avoid an 8-minute slowdown. I want you to just take me down the route you showed me when I started navigation.

I’ve had a couple times now where Google Maps has taken me into absolutely terrible traffic jams on back roads in areas where there is limited cell service. What seems to be happening is that there is a slowdown on the main road and a blind spot on the back route with no service, so Google assumes there are no cars there and no traffic, so it just funnels everyone that way until the whole route clogs up. Utterly infuriating.

Apple Maps suggests “your preferred route” as an option when you frequently travel an alternative path. In addition, all maps apps I know of have options to configure use of toll roads and highways.

Let me add to that: how about “no uncontrolled left turns onto busy streets” mode? Google Maps does this to me all the time and it’s infuriating, it’s up to me to avoid it.

I love when Google maps in the NY metro area makes me want to take a left-turn, at a stop sign at intersection with a 6 lane road that doesn't get a stop. Yes, these insanities exist and are basically fucking death traps to attempt lefts.

Wouldn't disabling real time traffic data or using app not supporting real time traffic data solve this problem?

Yeah that's the main issue usually. Google has live data, otherwise I'd use something else

Was about to write the same - those options do exist already. It works quite well in my experience. Although quality may depend on how well a specific city mapped out. Melbourne for example have options for accessibility (City consuls pays for mapping accessibility scores\options and I guess those details help to plan in maps and just generally a good city benchmark). Preferred and connecting modes works well too - one can specify if ride service or drive is not an option or bus is meh. One thing I wish to have there is 2-3 presets of these options so I can quickly switch between combinations of - "get there fast", "get on specific time", "get with my most comfortable preferences". It's all there, just switching it every time is a bit of annoying.

Conversely, as a cyclist, Google Maps infuriatingly will refuse to route you along an expressway, even when it's the shortest or only route without a huge detour. e.g. Lawrence Expressway where it crosses in an underpass under Central Expressway. This is a long-standing known issue with Google Maps routings for cycling mode.

Yes. Transit App allows you configure both your walking and cycling speeds. Combine that with selecting which other methods you allow, and you get lots of options, and more accurate ETAs.

Pro-tip: if you want to get from A to B without using Google Maps, simply pick a sequence of intermediate points A = a_0, …, a_n = B where each pair of consecutive points aren’t too far apart, and then travel to each point in turn.

What do you mean "but with a waypoint”? What happens if you route on public transit without a waypoint? Do you mean indirect spaghetti routings that seem ok to Google?

I find it incredible that "modify the chosen route as little as possible" is not really a thing in any major mapping app. Just because I turned left instead of right at an intersection and had to detour a little bit before getting to a highway shouldn't switch the way I'm going by hundreds of miles on a long trip just because it's supposedly 5 minutes or some other pithy amount faster, and I have seen scenarios like this happen in both Google Maps and Here.

Can't you turn off highways?

It’s not on the quick select pills so it’s not obvious but yes you can https://youtube.com/shorts/SA72d9VfsPg?is=F6zKWQNOkokN31F3

As for your other question, it looks like the guy was responding to an implied “I can’t turn off tolls as a hack bypass ferries because the bridge also requires a toll”. I’d speculate that it wasn’t obvious there’s a ferry-specific filter because the other filters show up as pills.

At least on Android google maps, there's an option to avoid ferries. But if you don't set the option before you get started, it's a pita to change options.

The main alternate route is a toll bridge unfortunately.

The risks, such as they are, of walking in a city are blown way out of proportion to reality in order to sell ads or elect political candidates.

Care to expand on this implication?

Well this was 15 years ago, all companies were trying to jump on the social media bandwagon (Google Plus launched in 2011), and both companies and users had to re-learn what privacy meant.

Good for them!

Are we sure this was actually leaked and not deliberately 'leaked' as a form of bragging?

And some of the roads have a toll only at certain times of day, but they're treated as tolled 24/7. Some are free if you have 3+ people in the car, but there's no way to say "I have N people in the car, adjust consideration of tolls accordingly."

I used to work in the Seattle office, but I wouldn't have had the first idea how to get anything like this changed.

Do they develop any products in any of those offices?

That used discrete nodes. Choosing “how far to walk” before changing mode changes that paradigm I think.

there really needs to be a configurable rules/decisions engine. I.e. i would prefer to walk everywhere, i will take public transit if it saves me more than 15 minutes total or 5 minutes per leg, evaluate this at every interchange node.

There are some routings in london for example where the best course of action is actually to take a train, get off walk 5 minutes then take a different train, google will always tell you to stay on the train to a point where you can change trains in the same station.

This is overstated. At least as of 2017, Americans walked about 93% as much as people in France, for example, and a little more than people in Portugal or Greece.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/747380/daily-step-averag...

I don't have sidewalks in front of my house but our neighbors all take walks - and walk to main street. A quiet street that sees a few cars an hour doesn't need a sidewalk to be walkable.

The other scenario of no sidewalk are like rural roads that are very long with nothing in between. So there sorta "no place to walk to".

Google has giant offices in NYC. Like, you'd think this would have come up.

… between me & my partner, we own multiple pieces of exercise wear that has a dedicated pocket for a phone, because … you need somewhere to put your phone.

I almost always run with my phone. One of the few times I didn’t, I was on about a 12 mile out and back run. At mile 6 my IT band seized up in a way it never had and never has since. I could barely walk, much less run and I was six miles from home. Eventually, I managed to hobble about a mile over the course of an hour and find a business with a phone I could use to call for a ride.

Having a phone that day would have been really nice.

I, for one, endeavor to retain situational awareness even while on foot.

The author of this article apparently demands to run around with an unlocked phone. I have the same "Theft Protection" enabled and the only thing it purports to do is lock the screen. So I may never trigger it, because if I'm walking, or running, or bicycling, the screen is locked!!

If I cram earbuds into my ears and drown out the world, then I am functionally deaf; I cannot hear tires squealing, or honking horns, or victims screaming. I shan't go on about how my bone-conduction technology muddles up both music and the real world sounds.

If I'm checking my phone while I'm in motion on a sidewalk, I'm functionally wearing blinders, and not the good kinds like they put on carriage-horses. Especially at night when my glowing screen is brighter than the Full Moon! If my face is in my screen, then my mind is also not in meatspace, but my imagination is in Lothlórien, or Cair Paravel, or 40 Eridani in the 23rd century.

My mind and five senses need to be in the present and need to be in meatspace, or my feet don't belong in traffic.

Unlikely to be the product manager, but absolutely the product manager mentality. How can people live without our product? Reality check: people fucking manage in the real world. Especially those with limited means.

But I don't. If I specifically look up transport directions it often means weather is bad or I'm tired. so no thanks please keep as is

Ok that makes sense.

My tips would be: check if it mistakenly thinks you can't directly walk to the station or something. In my town there's a particular place i often go to where Google I guess just doesn't know or care that there IS a crossing. if I just pick a point across the street it suggests much better routes

And personally if it's more than 5 min of walking i would just look up the way to the station and then from the station separately with whatever modes i prefer

And lobby your government for sorting out public transportation to your block? It seems crazy inconvenient