‘If I switch it off, my girlfriend might think I’m cheating’: inside the rise of couples location sharing
-
Vile.
I trust my wife, and she trusts me. We trust each other not to ask for stupid brain-poisoning shit that humans weren't meant to have access to that could one day blow up horribly.
I don't have her passwords, she doesn't have mine. Our phones are locked. I could technically see what she's doing online I suppose via traffic snooping in the router logs but the day I feel the urge to do something like that is the day I kill myself for having abandoned basic moral principles.
We're apes, we have brains built for avoiding snakes in tall grass and finding water and berries. You poison yourself with surveillance, you feed your worst and most destructive impulses. Practice keeping secrets, practice being okay with not knowing. Trust isn't surveillance, trust is knowing that if something fucking mattered you'd be told.
edit: I want my wife to be able to break my heart because if she does she'll have a good reason for doing so. That is what trust is.
wrote last edited by [email protected]Uhhh, I trust her which is precisely why she has my passwords. Are you guys teenagers or something?
Also, location sharing is literally a form of communication. What if there’s an emergency?
-
The peace of mind knowing that your significant other didn't just die in a car crash part way to their destination and are still making progress is significant.
Bless you but the moment I start being afraid of my partner dying everytime they leave the house will be the moment I'm getting back in touch with my psychologist.
wrote last edited by [email protected]Your sanguine naïveté is enviable.
-
This post did not contain any content.
If my partner could check my location at any time, how would I keep bday and anniversary gifts secret? The places where I go to buy things for her are not places I would normally go. She only has to randomly check one time when I'm at an unusual location for her to ask why and then I have to lie. Not worth it.
We use temporary sharing (can limit to one hour) when meeting somewhere. Beyond that, it's a potential liability.
Example: she once got upset that I wanted to go to the mail room (apt building) alone and didn't want her to go with me. She wanted to know what I was hiding. Turned out to be her bday gift and it was just in the commercial packaging with a shipping label. I let her go get it and she's never been suspicious of my motives since (this was at the very start of our relationship and we hadn't established the level of trust that we have now).
Anyway, again, the one-hour sharing is all we need.
-
How old are you guys, if you don't mind me asking? It seems that generally younger people don't see this as an innate violation of privacy, where older people feel quite surveilled and even like they're being viewed as untrustworthy for someone to ask this of them.
I've never cheated on my spouse (not even close), I've never felt any inclination to lie about my whereabouts. I can see the safety aspect of this, logically. I would feel offended if my spouse asked me to be a dot on his phone, as if he was asking to own me. We share a home, a child, a bank account, a car, but we don't share location. I don't even keep my location activated for my own use unless I'm actively navigating somewhere new.
We've got plenty of "normal" problems, but none of them lead me to want his location. I simply trust him enough. It feels to me like if you need your partners location on tap, you must first have other problems
I'm 40 and have done this with partners.
But also, they and I have an open relationship. If they found me in the bed of another, the reaction would an excited inquiry of if I had fun.
-
Uhhh, I trust her which is precisely why she has my passwords. Are you guys teenagers or something?
Also, location sharing is literally a form of communication. What if there’s an emergency?
Yes we're teenagers. We've been married 15 years, ceremony was when we were three.
Privacy is important, have you never kept a diary? Do you film therapy sessions lest your partner not know what you discussed? Shit with the door open? You don't need justification for wanting privacy, you need privacy so when you have a good reason for it nothing looks different.
What if there’s an emergency?
What if there is? Get help, that's an insane fear to live with. If I am unconscious there's nothing to do anyway, the hospital or whatever will find her details in my purse and call. What the fuck am I going to do, sit there watching the dot on the map and calling 000 if it stops moving? You are a lunatic, we have society to take care of us while we're out and about and emergency beacons if you're like camping beyond the black stump or sailing the Pacific.
-
I don’t have her passwords, she doesn’t have mine.
Having the means for each spouse to get the others passwords can be pretty essential when dealing with critical emergencies and death. It's good to have some way for someone you trust to get your online accounts when you pass away so that everything can be concluded and canceled and sentimental content preservation and all that.
For my relationship the means to gain access to my password manager are available in the case of an emergency. Maybe shove the credentials in a bank security box and put access to it into your will if you don't feel you can trust your partner with the knowledge while you are alive.
Obviously we have wills lmao
-
The original commenter explained they and their spouse share their location.
You said it was a breach of trust and privacy.
My question was “How? My situation is similar to the person you’re replying to and I’m curious how two consenting adults sharing their location with each other is ‘a major breach of privacy, for both parties, and also of trust’.”
I understand now that you didn’t mean that it was a breach of trust and privacy literally, obviously they’ve both opted in, but you used that to express your own preference.
wrote last edited by [email protected]I understand now that you didn’t mean that it was a breach of trust and privacy literally, obviously they’ve both opted in, but you used that to express your own preference.
well, it depends. I still think they are breaching their own privacy, but they just don't care.
-
You can self host location sharing. I do it with Nextcloud. Home assistant can do it too.
I think you didn't read my comment
-
I think you didn't read my comment
wrote last edited by [email protected]you are sharing your location with a greedy company [...] and then the highest bidder access this information
Pretty sure I read it.
You can do location sharing WITHOUT interacting with any "greedy company" or "highest bidder".
Then you state...
if you run nextcloud and that addon I don’t remember, or reitti, at home and use that, and you keep is somewhat safe*
and I confirm that you can do it in Nextcloud, and ALSO Home Assistant... as Home assistant is also likely to be something people are running.
I think you didn’t read my comment
I think that you think that everyone who ever comments to your post is always arguing against you.
Edit: missed a couple of words.
-
I understand now that you didn’t mean that it was a breach of trust and privacy literally, obviously they’ve both opted in, but you used that to express your own preference.
well, it depends. I still think they are breaching their own privacy, but they just don't care.
Privacy generally means the ability to control your personal information and how it's used, as well as your freedom from intrusion and observation.
If you knowingly opt in it’s not really a breach of privacy. They’re choosing to allow a 3rd party access to that information which doesn’t fit with your preferences but it’s not really a breach of privacy or trust.
-
How old are you guys, if you don't mind me asking? It seems that generally younger people don't see this as an innate violation of privacy, where older people feel quite surveilled and even like they're being viewed as untrustworthy for someone to ask this of them.
I've never cheated on my spouse (not even close), I've never felt any inclination to lie about my whereabouts. I can see the safety aspect of this, logically. I would feel offended if my spouse asked me to be a dot on his phone, as if he was asking to own me. We share a home, a child, a bank account, a car, but we don't share location. I don't even keep my location activated for my own use unless I'm actively navigating somewhere new.
We've got plenty of "normal" problems, but none of them lead me to want his location. I simply trust him enough. It feels to me like if you need your partners location on tap, you must first have other problems
I'd rather not disclose my age on this account, but, let's just say we're not newly married.
I will admit my statement about location sharing only being a problem if you've already got problems was a bit too binary. The issue is more nuanced.
I see you're focusing on the cheating aspect, which to your credit is what the OP is all about. But from our perspective, that's not even an issue or a use case for the technology. We have full trust in each other. The technology is simply useful for other reasons.
Did she make it to work in the snowstorm or rainstorm?
Huh she's usually home by now, is she unconscious in a ditch or just stopped at the store?
Dinner is almost ready, I just need to put this in the oven so it's ready to come out the second she walks in the door, let me make sure she's actually on her way home. Oh, she must have gotten held up at work, I'll wait a few more minutes.
Stuff like that. Yeah there's other ways of solving those problems, and that's fine too, we just prefer the convenience.
We don't share locations because we don't trust each other, we share because it's convenient. I guess you could say we trust each other not to go crazy with it
️We have married friends who won't share with each other, and that's fine too.
I'll retract my earlier statement. Location sharing is a sensitive subject, with lots of facets. Sharing or not is a personal choice. And while there can be practical benefits, I think most people would agree that using it for cheating prevention is.... Unhealthy.
-
You don't need anything other than home assistant though, right? the companion apps already just do that
Well, I need a reverse proxy or VPN or something so that the phones can connect to my Home Assistant server from outside the LAN. That's the main thing I haven't gotten done yet.
-
Same. For this to be a problem, you must first have other problems.
One of the ways I knew my marriage was over, he disabled location services and left them off for months and then years. I followed when I started fucking other people.
-
This post did not contain any content.
My partner and I used to use location sharing pretty much 100% of the time. We just felt better knowing we could find each other.
But today, we do not, because the trust is shattered.
Google just cannot be trusted with our locations.
-
My partner and I used to use location sharing pretty much 100% of the time. We just felt better knowing we could find each other.
But today, we do not, because the trust is shattered.
Google just cannot be trusted with our locations.
There are options that don't use Google et al.
-
My partner and I used to use location sharing pretty much 100% of the time. We just felt better knowing we could find each other.
But today, we do not, because the trust is shattered.
Google just cannot be trusted with our locations.
they still have it... if your using an android phone at least... and your cell provider...
-
My partner and I used to use location sharing pretty much 100% of the time. We just felt better knowing we could find each other.
But today, we do not, because the trust is shattered.
Google just cannot be trusted with our locations.
You are still sharing it with google if you have an android phone lol
-
Well, I need a reverse proxy or VPN or something so that the phones can connect to my Home Assistant server from outside the LAN. That's the main thing I haven't gotten done yet.
ah. tailscale is great for that. I personally just leave my home assistant exposed behind a reverse proxy
-
This comment is just 'what do you have to worry about it you're not doing anything wrong' with extra words.
wrote last edited by [email protected]Nope. That’s only part of it. You’ve flattened the nuance into cliché without refuting the substance. But if that’s what you walked away with, that’s fine.
-
My partner and I used to use location sharing pretty much 100% of the time. We just felt better knowing we could find each other.
But today, we do not, because the trust is shattered.
Google just cannot be trusted with our locations.
Home Assistant
