Delta Chat now contacting third party servers (map provider) for position related data (map tiles)
Position tracking "has been silently introduced as an advanced opt-in feature"
(https://support.delta.chat/t/send-location-only-one-time-android-v-0-301/380)
starting with version 0.301.0 of package Delta Chat (https://f-droid.org/packages/com.b44t.messenger/)
But apparently third party servers are now [EDIT: were] also contacted even if the feature is turned off! https://support.delta.chat/t/end-of-privacy/393
EDIT: The allways-on connections got fixed, now connections should now only occur after using the specific map feature:
- NonFreeNet - Delta Chat has a feature to show location tracking data on a map. The map drawing depends on Mapbox, a third-party map provider that states to record API calls.
Outcome from below discussion:
The NonFreeNet tag seems to need some sorting out more generally (#553), but the text everybody agreed on, here, seems to have come from @SimonLaux #1611 (comment 171740937) :
This app currently uses mapbox for an experimental feature. Mapbox is a proprietary service which communicates with their online service(that are hosted on amazon aws) to fetch map tiles. Don't enable the experimental setting "Location Streaming" when you don't want that.
If some features of an app generates additional online usage patterns, then that's certainly not an unimportant information to F-Droid users. So, it should be mentioned.
Concerning tags, instead of tha ambiguousNonFreeNet
mapbox would probably warrant a "Uses a Service as a Software Substitute" tag. (Substitutes a local map viewer.)
SaaSS
is equivalent to using a nonfree program with surveillance features and a universal back door, so you should reject it and replace it with a free program that does the same job.