alt Hacker News> We did not ask for your location. Your address arrived before you did.
Bunk. You asked a geolocation api/service to map my ip address back to a location. You _did_ ask for my location, using my IP as a key. And my IP is pretty much required in order for communication on the internet to work (outside of using services to hide it, but then _they_ have your info instead).
Replies
I think you are misreading this. It isn't saying they didn't ask ANYONE, they are saying they never asked YOU as a user for it.
Also, though, of COURSE your address arrived first... how else are they going to send back the data you are requesting?
> my IP is pretty much required in order for communication on the internet to work (outside of using services to hide it, but then _they_ have your info instead).
Tor and similar multi-hop proxies, depending on construction, supposedly can't match source to destination IPs.
Nah. The browser has a mechanism to request geolocation. This is the ask that was not performed. The user was not asked, which is the important piece.
If I have a dictionary, I don't have to ask the meaning of a word I hear from someone I am speaking to, I can look it up in the dictionary. I may infer an incorrect meaning because the word has multiple meanings or is a colloquialism.
If I need to clarify that inaccuracy, I need other data points (for example, the context of the conversation), or I can ask my conversational partner for clarification).