“It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop.” - Confucius
29th May 2020 / Issue #372
giffgaff Happenings
by bluemoonbaz
Payback update
The community works hard throughout the year and it’s very close to your payback window, so please make sure you’ve chosen how you want to take it before Sunday 14 June at 23:59. You can choose between having it as cash to your PayPal account, credit to your giffgaff account, or as a charity donation to the member-voted charities (which giffgaff will match). Make your selection here.
goodybank - Stories from the communities you’ve supported this week
Our @shaina_k brings us the latest goodybank news and how your amazing donations are really making a difference. Your generosity is helping people in communities. Read the update here.
Last chance reminder: £10 bonus credit on offer - bring your friends to giffgaff in May
giffgaff are offering an additional £10 bonus credit on top of your usual £5 Payback / Super Recruiter rewards. The offer starts as soon as the clocks strike 00:01 on Friday the 1st May 2020 and runs until 23:59 on Sunday the 31st May 2020. Yes, that’s for everyone, even Super Recruiters! Read about the offer here.
Top five charities
giffgaff are looking to start sending the vote email out tomorrow so please keep a lookout for that. Every vote really counts so we don’t want anyone to miss out. If you haven’t got it by June 4th, (and it’s not in your spam box and your email address is correct in your account) let a staff member know and they can have a look what happened and see if they can resend. Read the full update here.
Testing ways to make it easier for our members to add credit
Some interesting news that members offered make comments about. giffgaff are testing on-site at the moment to see if they can make it easier for people to add a little credit to their account on top of their goodybag if they think they might need it. Full details here.
Our weekly round from our fellow members’ recent discussion threads, head over and give them your views:
Say Hello!
by kathleen414
Please give a warm welcome to our new friend and member @brown028 who says “Hello giffgaff I’m new to your phone network.” Pop over and say hello here.
“Hi people I’m Louise and I’m really happy to be here any help would be nice.” Give our new member a big warm welcome to the community here.
Please welcome a recent new member to giffgaff and the community @galac13, who says “For the first time, in my mobile history of 20+ years, I have experienced the most seamless, stress-free transition ever! My previous mobile provider ‘ID’ shut me down without issue and giffgaff scooped me into their arms with my ageing phone number beside me. Hats off.” Say hello here.
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Happy giffgaffiversary!
by ijustcantdoit
9 years on giffgaff
@leedorney says “I’ve been on giffgaff for 9 years.. how long have you been on and have you any thoughts on the network?”
1st Anniversary
@miche22542 says “My husband and I have both been with giffgaff for 15 months and find it reasonably priced and a very helpful community.”
Second giffgaff anniversary!
@benfman says “I can’t express my happiness with you in some words but I can say BIG thank you to giffgaff.”
If it’s YOUR giffgaffiversary, please let the team know by sending a private message to @ijustcantdoit.
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Photo Of The Week
by brulaw
This week’s featured photo is Yes, I know I said you could have a pot plant… by @eldee. Some of the comments included:
- “Could always strap it to the roof?” (guy_ow)
- “One hell of a pot plant but looks fabulous” (themzbiker)
- “Brilliant picture” (vijay42924)
- “Wow great photo, I would love one of them in my garden” (tinawilliams0410)
- “Woah there, so many wonderful things in 1 picture” (netes81)
- “Haha that’s crazy” (fay2020)
Well here we are again, and the weather is starting to get a lot nicer. It’s given all you giffsnappers with shutter button fingers the opportunity to grab more brilliant shots to share with us all. As always, thank you and please keep them coming.
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On This Day In History
by jammydodge
1660 Charles II marched to London and was restored to the Throne as King, 11 years after the execution of his father King Charles I.
1953 Sir Edmund Hillary and sherpa Tenzing Norgay successfully reached the summit of Mount Everest becoming the first men to do so. The news broke to the Queen on her coronation day, 2nd June. Sir Edmund was later knighted by the Queen for his accomplishment.
1982 Polish-born Pope John Paul II prayed alongside the Archbishop of Canterbury in the first papal visit to Britain since 1531. John Paul was the second longest-serving Pope and the first non-Italian since 1523.
Tech Developments
by revilo10
Track and Trace Privacy: Fact-checking
Track and trace apps for the virus are becoming old news, there are over 30 countries across the world which have announced apps fort their populations or have actually rolled them into usage in some form. Here in the UK, as we explored last week, the government has been trialling NHSX, a track and trace app, in the Isle of Wight - as it offered a good platform to expand the findings to the wider population of the country.
Yesterday, May 28 saw the launch of a new nationwide track and trace strategy where people are being asked to report positive tests and isolate themselves. Matt Hancock said in yesterday’s daily Coronavirus briefing “NHS test and trace means we can start to replace the national lockdown with individual isolation for those who have been in contact with the virus and location action where it’s necessary,” The app will be rolled out in coming weeks, according to reports, as part of this strategy.
There are some privacy concerns which have been flagged up in the initial stages, and various organisations and cybersecurity firms have done research into the app itself via the Isle of Wight trial. Although the NHS website itself has a transparent privacy policy related to COVID-19, which covers every area from physical patient information when a person is admitted to a hospital with the virus, but also privacy in the NHSX app itself. One main security flaw found is the inability to opt-out of the trackers which the app uses. Privacy International ran a piece earlier this month after they researched the technicalities of the app, and through their research, they found certain permissions, many of which are not surprising. The app uses Bluetooth, internet network access and 3 different location permissions, including background location access.
There have been quite a few false allegations doing the rounds on social media (As they always do!), one specific one I’ve seen myself on Facebook alleges that the app (which, bear in mind is not publicly available yet) asks for access to your contacts and social media apps in order to use your friends and contacts information to track them without their knowledge. A part of the copy-paste I find interesting is when it urges people to think carefully before installing the app and says “you are not a parcel” and “you could be a prisoner” both statements make no sense, of course. First of all, as we saw in the Privacy International article, the app asks for no contact access at all (even if it did the NHS doesn’t have the resources or the want to track people via their mobile number) and you can’t track a person via their social media profile.
As I always say, folks, be careful what you read online, and don’t copy and paste things on Facebook… see you next week 😉
Image Source: Marco Verch, available under CC 2.0
Thanks for reading!
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