4 ms·

Answers to likely responses: "just use a different cloud service": on iOS, for cloud backups, there are no alternatives: it's iCloud or nothing. Moreover, in t

Answers to likely responses: "just use a different cloud service": on iOS, for cloud backups, there are no alternatives: it's iCloud or nothing. Moreover, in the case of Apple this could actually be productive. They have been pushing the privacy angle. Let's not forget that this is the company that pushed out end-to-end encrypted chats to tens (hundreds?) of millions of users before Whatsapp did it. If Apple offered this option, this would be a boon to tens of millions of people, which is far more productive than a few experts moving to relatively obscure alternatives.

justaman 9y ago
Apple could utilize their newer devices' capabilities of finger print recognition. If you don't have a device capable of this, you don't get encryption. Sound very Apple™.
bilbo0s 9y ago
Genuinely trying to get an understanding of the pros and cons here, but is there any guarantee that this, or any other, data theft ring used iCloud? I mean, let's say I have an iCloud and it is encrypted in a completely secure fashion such that even Apple cannot access it. Well couldn't this ring have just collected my phone number, Apple ID etc etc from some other Apple database? Maybe I'm misunderstanding the threat here, but it seems to me that this is not going to be fixed by simply encrypting iCloud. Sure, that would be part of a comprehensive response, but the main problem seems to be that these people had access to internal Apple databases. To my mind, "internal" means everything from retail POS data to iTunes. I guess I'm trying to understand why encrypting iCloud would prevent a ring of internal Apple employees from gathering a person's information and selling it? And, to be frank, it's concerning because it's not just Apple. What stops a group of internal employees of any company from gathering a person's information and selling it? What are needed are strong guarantees about data security internal to these companies. My background is in health care technology, so the analogy I would make is HIPAA. But we need HIPAA for everything instead of just for healthcare information. Right now if employees of enterprises outside healthcare access a person's information and they don't sell it, they're just checking on a friend, there is no liability for that. Under HIPAA you're fired at a minimum. That's what we need.

justaman 9y ago

Apple could utilize their newer devices' capabilities of finger print recognition. If you don't have a device capable of this, you don't get encryption. Sound very Apple™.

bilbo0s 9y ago

Genuinely trying to get an understanding of the pros and cons here, but is there any guarantee that this, or any other, data theft ring used iCloud? I mean, let's say I have an iCloud and it is encrypted in a completely secure fashion such that even Apple cannot access it. Well couldn't this ring have just collected my phone number, Apple ID etc etc from some other Apple database? Maybe I'm misunderstanding the threat here, but it seems to me that this is not going to be fixed by simply encrypting iCloud. Sure, that would be part of a comprehensive response, but the main problem seems to be that these people had access to internal Apple databases. To my mind, "internal" means everything from retail POS data to iTunes. I guess I'm trying to understand why encrypting iCloud would prevent a ring of internal Apple employees from gathering a person's information and selling it? And, to be frank, it's concerning because it's not just Apple. What stops a group of internal employees of any company from gathering a person's information and selling it? What are needed are strong guarantees about data security internal to these companies. My background is in health care technology, so the analogy I would make is HIPAA. But we need HIPAA for everything instead of just for healthcare information. Right now if employees of enterprises outside healthcare access a person's information and they don't sell it, they're just checking on a friend, there is no liability for that. Under HIPAA you're fired at a minimum. That's what we need.