5 ms·

Nobody credible believes for a second that Apple was involved, for whatever it’s worth.

by lawnchair_larry 8y ago

abrichr 8y ago
Could you please provide some sources?
- ryanlol 8y ago
  Wouldn’t it be far more useful for you to provide someone credible making such a claim? If he was wrong this claim would be so trivial to refute that sources seem entirely pointless.
  - abrichr 8y ago
    To clarify my earlier comment, I wasn't taking a position one way or the other. lawnchair_larry made a claim about "nobody credible" believing something. As a lay person in the field, I don't know who these credible people are. Therefore I asked whether lawnchair_larry could tell us who one or more of these credible people are, and where we can read more about what they believe to be true about the situation.
    - jonathanyc 8y ago
      Asking lawnchair_larry to give you a complete list of everyone he considers credible is disingenuous. As the other commenter stated, if someone thought that someone credible made that claim they could simply provide that source, which both (1) involves asymptotically less effort for everyone involved and (2) under reasonable assumptions is at least as effective. “Sir, I’m going to need for you to list for me all the crimes you didn’t commit last Saturday.”
      - abugheratwork 8y ago
        > Asking lawnchair_larry to give you a complete list of everyone he considers credible is disingenuous. Implying that was asked seems disingenuous to me, but I assume that wasn't your intent. What I see is a request for clarification, specifically asking for the sources from which a conclusion was drawn. It's not a police raid. Relax.
    - ryanlol 8y ago
      How is he supposed to refer you to people not saying something? This is most definitely a rather silly request. Can you prove that magic doesn’t exist?
      - abrichr 8y ago
        > How is he supposed to refer you to people not saying something? That's not what I was asking for. I was asking him to refer me to credible people saying that they don't believe Apple was involved. Here is what he said: > Nobody credible believes for a second that Apple was involved, for whatever it’s worth. I thought perhaps he had read about credible people making this claim, or had some other way of knowing what these people believe. I was simply asking for more information, so as to further educate myself. I believe that in the absence of any sources, this claim may suffer from the Argument to the People [1] and Argument from Authority [2] logical fallacies. Full disclosure: I have a MacBook and an iPhone. I enjoy Apple products and respect their business model. And in the absence of any evidence to the contrary, I'm inclined to believe that Apple wasn't involved. I just want to learn more about the subject from people who know more than me. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority
        ryanlol 8y ago
        You seem to assume that “apple planted this backdoor” is a realistic enough claim that someone credible would be willing to waste their time on it. Well, it isn’t.
zaroth 8y ago
I was not trying to suggest that, I was trying to convey that once a spy agency has remote access (sanctioned or otherwise) we can see by this example how it is proliferated and abused.
- bigiain 8y ago
  yeah, but the Australian Government is busy passing laws to require companies like Apple to do something pretty much exactly like this. (And in my mind at least, those laws are without doubt part of a coordinated five eyes security/law-enforcement campaign to push those kinds of laws through everywhere: "Look, it works in Australia!" the Canadians/UK/NZ/US will say...)
  - cronix 8y ago
    That's precisely the GP's point.
    - bigiain 8y ago
      Yeah. Right now, nobody (credible) is accusing Apple of enabling this kind of exploit. If Apple are still selling hardware in Australia in 12 months time, the suspicion will _have_ to be that they have enabled something similar enough to this to be considered untrustworthy... (And not just Apple, any manufacturer or software company doing business in Australia...)
- mlindner 8y ago
  > I was not trying to suggest that You were by simply stating it. It's the same type of saying-but-not-saying lines that the media uses like "if this allegation proves to be true" or similar such phrases. The fact that you state it suggests to the reader that people think it. If it was an honest mistake in wording on your part that's one thing, but you should probably avoid using such phrasing. Look at all the people responding to the post you responded to saying that Apple did it. There's no reason to give a forum for such ideas.
  - 8y ago
aboutruby 8y ago
Could be some rogue employee, could be a legitimate employee under constraints / influence of an organization, etc. The NSA tried to do it with Linux quite a few times.
atomical 8y ago
Nobody? https://9to5mac.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2018/04/cook4.jpg https://9to5mac.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2018/04/cook4...
- equalunique 8y ago
  Is that Tim Cook and Saudi Arabia's MBS?
writepub 8y ago
> "Nobody credible..." Your implication that doubting Apple is incredulousy, is ludicrous! Why is Apple so damn special? At this point, there isn't any evidence that Apple is involved, and yes, they go on a PR blitz to focus on privacy and security, and get hit pieces published on how "privacy is a feature on the iPhone". But the history of backdoors suggests that no one voluntarily reveals them (Intel, Cisco, Juniper,...). In many cases, how the backdoors made their way in is a closely guarded secret, specifically to enable plausible deniability. It's best not to put a company on a pedestal, like some religious cult.
equalunique 8y ago
Can't tell if you mean credible as in credible or credible as in "credible"

Nobody credible believes for a second that Apple was involved, for whatever it’s worth.

abrichr 8y ago

Could you please provide some sources?

ryanlol 8y ago
Wouldn’t it be far more useful for you to provide someone credible making such a claim? If he was wrong this claim would be so trivial to refute that sources seem entirely pointless.
- abrichr 8y ago
  To clarify my earlier comment, I wasn't taking a position one way or the other. lawnchair_larry made a claim about "nobody credible" believing something. As a lay person in the field, I don't know who these credible people are. Therefore I asked whether lawnchair_larry could tell us who one or more of these credible people are, and where we can read more about what they believe to be true about the situation.
  - jonathanyc 8y ago
    Asking lawnchair_larry to give you a complete list of everyone he considers credible is disingenuous. As the other commenter stated, if someone thought that someone credible made that claim they could simply provide that source, which both (1) involves asymptotically less effort for everyone involved and (2) under reasonable assumptions is at least as effective. “Sir, I’m going to need for you to list for me all the crimes you didn’t commit last Saturday.”
    - abugheratwork 8y ago
      > Asking lawnchair_larry to give you a complete list of everyone he considers credible is disingenuous. Implying that was asked seems disingenuous to me, but I assume that wasn't your intent. What I see is a request for clarification, specifically asking for the sources from which a conclusion was drawn. It's not a police raid. Relax.
  - ryanlol 8y ago
    How is he supposed to refer you to people not saying something? This is most definitely a rather silly request. Can you prove that magic doesn’t exist?
    - abrichr 8y ago
      > How is he supposed to refer you to people not saying something? That's not what I was asking for. I was asking him to refer me to credible people saying that they don't believe Apple was involved. Here is what he said: > Nobody credible believes for a second that Apple was involved, for whatever it’s worth. I thought perhaps he had read about credible people making this claim, or had some other way of knowing what these people believe. I was simply asking for more information, so as to further educate myself. I believe that in the absence of any sources, this claim may suffer from the Argument to the People [1] and Argument from Authority [2] logical fallacies. Full disclosure: I have a MacBook and an iPhone. I enjoy Apple products and respect their business model. And in the absence of any evidence to the contrary, I'm inclined to believe that Apple wasn't involved. I just want to learn more about the subject from people who know more than me. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority
      - ryanlol 8y ago
        You seem to assume that “apple planted this backdoor” is a realistic enough claim that someone credible would be willing to waste their time on it. Well, it isn’t.

zaroth 8y ago

I was not trying to suggest that, I was trying to convey that once a spy agency has remote access (sanctioned or otherwise) we can see by this example how it is proliferated and abused.

bigiain 8y ago
yeah, but the Australian Government is busy passing laws to require companies like Apple to do something pretty much exactly like this. (And in my mind at least, those laws are without doubt part of a coordinated five eyes security/law-enforcement campaign to push those kinds of laws through everywhere: "Look, it works in Australia!" the Canadians/UK/NZ/US will say...)
- cronix 8y ago
  That's precisely the GP's point.
  - bigiain 8y ago
    Yeah. Right now, nobody (credible) is accusing Apple of enabling this kind of exploit. If Apple are still selling hardware in Australia in 12 months time, the suspicion will _have_ to be that they have enabled something similar enough to this to be considered untrustworthy... (And not just Apple, any manufacturer or software company doing business in Australia...)
mlindner 8y ago
> I was not trying to suggest that You were by simply stating it. It's the same type of saying-but-not-saying lines that the media uses like "if this allegation proves to be true" or similar such phrases. The fact that you state it suggests to the reader that people think it. If it was an honest mistake in wording on your part that's one thing, but you should probably avoid using such phrasing. Look at all the people responding to the post you responded to saying that Apple did it. There's no reason to give a forum for such ideas.
- 8y ago

aboutruby 8y ago

Could be some rogue employee, could be a legitimate employee under constraints / influence of an organization, etc. The NSA tried to do it with Linux quite a few times.

atomical 8y ago

Nobody? https://9to5mac.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2018/04/cook4.jpg https://9to5mac.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2018/04/cook4...

equalunique 8y ago
Is that Tim Cook and Saudi Arabia's MBS?

writepub 8y ago

> "Nobody credible..." Your implication that doubting Apple is incredulousy, is ludicrous! Why is Apple so damn special? At this point, there isn't any evidence that Apple is involved, and yes, they go on a PR blitz to focus on privacy and security, and get hit pieces published on how "privacy is a feature on the iPhone". But the history of backdoors suggests that no one voluntarily reveals them (Intel, Cisco, Juniper,...). In many cases, how the backdoors made their way in is a closely guarded secret, specifically to enable plausible deniability. It's best not to put a company on a pedestal, like some religious cult.

equalunique 8y ago

Can't tell if you mean credible as in credible or credible as in "credible"