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>Now, gushing praise aside, making sure the labels are truly accurate is the hard part. For example, I’m not sure how iMessage can claim it doesn’t track paymen

>Now, gushing praise aside, making sure the labels are truly accurate is the hard part. For example, I’m not sure how iMessage can claim it doesn’t track payments when I use it to actually make payments, but I guess the point is aside from the system that actually processed the payment that iMessage itself is not using any metadata of that payment. Very interesting distinction which boils down to whether a bullet item might show up in the box or not. It's a classic "lies, damn lies, and statistics" scenario. The graphic might be technically correct but it's misleading in a way to spread a specific message. It irks me that this image keeps being spread all over. The thing people should actually care about isn't if iMessage stores/uses this information, but if the organization in control of iMessage stores/uses it. It's just like I don't really care if the WhatsApp app stores all this info, the actual problem is if Facebook (the company) uses it for some reason. WhatsApp (the app) just happens to be one of the avenues that this data is collected. For iMessage, sure, maybe technically iMessage isn't collecting my payment information... but Apple still gets it via the Wallet app. Maybe iMessage isn't storing my location history, but Apple still is through the iPhone location history. Maybe iMessage isn't watching my app usage history, but Apple Screen Time sure is. This applies to all of the things listed as bad under the WhatsApp label. Secondarily, the graphic is also misleading because the WhatsApp side of it becomes artificially larger since most of the items are listed twice. It immediately causes you to think "WhatsApp collects a lot more" due to the size of the box, but in reality the box could be collapsed to half the size. It just so happens that the way Apple chose to present this information makes it seem like WhatsApp collects twice the data. Personally (perhaps naively) I do trust Apple with this information more than Facebook, but the graphic is still misleading by implying that it isn't being collected and used in some way.

snowwrestler 6y ago
Does Apple get your payment information? I thought one of the selling points of Apple Pay is that Apple cannot collect your transaction data.
- tidepod12 6y ago
  So to avoid confusion: there's two sources of "payment information" that might get confused with Apple. There's Apple Pay (which has no WhatsApp equivalent AFAIK) and Apple Cash (which is the equivalent of WhatsApp Pay). When using Apple Pay, Apple obviously stores your payment methods and for some cards, the Wallet app stores your transaction history. However, the Apple privacy policy for Apple Pay says they only use anonymized transaction history for their analytics. But there is also Apple Cash. Apple Cash's privacy policy says that they do collect non-anonymized information on your transactions (and communication history from messages, email, and calls!), but they promise to only use it if they deem it necessary [1]. Take that as you will. >To assist Apple Payments Inc. in preventing fraud when you are using Apple Cash to send, request, and receive money, Apple Inc. may provide it with approximate use patterns from your device about how frequently you communicate with that person by phone, email, or in Messages. No content of your communication is collected. This information is stored for a limited time, and in such a way that it is not linked to you unless the transaction with which it is associated is determined to require further analysis due to suspicious activity. Again, I do trust Apple more than I trust FB to only use it when necessary... but they are still collecting it. 1: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210701 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210701
  - snowwrestler 6y ago
    Thanks! Very helpful

snowwrestler 6y ago

Does Apple get your payment information? I thought one of the selling points of Apple Pay is that Apple cannot collect your transaction data.

tidepod12 6y ago
So to avoid confusion: there's two sources of "payment information" that might get confused with Apple. There's Apple Pay (which has no WhatsApp equivalent AFAIK) and Apple Cash (which is the equivalent of WhatsApp Pay). When using Apple Pay, Apple obviously stores your payment methods and for some cards, the Wallet app stores your transaction history. However, the Apple privacy policy for Apple Pay says they only use anonymized transaction history for their analytics. But there is also Apple Cash. Apple Cash's privacy policy says that they do collect non-anonymized information on your transactions (and communication history from messages, email, and calls!), but they promise to only use it if they deem it necessary [1]. Take that as you will. >To assist Apple Payments Inc. in preventing fraud when you are using Apple Cash to send, request, and receive money, Apple Inc. may provide it with approximate use patterns from your device about how frequently you communicate with that person by phone, email, or in Messages. No content of your communication is collected. This information is stored for a limited time, and in such a way that it is not linked to you unless the transaction with which it is associated is determined to require further analysis due to suspicious activity. Again, I do trust Apple more than I trust FB to only use it when necessary... but they are still collecting it. 1: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210701 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210701
- snowwrestler 6y ago
  Thanks! Very helpful