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We can carry every single element back to its inception and make identical arguments. That's the problem with slippery slopes. Apple - creates messaging platfo

We can carry every single element back to its inception and make identical arguments. That's the problem with slippery slopes. Apple - creates messaging platform. Slippery slope - governments can force Apple to send them all messages. Apple - creates encrypted messaging platform. Slippery slope - governments can force Apple to send them the keys and all messages Apple - Adds camera to device (GPS, microphone, accelerometer, step detection, etc) Slippery slope - governments can force them to record whenever the government demands and send a live stream to the government. Or send locations, or walking patterns, or conversations. Apple - makes operating system Slippery slope - Basically anything. There are so many ways I could go with this. Government can force them to make a messaging and photo system, add cameras to their devices, entice users to take and accumulate pictures, and do image hashing and report suspect photos. That's the problem with slippery slope arguments. They become meaningless rhetoric. Image perceptual hashing is literally a single person's work for two hours. If you really think the barrier between an oppressive government stomping on groups or not is whether Apple did a (poorly communicated) Child Safety PR move and implemented this trivial mechanism...the world is a lot more perilous and scary than you think.

syshum 5y ago
That is because you are incorrectly using the the charge of the Slippery slope fallacy to hand wave away legitimate concerns by reducing them to an absurdity which is itself a logical fallacy The legitimate concerns here are not a slippery slop, they are real and self evidence born from countless examples through out history of these types of survelence systems being abused. EFF points to a coulple, other artiles point to other examples It takes a person an extremely dense person (or intellectually dishonest) to simply hand wave all of these concerns away as "well that is just a slippery slope so I can ignore you"
- defaultname 5y ago
  I guess I'm just extremely dense. I see Apple implement a trivial (laughably trivial) system -- a tiny little pimple on a massive platform of hardware and software -- and I don't think "this is it! This is what puts the surveillance state over the top!", I think "Hey look, trivial, constrained system". But if you believe that this was what was between a surveillance state or not...well you must be much more intellectually capable than I and I am honored to be in your presence. It is the very definition of a slippery slope. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, but usually you're just walking to the bathroom.
rdedev 5y ago
Do keep in mind that atleast one govt has successfully preassured apple to give up on its privacy Also the difference here compared to the scenarios you've mentioned above is that Apple has walked pretty far. All it would take is to make the verification happen on all local files irrespective of its being uploaded to iCloud or not. Then any government can provide their own hashes to apple to keep track of. Apple won't have any idea what those hashes actually mean
- defaultname 5y ago
  "Do keep in mind that at least one govt has successfully pressured apple to give up on its privacy" No company can defend you from your government. "All it would take"... That is the slippery slope. If a government is going to say "that's a nice looking hashing system you have there, now we need you to..." they could as easily -- more easily -- have said "that's a nice filesystem you have there, we need you to...". Hashing files and comparing them against a list is literally a college grad afternoon project. There is absolutely nothing in Apple's announcement that empowers any government anywhere in any meaningful way at all. It is only fear-mongering (or simply raw factual errors as seen throughout this discussion) that makes it seem like it does.
  - rdedev 5y ago
    Sure no company can completely defend me from my govt but atleast they can not build tools that make it easier. Also while it could be easy for a college graduate to build such a system, only Apple has the capability of rolling out this system to all of their phones. Otherwise we would have already seen such a system implemented in other countries
    - defaultname 5y ago
      "only Apple has the capability of rolling out this system" Right. Exactly. Any country in the world can mandate that Apple do anything they want (any of the slippery slope mandates), and Apple can comply or withdraw from the market. If any country wanted to demand that Apple compare all files against a ban list, they could have done that in 2007, or any year since. There is zero technical barrier and it would be a trivial task. The point is that this development moves the bar infinitesimally. I would argue not at all. Fearmongering that depends upon "Well what if..." didn't actually think it through very well.

syshum 5y ago

That is because you are incorrectly using the the charge of the Slippery slope fallacy to hand wave away legitimate concerns by reducing them to an absurdity which is itself a logical fallacy The legitimate concerns here are not a slippery slop, they are real and self evidence born from countless examples through out history of these types of survelence systems being abused. EFF points to a coulple, other artiles point to other examples It takes a person an extremely dense person (or intellectually dishonest) to simply hand wave all of these concerns away as "well that is just a slippery slope so I can ignore you"

defaultname 5y ago
I guess I'm just extremely dense. I see Apple implement a trivial (laughably trivial) system -- a tiny little pimple on a massive platform of hardware and software -- and I don't think "this is it! This is what puts the surveillance state over the top!", I think "Hey look, trivial, constrained system". But if you believe that this was what was between a surveillance state or not...well you must be much more intellectually capable than I and I am honored to be in your presence. It is the very definition of a slippery slope. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, but usually you're just walking to the bathroom.

rdedev 5y ago

Do keep in mind that atleast one govt has successfully preassured apple to give up on its privacy Also the difference here compared to the scenarios you've mentioned above is that Apple has walked pretty far. All it would take is to make the verification happen on all local files irrespective of its being uploaded to iCloud or not. Then any government can provide their own hashes to apple to keep track of. Apple won't have any idea what those hashes actually mean

defaultname 5y ago
"Do keep in mind that at least one govt has successfully pressured apple to give up on its privacy" No company can defend you from your government. "All it would take"... That is the slippery slope. If a government is going to say "that's a nice looking hashing system you have there, now we need you to..." they could as easily -- more easily -- have said "that's a nice filesystem you have there, we need you to...". Hashing files and comparing them against a list is literally a college grad afternoon project. There is absolutely nothing in Apple's announcement that empowers any government anywhere in any meaningful way at all. It is only fear-mongering (or simply raw factual errors as seen throughout this discussion) that makes it seem like it does.
- rdedev 5y ago
  Sure no company can completely defend me from my govt but atleast they can not build tools that make it easier. Also while it could be easy for a college graduate to build such a system, only Apple has the capability of rolling out this system to all of their phones. Otherwise we would have already seen such a system implemented in other countries
  - defaultname 5y ago
    "only Apple has the capability of rolling out this system" Right. Exactly. Any country in the world can mandate that Apple do anything they want (any of the slippery slope mandates), and Apple can comply or withdraw from the market. If any country wanted to demand that Apple compare all files against a ban list, they could have done that in 2007, or any year since. There is zero technical barrier and it would be a trivial task. The point is that this development moves the bar infinitesimally. I would argue not at all. Fearmongering that depends upon "Well what if..." didn't actually think it through very well.