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There are probably a billion Apple devices out there [0]. Each of those devices has at least a couple hundred unique images on it [1]. If you're correct, and t

There are probably a billion Apple devices out there [0]. Each of those devices has at least a couple hundred unique images on it [1]. If you're correct, and the chance of a hash collision is 0.0001% then for each hash in the database, that's 200,000 collisions. Assuming the database has 1,000 hashes [2] and there's no overlap in collisions for any given person, that 200 million peoples' lives ruined. [0] rough guess based on: https://www.statista.com/statistics/276306/global-apple-iphone-sales-since-fiscal-year-2007/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/276306/global-apple-ipho... the exact number might be off but I think the order of magnitude is about right. [1] My gf has taken at least 3 photos every day for the last 5 years at least (so well over 5000 unique photos) - 200 is very conservative. [2] Again, very conservative. This is a collection of all known child porn images. I wouldn't be surprised if the number is actually two orders of magnitude higher. [edit] replied to the wrong comment. Bugger. Hopefully contributed to the conversation anyway.

treis 5y ago
Apple says: >less than a one in one trillion chance per year of incorrectly flagging a given account If we gave every single human being an iPhone we'd expect an incorrect flag every 160 years or so.
- dont__panic 5y ago
  In all fairness, we've all seen marketing twist developer words many, many times. "less than one in one trillion" sounds like a very neat, nice number that somebody decided to fixate on.
  - marcus_holmes 5y ago
    This. And I guess we'll find out. The horrible thing is, of course, that this whole process will probably be automated and there'll be no recourse to a human with any power to work things out properly. If there are thousands of cases, they'll have to take to Twitter to shine some light on it. Except that in this case they're self-identlfying as suspected child abusers. How many people are going to risk the negatives that go with that? Will we ever find out how many people were actually false positives?

treis 5y ago

Apple says: >less than a one in one trillion chance per year of incorrectly flagging a given account If we gave every single human being an iPhone we'd expect an incorrect flag every 160 years or so.

dont__panic 5y ago
In all fairness, we've all seen marketing twist developer words many, many times. "less than one in one trillion" sounds like a very neat, nice number that somebody decided to fixate on.
- marcus_holmes 5y ago
  This. And I guess we'll find out. The horrible thing is, of course, that this whole process will probably be automated and there'll be no recourse to a human with any power to work things out properly. If there are thousands of cases, they'll have to take to Twitter to shine some light on it. Except that in this case they're self-identlfying as suspected child abusers. How many people are going to risk the negatives that go with that? Will we ever find out how many people were actually false positives?