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“People have asked if we'll adopt this system for WhatsApp. The answer is no.”

298 points by amadeuspagel 5y ago

JimB7 5y ago
Apple is in dire need of some good ol antitrust enforcement
gordon_freeman 5y ago
Over the last few years I have moved my entire Digital life to the Apple eco-system with a deep belief that Apple would care about "my" privacy for the long-term. And with this move to create a backdoor on the iPhone is making me very worried about relying on the Apple ecosystem.
- leephillips 5y ago
  I don’t want to be mean, but why would you entertain such a “deep belief” about a corporation? I’ve heard similar things from many Apple users. What leads people to have this kind of faith in particular corporations? It’s really alien to me.
  - post_break 5y ago
    When you have two options it's pretty easy to have faith in the one that tries to drum up it's privacy first stance.
  - bodo11 5y ago
    While also seeing deep belief in corporations sceptically myself, I don't think it should be the root cause of scepticism toward apple. The maximisation of proprietariness paired with this "deep belief" breads a really hard possibility to switch vendor (of whatever product), locking people in so much that the perceived cost of privacy-breaching software is lower than the cost of switching.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - dm1011 5y ago
    >What leads people to have this kind of faith in particular corporations? Marketing and groupthink makes them join and buyers remorse makes them stay
  - blacktriangle 5y ago
    Cynically, I would say I also had a deep belief that Apple would respect user privacy because Apple and Google are in a fight over control over the internet and your whole life. Google goes at it by giving away free shit then making billions off your data, Apple goes at this by making billions off hardware and software. From that point of view respecting user privacy is Apple's most powerful weapon in their fight against Google since its a place that Google simply cannot go.
    - ncmncm 5y ago
      Generating the impression that they respect your privacy works exactly equally as well, and is much cheaper.
  - danuker 5y ago
    My guess is the advertising worked. https://medium.com/seedx-digital-marketing-guru/why-apple-spends-1-8-billion-on-advertising-38d3940270bf https://medium.com/seedx-digital-marketing-guru/why-apple-sp...
  - D13Fd 5y ago
    I wouldn't say I have a "deep belief" in Apple, but I trust Apple more than the other available options, because Apple's financial incentives are basically the opposite of Google or Facebook's. Instead of being motivated to use and/or sell user data, it's in Apple's best interest to keep that data secure and play to its competitive advantage as the company who is not trying to pry into its users' lives. That said, I really don't understand why Apple would do this, and it is very disconcerting. Obviously child pornography is absolutely horrible, but this move seems to throw out everyone's privacy in exchange for catching what I have to imagine is a tiny minority of users who are involved with that.
    - handrous 5y ago
      > I wouldn't say I have a "deep belief" in Apple, but I trust Apple more than the other available options That, for me too. From my perspective they basically don't have competition. The only viable alternative to Apple is "do everything yourself with open software, and just accept everything being buggier, jankier, and less helpful, while eating way more of your time". Obviously I'm not in love with that option, but what else? MS? Google? Ha. If Apple stops being Apple it'll be the elimination of a whole category of products and services, essentially. Just won't exist anymore. This is all less a product of Apple being wonderful than of user-facing computing everywhere else being an embarrassing shit-show.
  - AshamedCaptain 5y ago
    I don't know how Apple has managed to get the image of a "privacy friendly" company while painting Google as "privacy unfriendly" at the same time. Apple is better than Google, but mostly because they can't gather as much data about you as Google does (this is not related to iOS vs Android; it's about how pervasive Google is on the WWW), and that's about all the practical differences between the two. And on iOS, Apple is also just one silent App Store update away from being able to exploit your data, not very different from Android. Even if I consider Google enemy #1 right now, I also don't really see them as privacy unfriendly. They have a shitton of data, but what have they exactly done with it that warrants the moniker? Microsoft seems to me to be much more privacy unfriendly (e.g., LinkedIn)
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - handrous 5y ago
      > Even if I consider Google enemy #1 right now, I also don't really see them as privacy unfriendly. They have a shitton of data, but what have they exactly done with it that warrants the moniker? Microsoft seems to me to be much more privacy unfriendly (e.g., LinkedIn) Collecting and having that data to begin with is awful & dangerous. The behavior of collecting it is creepy and gross. The existence of the collected data is threatening.
      - AshamedCaptain 5y ago
        The reason I consider Google a public enemy is not because they collect data or have a poor privacy policy or whatever (because I don't think they are particularly bad at that). The reason is because I think they are "unavoidable". It's very hard to do anything online without it leaving a fingerprint on some Google server. Even governments seem to be ready to endorse Google services (e.g. recaptcha, Android) for fulfillment of basic services. Apple, Facebook, etc. may have (or not have) worse privacy policy, but it is much easier to avoid leaving fingerprints on their servers. Amazon & Microsoft are on the other hand particularly dangerous, though.
  - tomjen3 5y ago
    Because privacy is an obvious goal that Apple can crediblebly target because of the nature of what they sell. Google is fundamentally an advertising agency, Amazon sells cheap stuff but steals your data in the process. Apple sells premium hardware and services, which means they have the margin to do things that neither google or amazon has. They also make money the old fashioned way: when you pay them. Therefore Apple could focus on privacy in a credible manor, because it didn't threaten their business model and it was an argument they could use, but their competition couldn't.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - wnscooke 5y ago
    It probably stems from the well-known history of the start of the company. Who knows who started Dell, McDs, any number of SSD manufacturers, Lenovo, BlackBerry, etc.? I guess we all know about Microsoft and Bill Gates, but their story trajectory went the other way (more corporate). So, I imagine people say that because something Steve Jobs or Ives said or was recorded as saying resonated with them, and thus they share that deep belief.
  - ksec 5y ago
    >I’ve heard similar things from many Apple users. What leads people to have this kind of faith in particular corporations? It is all part of their PR and marketing. And they are very good at it. This happened in Tim Cook's era, not Steve Jobs. May be too good it backfired. If you pay close attention to all the Apple news, ( not some, but ALL ). Pick the top 10 Apple news site and read through it for a few years and it will surely get to most people. And Apple news are the most sort after, highest paid Ads revenue in tech sector. So it is sort of a feedback loop. Worth remembering there are relatively little journalist left, only reporters. No one bother to fact check anything any more. That is why we have so much crap that anyone has some domain knowledge on the subject will immediately smells BS. And their PR tactics are.... dull or should I say predictable? Controlled Leaks ( I mean come on from the same press again? ) on the same subject or using same allies in testimony ( SnapChat again? )? Unfortunately most people dont do any analysis like this. ( Although I guess that is borderline forensic ).
- dev_tty01 5y ago
  I think Apple sees the writing on the wall in terms of governments soon forcing this kind of oversight into platforms. They have tried to create a system that will not create false positives and will still protect the 99.99999% of their users that simply want privacy. Its a messy business and fraught with downstream implications, but I think Apple is trying to avoid a future where end-to-end encryption of communications is made illegal by a tech-ignorant congress. I also think they are simply pissed off that their platforms are being used to shield these activities. Is being preemptive to avoid imposed regs that might be much worse for their users the right approach? I don't know. Based on the tech papers linked at the end of their announcement, they are trying hard to thread a needle here.
  - dm1011 5y ago
    either way there marketing is truly amazing if people are still willing to write something like this after PRISM
  - dcow 5y ago
    But, we've fought this type of bull crap entering via our government in the past. We rule ourselves we can literally say, "no, government, you can't do that". Why is it different now? Are people getting tired of the recurring battles? Is human trafficking on the rise?
    - dev_tty01 5y ago
      First, yes human trafficking is on the rise. It is a horrible blight affecting millions of people globally. Most people are not aware of how pervasive it is. Second, what is different today is that pervasive tech has made it possible for people to communicate over distance in a shielded way. Before modern tech, people had to physically stand next to each other to have a truly private conversation. That is new. I think that makes legislators feel that since tech has enabled this capability, tech should be enabling a way to "fix" the issue. The argument isn't completely without merit. Along with all the positive benefits of tech, there are of course some downsides. The question is what role should tech have in mitigating the downsides. This is an attempt by Apple to provide a mitigation. Time will tell if this attempt was a good idea. It could provide some benefit, but will the cost be too high?
- Kenji 5y ago
  Over the last few years I have moved my entire digital life to local disks and GNU/Linux machines. Best decision of my life. I sleep well knowing that I own my data because I own the disks it resides on, and I own the computers they store it, and the entire stack from top to bottom, including software, is tailored to my and only my needs. The machine serves me.
- wutbrodo 5y ago
  Apple has long set itself in opposition to user control and autonomy. That approach runs bone-deep in their DNA; it's practically their brand! To me, that DNA makes a move like this entirely unsurprising. To be clear, this isn't exclusively a bad thing: a paternalistic, limiting approach to one's userbase allows for everything from better hardware/software integration to lower risk of malware to Steve Jobs' famous "freedom from porn". By contrast, their privacy messaging runs much more shallow, and those who uncritically swallowed it always struck me as rather naive. Apple's ostensible pro-privacy stance has nothing to do with their ethos as a company, but was just convenient positioning relative to Google given their respective lines of business. It's fair game to highlight this advantage, but it's a lot like Facebook saying they "prioritize" avoiding abusive manufacturing practices more than Apple...while technically true, it's a function of their market position, and is not very useful for understanding the org's future behavior.
  - schoen 5y ago
    This phenomenon that you mention in your second paragraph was described in 2013 as a "strategy credit": https://stratechery.com/2013/strategy-credit/ https://stratechery.com/2013/strategy-credit/ Maybe kind of akin to the concept of "moral luck": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_luck https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_luck
  - taneq 5y ago
    For years I've found it interesting that Apple's privacy stance hasn't really shifted much over the past decade (other than their messaging in their advertising etc.) but Google's stance has changed so dramatically that by comparison, Apple's gone from invasive and overbearing to respectful and privacy-valuing.
- enriquto 5y ago
  > a deep belief that Apple In the context of software, beliefs are meaningless, religious issues. You do not need trust when you can have proof (i.e. source code that you can compile and modify yourself).
- arthur_sav 5y ago
  As long as the US government is pushing laws that makes it easier to spy on people, it's not going to get any better. The only hope is for other countries to (legally) force global companies to abide by local laws, just like EU did with GDPR. So user experience will vary by country of residence.
- vineyardmike 5y ago
  I did the same. It's not just concerning that this occurred, but that we effectively got no warning about it at all that this would be starting! Its already running now.
- nanidin 5y ago
  I imagine this is the result of some sort of negotiation with the US government. US government wants backdoors, Apple doesn't want to provide them. Apple also wants to store pictures on iCloud encrypted, without encryption backdoors. The compromise to protect the rest of encrypted things on iCloud was to implement this client side scanning before upload to iCloud to ensure iCloud does not contain any illegal material without exposing backdoors directly to the US government. In light of that, I then imagine that other providers are already storing photos and data unencrypted and did not object to adding scanning on the server side, and also did not share anything about the scanning with the public.
  - distances 5y ago
    > In light of that, I then imagine that other providers are already storing photos and data unencrypted and did not object to adding scanning on the server side, and also did not share anything about the scanning with the public. It is well known that competitors scan on server side, I don't think that's any kind of a secret with Google Drive et al. Outrage is exactly about that -- client side scanning is seen as way more intrusive, for a good reason.
- ur-whale 5y ago
  Move your digital life to a system that you actually own. Baseline, it means no cloud.
- ezoe 5y ago
  For all these years, Apple is trying so hard to prevent you from modifying the physical computer you own from you, the owner. You are so delusional.
  - dane-pgp 5y ago
    Your final sentence detracts from the otherwise reasonable point you are making.
- crossroadsguy 5y ago
  It was a belief or hope? Because seeing they’re a closed source, closed ecosystem, closed to feedback and criticism behemoth I was wondering how can one even hope that.
- anonuser123456 5y ago
  Such a Faustian bargain; giving up the ability to store child porn in the cloud for reliable backups and seamless access across devices... I can't believe people put up with this!
  - BobbyJo 5y ago
    And giving up the ability to carry a gun in exchange for safe streets for everyone! Lunacy! /s If it would 100% eliminate child pornography and not produce a residual erosion of personal privacy no one would be arguing against it. It won't solve the problem. It will erode privacy. It's perfectly reasonable to be not ok with it.
    - jpmoral 5y ago
      Why does the elimination have to be 100% and the privacy erosion be 0 for it to be worthwhile? To be clear I'm not saying that Apple are right to do this or that there aren't privacy concerns. What I am saying is that those thresholds seem unreasonable.
      - BobbyJo 5y ago
        Because that's the only way an individual's value system wouldn't come into play. If it's anything less than completely fixed and anything more than no erosion of privacy, then it just depends on how important privacy is to the person. I personally think privacy is super important, and it would take massive changes in how society and our government work before I was willing to give it up for just about anything.
    - anonuser123456 5y ago
      What information leaks from the system? That a user isn't storing child porn on Apple servers? That's literally the only information emitted by the system _unless_ you have actual child porn on your system.
      - BobbyJo 5y ago
- KingOfCoders 5y ago
  "privacy for the long-term." Apple cares about your privacy as long as it helps their marketing position against Amazon, Google and Facebook. If they decide for a different marketing, you will lose all your privacy. If their bottom line dips they will sell your data in a heartbeat. The EFF cares about your privacy.
- herbst 5y ago
  You moved your entire digital life to a walled garden because of some believe? I hope you see the deeper issue here.
- systemsignal 5y ago
  Check out what it’s actually doing “ Messages uses on-device machine learning to analyze image attachments and determine if a photo is sexually explicit. The feature is designed so that Apple does not get access to the messages.” https://www.apple.com/child-safety/ https://www.apple.com/child-safety/ It’s all on-device which satisfies E2E I believe
  - ric2b 5y ago
    It doesn't satisfy E2E, it works around it.
AlexandrB 5y ago
A statement like this is meaningless. Changing business, regulatory, and social pressures can cause WhatsApp to change direction tomorrow. Remember how at one time Mark Zuckerberg promised that Instagram and WhatsApp data would remain separate from Facebook[1]? [1] https://mashable.com/article/mark-zuckerberg-instagram-whatsapp-independence https://mashable.com/article/mark-zuckerberg-instagram-whats...
- amadeuspagel 5y ago
  > Changing business, regulatory, and social pressures can cause WhatsApp to change direction tomorrow. Yeah, WhatsApp might decide to spy on you in the future, so you might as well use iMessage which already spies on you?
  - crackercrews 5y ago
    iMessage isn't spying on you. There are two aspects to the scanning. One is if you use iCloud. The other is if you send photos to a minor via iMessage. If you get flagged by the iCloud scanning, you could be reported to the authorities. But you can opt out of iCloud scanning by not using iCloud. If you get flagged by the iMessage system, you are not reported to the authorities. The parents of that person may receive a notification. But if you are sending photos to a kid on a device set up by their parents, you should pretty well expect that photos you send may be seen by their parents. I understand the privacy concerns raised by Apple's about-face here. But we should be clear about what is and isn't happening. WhatsApp comes off looking like a defender of privacy by saying "we won't do what Apple has done" but in reality the most objectionable thing Apple is doing relates to cloud-based photo storage, not messaging. The messaging piece is a new type of parental controls and does not involve the authorities in any event.
    - wutbrodo 5y ago
      > you can opt out of iCloud scanning by not using iCloud. You can opt out of any privacy concerns by not using the concerning product. That's a complete non sequitur in a conversation about the concern.
recursivedoubts 5y ago
Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: Richard Stallman was right again.
- fsflover 5y ago
  Yes: https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/apple https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/apple https://stallman.org/apple.html https://stallman.org/apple.html
  - rvz 5y ago
    Absolutely. He will continue to be right until everyone wakes up and uses alternatives. Unfortunately the social inertia has caused people to stay because their friends are using it. Given that the most overused words in services operated by FAAMG companies are 'privacy', 'security' and 'trust' one should question: What sort of act or event will it take to get their complete attention in plain layman terms that it is so severe for the majority of users, that they now realise it irreparably violates all three of those words? It would have to be far worse than the whole PRISM programme and this put together and motivate them to move to other alternatives. When that time comes, let's see who escapes before then.
    - amelius 5y ago
      > What sort of act or event will it take to get their complete attention in plain layman terms that it is so severe for the majority of users, that they now realise it irreparably violates all three of those words? I think first developers need to wake up. Then users will follow. However, for developers who make money in the Apple ecosystem this is harder. There's this quote: it's hard to understand something if your salary depends on you not understanding it.
  - vineyardmike 5y ago
    > Apple, not you, controls what you can install on mobile devices Apple corporate headquarters keeps a tight lock on the apps available for its mobile operating system (iOS), which is used on the iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. Software developers even have to pay a tax to Apple to publish their work in the App Store. With the vice-like grip they have on Macs now thanks to Apple Silicon, new Mac computers now forbid you from installing free software applications or operating systems, due to improper use of code signing. > Apple also prevents you from changing the operating system on the devices, so there's no way to escape the restrictions. If you try to change the software on your device, Apple's lawyers claim you are a criminal under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). They've done this as recently as December 2019, when they used the DMCA to remove a post to Twitter that revealed an iPhone encryption key.
shawnz 5y ago
WhatsApp is quickly earning back my trust as the most privacy-respecting chat system for laypeople right now. Obviously, actions matter more than words, but the actions they have been taking as of late are promising. I certainly won't be putting all my eggs in one basket after being burned this many times, but for now I am happy to recommend WhatsApp. See also the recent news about them rolling out encrypted backups, which essentially would solve the biggest weak point with WhatsApp right now: https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/16/22580800/icloud-google-drive-encrypted-whatsapp-cloud-backup https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/16/22580800/icloud-google-dr...
- peakaboo 5y ago
  You know WhatsApp is Facebook right? I don't think there is a worse company to trust except maybe Google. :)
  - shawnz 5y ago
    Didn't Apple just show us how brand names are basically meaningless? I am only concerned with their actions, not their owners.
    - ranguna 5y ago
      WhatsApp's action are pretty bad, did you forget that terms of service change a few months ago? They literally said that WhatsApp will start to share metadata, including your availability, status and the people you talk with, with Facebook companies. Who are you trying to convince? Did Facebook pay you to say this or something?
      - shawnz 5y ago
        I remember the terms of service change and I almost left the platform because of it. But you are also greatly mischaracterizing the change. It actually only allows those things in some pretty specific circumstances which are under the user's control (although that's still not ideal, of course). I am only trying to convince WhatsApp that the stance they are taking here is the right one. Unless we give credit where it's actually due, what will be the incentive for any bigcorp to take any privacy-protecting actions?
esotericimpl 5y ago
I don't think facebook has earned the benefit of the doubt in any way, shape or form. One would assume facebook already does all these things across, FB, Messenger and Whatsapp, its just amusing that anyone would believe anything out of the whatsapp team.
asadlionpk 5y ago
...for now
d--b 5y ago
We’re in a middle of a false privacy marketing schoolyard battle. This is pathetic
yalogin 5y ago
> Apple has long needed to do something about CSAM This statement gives away the true motive behind those tweets. They just wanted to get back at Apple. They could have at least left that tweet out.
- vineyardmike 5y ago
  I think this is actually a hedging by the author. If someone public is criticizing a CSAM system, they have to admit CSAM is a problem to avoid being considered a sympathizer and damage their rep.
  - Cycl0ps 5y ago
    Then we need to damage the rep of the people spouting blatant McCarthyisms. If their retort to serious security concerns is to call someone a pedophile, they aren't worth giving a platform to.
stefan_ 5y ago
"We will never share data with WhatsApp, we put it into the contract" That's the problem with all E2E. The cryptography is sound, but we can't trust any of the software to not change from under us.
throwawayboise 5y ago
"I don’t think you’ll ever see a mandating of vaccine" Anthony Fauci, 18-AUG-2020
bangonkeyboard 5y ago
"You will not need a Facebook account to use or develop for the [Oculus] Rift. I promise." — Palmer Luckey, 2014 (https://time.com/38366/here-are-7-promises-oculus-has-made-after-getting-bought-by-facebook/ https://time.com/38366/here-are-7-promises-oculus-has-made-a...)
- enumjorge 5y ago
  “Person who is about to become very wealthy promises that no one needs to feel wary about the event that will make them wealthy”.
  - bangonkeyboard 5y ago
    Yes. And?
    - slapfrog 5y ago
      Take it as a lesson in critical thinking and trust. I presume this is a lesson you already learned long ago, but clearly it's a lesson some people haven't learned yet, because a lot of people seem to have believed him.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- hncurious 5y ago
  That's what he was told during the acquisition and he believed it. Many entrepreneurs learn that lesson the hard way.
  - hellcow 5y ago
    Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Facebook has made promises, then broken those promises, time and again. They've lied to founders they've acquired, to users, and to governments and regulators. If anyone trusts Facebook at this point knowing that, I'm not sure what could convince them otherwise.
stereoradonc 5y ago
The pot calling the kettle black.
blibble 5y ago
now governments have realised they can run code locally on the phone... how do they expect to stop them legislating to do that?
- placatedmayhem 5y ago
  This is the biggest issue, IMO. As I understand it, with governments, particularly the US, wanting Apple to get data off an Apple device, they couldn't because forcing Apple to write software to do this would be coerced speech, which is forbidden by the US court's interpretation of 1st amendment of the US constitution. (Obviously, this doesn't address breaking into the device, which the US did in the San Bernadino shooter case, which is more akin to law enforcement breaking into a safe or house with a warrant.) By implementing data harvesters, Apple's 1st amendment protections goes away, since the code is already written. What must be changed, by court order or what have you, is the configuration for what gets reported back. Again, IMO, it becomes much more like a "give us your files" subpoena, like Apple, Google, etc. get on a regular basis and must comply with. But IANAL.
  - schoen 5y ago
    EFF (where I was working at the time) promoted Apple's first amendment argument in the San Bernadino case, which is a genuine argument in Apple's favor but not one that a court ended up deciding on in that case. There are also other arguments in Apple's favor there. In general, it hasn't been very clear what the courts will or won't allow law enforcement or spy agencies to commandeer tech companies into doing. As we saw with several other countries' legislation in this area, it's also something that typically comes with strict gag orders and so we don't really even know much about what governments have tried. I guess my main points would be: * when these issues actually end up in court, it's not yet clear whether the first amendment issue about software will or won't be the most important legal issue, and * especially in Australia and the UK, but very possibly also in other jurisdictions, there may already be tech companies that have lost secret fights over related issues and been forced to do things that users (or even most workers in those companies) haven't been told about, and * if you don't like governments being able to backdoor stuff, maybe try to promote technology architectures where it's harder to hide features and functionality! That last point reminds me how there's a kind of complicated side argument about how Apple's proprietary technology and paternalistic control most often make it harder for governments to spy on users, because there are comparatively fewer people to suborn or coerce in order to backdoor things, and it's harder to run code on the device that Apple doesn't approve of, and the company is very sensitive to public perception (maybe not this week!?), and has a big legal team to fight back against things. But when Apple does cooperate to increase governments' power in various ways -- e.g. banning specific apps from its app store, like it did with VPN and other anticensorship apps in China, among other cases, or doing this new scanning stuff -- it's also harder for users to override those decisions. (I'm definitely not speaking for EFF here -- I stopped working there a year ago this week.)
kbd 5y ago
https://twitter.com/pwnallthethings/status/1423752675049492481 https://twitter.com/pwnallthethings/status/14237526750494924...
- gr__or 5y ago
  I was about to post this. I am surprised most publications give FB/WhatsApp the moral highground, given what this tweet suggests. Is there an angle I am missing?
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
avalys 5y ago
Article in the NYT tomorrow: “Facebook continues to profit from allowing child predators to distribute pornography through WhatsApp, refuses to adopt industry-standard technology to block this”
- cblconfederate 5y ago
  Hide your children: predators are coming to whatsapp
- nyx-aiur 5y ago
  Facebook and it's subsidiaries use PhotoDNA since 2012.
05 5y ago
They don't need to. Apple will just scan app memory for wrongthink for them.
imglorp 5y ago
Unfortunately any time a National Security Letter comes along, whatever it asks for will get implemented and the company will be unable to communicate anything for the gag period. It may already have happened.
- hellcow 5y ago
  May have happened? Given what we've learned about the NSA over the years, the news that's leaked is consistently _worse_ than expected, not better. Pessimism is warranted. This policy provides cover for the NSA's PRISM partner Apple to search and exfiltrate data on devices en masse. Apple and the NSA no longer have to do this in a targeted way to remain undetected. It's now done to everyone. Obviously this is a huge problem for privacy. If Apple doesn't reverse course despite all this backlash, it's reasonable to assume the alternative for Apple must be worse. There must be an explanation for their behavior. Apple's decision makes sense if the NSA were already doing this on devices with Apple's cooperation, and Apple feared the scope of the operation would be discovered. Then making it public "to catch child predators" seems like far less damage to their brand than appearing to buddy up with the feds. I can't think of another reason which justifies Apple stomping on their own privacy narrative.
dmitrygr 5y ago
When Facebook out-privacies you, it may be time to give up...
deleted 5y ago
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neilv 5y ago
Apple let Facebook (WhatsApp) grab the high ground on privacy?! That's funny, in a boggling at a blunder of the powerful kind of way. It's also sad, if we're reduced to watching a handful of organizations battle over who's the most privacy-respecting, relatively speaking, when their standards are so low.
- rudian 5y ago
  Everything you do on Facebook is hosted on Facebook’s server. You can assume that it's already happening there via PhotoDNA.
villgax 5y ago
I guess it's back to SMS then
cblconfederate 5y ago
Phone software should be considered under constant surveillance by design , given their relatively blackbox design, and i think this is not a surprise to most of their users. It's more concerning that this is now coming to the desktop. How can we make sure that windows updates or virus definitions are what they say they are ?
YokoSix 5y ago
Now even WhatsApp is more privacy oriented than Apple? It's really surprising how one day can change everything.
rudian 5y ago
> The answer is not right now. Fixed it for you. Every answer is temporary. Apple also said they wouldn't install backdoors and here we are.
Beldin 5y ago
https://mobile.twitter.com/floorter/status/1423707725989654531 https://mobile.twitter.com/floorter/status/14237077259896545... "It's a bit awkward to see a Facebook representative dunking on Apple about privacy. But in the end it doesn't really matter if WhatsApp implements this if the underlying OS does."
hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
Oh the irony, Facebook is now more privacy oriented than Apple... (Except that it's not, since they have been scanning Messenger photos for years.)
- 5faulker 5y ago
  The other day I was texting Messenger about a stove and then some stove ad showed up on Facebook Marketplace, so you can bet that they keep track of your other inputs as well.

298 points by amadeuspagel 5y ago

Apple is in dire need of some good ol antitrust enforcement

Over the last few years I have moved my entire Digital life to the Apple eco-system with a deep belief that Apple would care about "my" privacy for the long-term. And with this move to create a backdoor on the iPhone is making me very worried about relying on the Apple ecosystem.

leephillips 5y ago
I don’t want to be mean, but why would you entertain such a “deep belief” about a corporation? I’ve heard similar things from many Apple users. What leads people to have this kind of faith in particular corporations? It’s really alien to me.
- post_break 5y ago
  When you have two options it's pretty easy to have faith in the one that tries to drum up it's privacy first stance.
- bodo11 5y ago
  While also seeing deep belief in corporations sceptically myself, I don't think it should be the root cause of scepticism toward apple. The maximisation of proprietariness paired with this "deep belief" breads a really hard possibility to switch vendor (of whatever product), locking people in so much that the perceived cost of privacy-breaching software is lower than the cost of switching.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- dm1011 5y ago
  >What leads people to have this kind of faith in particular corporations? Marketing and groupthink makes them join and buyers remorse makes them stay
- blacktriangle 5y ago
  Cynically, I would say I also had a deep belief that Apple would respect user privacy because Apple and Google are in a fight over control over the internet and your whole life. Google goes at it by giving away free shit then making billions off your data, Apple goes at this by making billions off hardware and software. From that point of view respecting user privacy is Apple's most powerful weapon in their fight against Google since its a place that Google simply cannot go.
  - ncmncm 5y ago
    Generating the impression that they respect your privacy works exactly equally as well, and is much cheaper.
- danuker 5y ago
  My guess is the advertising worked. https://medium.com/seedx-digital-marketing-guru/why-apple-spends-1-8-billion-on-advertising-38d3940270bf https://medium.com/seedx-digital-marketing-guru/why-apple-sp...
- D13Fd 5y ago
  I wouldn't say I have a "deep belief" in Apple, but I trust Apple more than the other available options, because Apple's financial incentives are basically the opposite of Google or Facebook's. Instead of being motivated to use and/or sell user data, it's in Apple's best interest to keep that data secure and play to its competitive advantage as the company who is not trying to pry into its users' lives. That said, I really don't understand why Apple would do this, and it is very disconcerting. Obviously child pornography is absolutely horrible, but this move seems to throw out everyone's privacy in exchange for catching what I have to imagine is a tiny minority of users who are involved with that.
  - handrous 5y ago
    > I wouldn't say I have a "deep belief" in Apple, but I trust Apple more than the other available options That, for me too. From my perspective they basically don't have competition. The only viable alternative to Apple is "do everything yourself with open software, and just accept everything being buggier, jankier, and less helpful, while eating way more of your time". Obviously I'm not in love with that option, but what else? MS? Google? Ha. If Apple stops being Apple it'll be the elimination of a whole category of products and services, essentially. Just won't exist anymore. This is all less a product of Apple being wonderful than of user-facing computing everywhere else being an embarrassing shit-show.
- AshamedCaptain 5y ago
  I don't know how Apple has managed to get the image of a "privacy friendly" company while painting Google as "privacy unfriendly" at the same time. Apple is better than Google, but mostly because they can't gather as much data about you as Google does (this is not related to iOS vs Android; it's about how pervasive Google is on the WWW), and that's about all the practical differences between the two. And on iOS, Apple is also just one silent App Store update away from being able to exploit your data, not very different from Android. Even if I consider Google enemy #1 right now, I also don't really see them as privacy unfriendly. They have a shitton of data, but what have they exactly done with it that warrants the moniker? Microsoft seems to me to be much more privacy unfriendly (e.g., LinkedIn)
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - handrous 5y ago
    > Even if I consider Google enemy #1 right now, I also don't really see them as privacy unfriendly. They have a shitton of data, but what have they exactly done with it that warrants the moniker? Microsoft seems to me to be much more privacy unfriendly (e.g., LinkedIn) Collecting and having that data to begin with is awful & dangerous. The behavior of collecting it is creepy and gross. The existence of the collected data is threatening.
    - AshamedCaptain 5y ago
      The reason I consider Google a public enemy is not because they collect data or have a poor privacy policy or whatever (because I don't think they are particularly bad at that). The reason is because I think they are "unavoidable". It's very hard to do anything online without it leaving a fingerprint on some Google server. Even governments seem to be ready to endorse Google services (e.g. recaptcha, Android) for fulfillment of basic services. Apple, Facebook, etc. may have (or not have) worse privacy policy, but it is much easier to avoid leaving fingerprints on their servers. Amazon & Microsoft are on the other hand particularly dangerous, though.
- tomjen3 5y ago
  Because privacy is an obvious goal that Apple can crediblebly target because of the nature of what they sell. Google is fundamentally an advertising agency, Amazon sells cheap stuff but steals your data in the process. Apple sells premium hardware and services, which means they have the margin to do things that neither google or amazon has. They also make money the old fashioned way: when you pay them. Therefore Apple could focus on privacy in a credible manor, because it didn't threaten their business model and it was an argument they could use, but their competition couldn't.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- wnscooke 5y ago
  It probably stems from the well-known history of the start of the company. Who knows who started Dell, McDs, any number of SSD manufacturers, Lenovo, BlackBerry, etc.? I guess we all know about Microsoft and Bill Gates, but their story trajectory went the other way (more corporate). So, I imagine people say that because something Steve Jobs or Ives said or was recorded as saying resonated with them, and thus they share that deep belief.
- ksec 5y ago
  >I’ve heard similar things from many Apple users. What leads people to have this kind of faith in particular corporations? It is all part of their PR and marketing. And they are very good at it. This happened in Tim Cook's era, not Steve Jobs. May be too good it backfired. If you pay close attention to all the Apple news, ( not some, but ALL ). Pick the top 10 Apple news site and read through it for a few years and it will surely get to most people. And Apple news are the most sort after, highest paid Ads revenue in tech sector. So it is sort of a feedback loop. Worth remembering there are relatively little journalist left, only reporters. No one bother to fact check anything any more. That is why we have so much crap that anyone has some domain knowledge on the subject will immediately smells BS. And their PR tactics are.... dull or should I say predictable? Controlled Leaks ( I mean come on from the same press again? ) on the same subject or using same allies in testimony ( SnapChat again? )? Unfortunately most people dont do any analysis like this. ( Although I guess that is borderline forensic ).
dev_tty01 5y ago
I think Apple sees the writing on the wall in terms of governments soon forcing this kind of oversight into platforms. They have tried to create a system that will not create false positives and will still protect the 99.99999% of their users that simply want privacy. Its a messy business and fraught with downstream implications, but I think Apple is trying to avoid a future where end-to-end encryption of communications is made illegal by a tech-ignorant congress. I also think they are simply pissed off that their platforms are being used to shield these activities. Is being preemptive to avoid imposed regs that might be much worse for their users the right approach? I don't know. Based on the tech papers linked at the end of their announcement, they are trying hard to thread a needle here.
- dm1011 5y ago
  either way there marketing is truly amazing if people are still willing to write something like this after PRISM
- dcow 5y ago
  But, we've fought this type of bull crap entering via our government in the past. We rule ourselves we can literally say, "no, government, you can't do that". Why is it different now? Are people getting tired of the recurring battles? Is human trafficking on the rise?
  - dev_tty01 5y ago
    First, yes human trafficking is on the rise. It is a horrible blight affecting millions of people globally. Most people are not aware of how pervasive it is. Second, what is different today is that pervasive tech has made it possible for people to communicate over distance in a shielded way. Before modern tech, people had to physically stand next to each other to have a truly private conversation. That is new. I think that makes legislators feel that since tech has enabled this capability, tech should be enabling a way to "fix" the issue. The argument isn't completely without merit. Along with all the positive benefits of tech, there are of course some downsides. The question is what role should tech have in mitigating the downsides. This is an attempt by Apple to provide a mitigation. Time will tell if this attempt was a good idea. It could provide some benefit, but will the cost be too high?
Kenji 5y ago
Over the last few years I have moved my entire digital life to local disks and GNU/Linux machines. Best decision of my life. I sleep well knowing that I own my data because I own the disks it resides on, and I own the computers they store it, and the entire stack from top to bottom, including software, is tailored to my and only my needs. The machine serves me.
wutbrodo 5y ago
Apple has long set itself in opposition to user control and autonomy. That approach runs bone-deep in their DNA; it's practically their brand! To me, that DNA makes a move like this entirely unsurprising. To be clear, this isn't exclusively a bad thing: a paternalistic, limiting approach to one's userbase allows for everything from better hardware/software integration to lower risk of malware to Steve Jobs' famous "freedom from porn". By contrast, their privacy messaging runs much more shallow, and those who uncritically swallowed it always struck me as rather naive. Apple's ostensible pro-privacy stance has nothing to do with their ethos as a company, but was just convenient positioning relative to Google given their respective lines of business. It's fair game to highlight this advantage, but it's a lot like Facebook saying they "prioritize" avoiding abusive manufacturing practices more than Apple...while technically true, it's a function of their market position, and is not very useful for understanding the org's future behavior.
- schoen 5y ago
  This phenomenon that you mention in your second paragraph was described in 2013 as a "strategy credit": https://stratechery.com/2013/strategy-credit/ https://stratechery.com/2013/strategy-credit/ Maybe kind of akin to the concept of "moral luck": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_luck https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_luck
- taneq 5y ago
  For years I've found it interesting that Apple's privacy stance hasn't really shifted much over the past decade (other than their messaging in their advertising etc.) but Google's stance has changed so dramatically that by comparison, Apple's gone from invasive and overbearing to respectful and privacy-valuing.
enriquto 5y ago
> a deep belief that Apple In the context of software, beliefs are meaningless, religious issues. You do not need trust when you can have proof (i.e. source code that you can compile and modify yourself).
arthur_sav 5y ago
As long as the US government is pushing laws that makes it easier to spy on people, it's not going to get any better. The only hope is for other countries to (legally) force global companies to abide by local laws, just like EU did with GDPR. So user experience will vary by country of residence.
vineyardmike 5y ago
I did the same. It's not just concerning that this occurred, but that we effectively got no warning about it at all that this would be starting! Its already running now.
nanidin 5y ago
I imagine this is the result of some sort of negotiation with the US government. US government wants backdoors, Apple doesn't want to provide them. Apple also wants to store pictures on iCloud encrypted, without encryption backdoors. The compromise to protect the rest of encrypted things on iCloud was to implement this client side scanning before upload to iCloud to ensure iCloud does not contain any illegal material without exposing backdoors directly to the US government. In light of that, I then imagine that other providers are already storing photos and data unencrypted and did not object to adding scanning on the server side, and also did not share anything about the scanning with the public.
- distances 5y ago
  > In light of that, I then imagine that other providers are already storing photos and data unencrypted and did not object to adding scanning on the server side, and also did not share anything about the scanning with the public. It is well known that competitors scan on server side, I don't think that's any kind of a secret with Google Drive et al. Outrage is exactly about that -- client side scanning is seen as way more intrusive, for a good reason.
ur-whale 5y ago
Move your digital life to a system that you actually own. Baseline, it means no cloud.
ezoe 5y ago
For all these years, Apple is trying so hard to prevent you from modifying the physical computer you own from you, the owner. You are so delusional.
- dane-pgp 5y ago
  Your final sentence detracts from the otherwise reasonable point you are making.
crossroadsguy 5y ago
It was a belief or hope? Because seeing they’re a closed source, closed ecosystem, closed to feedback and criticism behemoth I was wondering how can one even hope that.
anonuser123456 5y ago
Such a Faustian bargain; giving up the ability to store child porn in the cloud for reliable backups and seamless access across devices... I can't believe people put up with this!
- BobbyJo 5y ago
  And giving up the ability to carry a gun in exchange for safe streets for everyone! Lunacy! /s If it would 100% eliminate child pornography and not produce a residual erosion of personal privacy no one would be arguing against it. It won't solve the problem. It will erode privacy. It's perfectly reasonable to be not ok with it.
  - jpmoral 5y ago
    Why does the elimination have to be 100% and the privacy erosion be 0 for it to be worthwhile? To be clear I'm not saying that Apple are right to do this or that there aren't privacy concerns. What I am saying is that those thresholds seem unreasonable.
    - BobbyJo 5y ago
      Because that's the only way an individual's value system wouldn't come into play. If it's anything less than completely fixed and anything more than no erosion of privacy, then it just depends on how important privacy is to the person. I personally think privacy is super important, and it would take massive changes in how society and our government work before I was willing to give it up for just about anything.
  - anonuser123456 5y ago
    What information leaks from the system? That a user isn't storing child porn on Apple servers? That's literally the only information emitted by the system _unless_ you have actual child porn on your system.
    - BobbyJo 5y ago
KingOfCoders 5y ago
"privacy for the long-term." Apple cares about your privacy as long as it helps their marketing position against Amazon, Google and Facebook. If they decide for a different marketing, you will lose all your privacy. If their bottom line dips they will sell your data in a heartbeat. The EFF cares about your privacy.
herbst 5y ago
You moved your entire digital life to a walled garden because of some believe? I hope you see the deeper issue here.
systemsignal 5y ago
Check out what it’s actually doing “ Messages uses on-device machine learning to analyze image attachments and determine if a photo is sexually explicit. The feature is designed so that Apple does not get access to the messages.” https://www.apple.com/child-safety/ https://www.apple.com/child-safety/ It’s all on-device which satisfies E2E I believe
- ric2b 5y ago
  It doesn't satisfy E2E, it works around it.

AlexandrB 5y ago

A statement like this is meaningless. Changing business, regulatory, and social pressures can cause WhatsApp to change direction tomorrow. Remember how at one time Mark Zuckerberg promised that Instagram and WhatsApp data would remain separate from Facebook[1]? [1] https://mashable.com/article/mark-zuckerberg-instagram-whatsapp-independence https://mashable.com/article/mark-zuckerberg-instagram-whats...

amadeuspagel 5y ago
> Changing business, regulatory, and social pressures can cause WhatsApp to change direction tomorrow. Yeah, WhatsApp might decide to spy on you in the future, so you might as well use iMessage which already spies on you?
- crackercrews 5y ago
  iMessage isn't spying on you. There are two aspects to the scanning. One is if you use iCloud. The other is if you send photos to a minor via iMessage. If you get flagged by the iCloud scanning, you could be reported to the authorities. But you can opt out of iCloud scanning by not using iCloud. If you get flagged by the iMessage system, you are not reported to the authorities. The parents of that person may receive a notification. But if you are sending photos to a kid on a device set up by their parents, you should pretty well expect that photos you send may be seen by their parents. I understand the privacy concerns raised by Apple's about-face here. But we should be clear about what is and isn't happening. WhatsApp comes off looking like a defender of privacy by saying "we won't do what Apple has done" but in reality the most objectionable thing Apple is doing relates to cloud-based photo storage, not messaging. The messaging piece is a new type of parental controls and does not involve the authorities in any event.
  - wutbrodo 5y ago
    > you can opt out of iCloud scanning by not using iCloud. You can opt out of any privacy concerns by not using the concerning product. That's a complete non sequitur in a conversation about the concern.

recursivedoubts 5y ago

Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: Richard Stallman was right again.

fsflover 5y ago
Yes: https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/apple https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/apple https://stallman.org/apple.html https://stallman.org/apple.html
- rvz 5y ago
  Absolutely. He will continue to be right until everyone wakes up and uses alternatives. Unfortunately the social inertia has caused people to stay because their friends are using it. Given that the most overused words in services operated by FAAMG companies are 'privacy', 'security' and 'trust' one should question: What sort of act or event will it take to get their complete attention in plain layman terms that it is so severe for the majority of users, that they now realise it irreparably violates all three of those words? It would have to be far worse than the whole PRISM programme and this put together and motivate them to move to other alternatives. When that time comes, let's see who escapes before then.
  - amelius 5y ago
    > What sort of act or event will it take to get their complete attention in plain layman terms that it is so severe for the majority of users, that they now realise it irreparably violates all three of those words? I think first developers need to wake up. Then users will follow. However, for developers who make money in the Apple ecosystem this is harder. There's this quote: it's hard to understand something if your salary depends on you not understanding it.
- vineyardmike 5y ago
  > Apple, not you, controls what you can install on mobile devices Apple corporate headquarters keeps a tight lock on the apps available for its mobile operating system (iOS), which is used on the iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. Software developers even have to pay a tax to Apple to publish their work in the App Store. With the vice-like grip they have on Macs now thanks to Apple Silicon, new Mac computers now forbid you from installing free software applications or operating systems, due to improper use of code signing. > Apple also prevents you from changing the operating system on the devices, so there's no way to escape the restrictions. If you try to change the software on your device, Apple's lawyers claim you are a criminal under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). They've done this as recently as December 2019, when they used the DMCA to remove a post to Twitter that revealed an iPhone encryption key.

shawnz 5y ago

WhatsApp is quickly earning back my trust as the most privacy-respecting chat system for laypeople right now. Obviously, actions matter more than words, but the actions they have been taking as of late are promising. I certainly won't be putting all my eggs in one basket after being burned this many times, but for now I am happy to recommend WhatsApp. See also the recent news about them rolling out encrypted backups, which essentially would solve the biggest weak point with WhatsApp right now: https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/16/22580800/icloud-google-drive-encrypted-whatsapp-cloud-backup https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/16/22580800/icloud-google-dr...

peakaboo 5y ago
You know WhatsApp is Facebook right? I don't think there is a worse company to trust except maybe Google. :)
- shawnz 5y ago
  Didn't Apple just show us how brand names are basically meaningless? I am only concerned with their actions, not their owners.
  - ranguna 5y ago
    WhatsApp's action are pretty bad, did you forget that terms of service change a few months ago? They literally said that WhatsApp will start to share metadata, including your availability, status and the people you talk with, with Facebook companies. Who are you trying to convince? Did Facebook pay you to say this or something?
    - shawnz 5y ago
      I remember the terms of service change and I almost left the platform because of it. But you are also greatly mischaracterizing the change. It actually only allows those things in some pretty specific circumstances which are under the user's control (although that's still not ideal, of course). I am only trying to convince WhatsApp that the stance they are taking here is the right one. Unless we give credit where it's actually due, what will be the incentive for any bigcorp to take any privacy-protecting actions?

esotericimpl 5y ago

I don't think facebook has earned the benefit of the doubt in any way, shape or form. One would assume facebook already does all these things across, FB, Messenger and Whatsapp, its just amusing that anyone would believe anything out of the whatsapp team.

asadlionpk 5y ago

...for now

d--b 5y ago

We’re in a middle of a false privacy marketing schoolyard battle. This is pathetic

yalogin 5y ago

> Apple has long needed to do something about CSAM This statement gives away the true motive behind those tweets. They just wanted to get back at Apple. They could have at least left that tweet out.

vineyardmike 5y ago
I think this is actually a hedging by the author. If someone public is criticizing a CSAM system, they have to admit CSAM is a problem to avoid being considered a sympathizer and damage their rep.
- Cycl0ps 5y ago
  Then we need to damage the rep of the people spouting blatant McCarthyisms. If their retort to serious security concerns is to call someone a pedophile, they aren't worth giving a platform to.

stefan_ 5y ago

"We will never share data with WhatsApp, we put it into the contract" That's the problem with all E2E. The cryptography is sound, but we can't trust any of the software to not change from under us.

throwawayboise 5y ago

"I don’t think you’ll ever see a mandating of vaccine" Anthony Fauci, 18-AUG-2020

bangonkeyboard 5y ago

"You will not need a Facebook account to use or develop for the [Oculus] Rift. I promise." — Palmer Luckey, 2014 (https://time.com/38366/here-are-7-promises-oculus-has-made-after-getting-bought-by-facebook/ https://time.com/38366/here-are-7-promises-oculus-has-made-a...)

enumjorge 5y ago
“Person who is about to become very wealthy promises that no one needs to feel wary about the event that will make them wealthy”.
- bangonkeyboard 5y ago
  Yes. And?
  - slapfrog 5y ago
    Take it as a lesson in critical thinking and trust. I presume this is a lesson you already learned long ago, but clearly it's a lesson some people haven't learned yet, because a lot of people seem to have believed him.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
hncurious 5y ago
That's what he was told during the acquisition and he believed it. Many entrepreneurs learn that lesson the hard way.
- hellcow 5y ago
  Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Facebook has made promises, then broken those promises, time and again. They've lied to founders they've acquired, to users, and to governments and regulators. If anyone trusts Facebook at this point knowing that, I'm not sure what could convince them otherwise.

stereoradonc 5y ago

The pot calling the kettle black.

blibble 5y ago

now governments have realised they can run code locally on the phone... how do they expect to stop them legislating to do that?

placatedmayhem 5y ago
This is the biggest issue, IMO. As I understand it, with governments, particularly the US, wanting Apple to get data off an Apple device, they couldn't because forcing Apple to write software to do this would be coerced speech, which is forbidden by the US court's interpretation of 1st amendment of the US constitution. (Obviously, this doesn't address breaking into the device, which the US did in the San Bernadino shooter case, which is more akin to law enforcement breaking into a safe or house with a warrant.) By implementing data harvesters, Apple's 1st amendment protections goes away, since the code is already written. What must be changed, by court order or what have you, is the configuration for what gets reported back. Again, IMO, it becomes much more like a "give us your files" subpoena, like Apple, Google, etc. get on a regular basis and must comply with. But IANAL.
- schoen 5y ago
  EFF (where I was working at the time) promoted Apple's first amendment argument in the San Bernadino case, which is a genuine argument in Apple's favor but not one that a court ended up deciding on in that case. There are also other arguments in Apple's favor there. In general, it hasn't been very clear what the courts will or won't allow law enforcement or spy agencies to commandeer tech companies into doing. As we saw with several other countries' legislation in this area, it's also something that typically comes with strict gag orders and so we don't really even know much about what governments have tried. I guess my main points would be: * when these issues actually end up in court, it's not yet clear whether the first amendment issue about software will or won't be the most important legal issue, and * especially in Australia and the UK, but very possibly also in other jurisdictions, there may already be tech companies that have lost secret fights over related issues and been forced to do things that users (or even most workers in those companies) haven't been told about, and * if you don't like governments being able to backdoor stuff, maybe try to promote technology architectures where it's harder to hide features and functionality! That last point reminds me how there's a kind of complicated side argument about how Apple's proprietary technology and paternalistic control most often make it harder for governments to spy on users, because there are comparatively fewer people to suborn or coerce in order to backdoor things, and it's harder to run code on the device that Apple doesn't approve of, and the company is very sensitive to public perception (maybe not this week!?), and has a big legal team to fight back against things. But when Apple does cooperate to increase governments' power in various ways -- e.g. banning specific apps from its app store, like it did with VPN and other anticensorship apps in China, among other cases, or doing this new scanning stuff -- it's also harder for users to override those decisions. (I'm definitely not speaking for EFF here -- I stopped working there a year ago this week.)

kbd 5y ago

https://twitter.com/pwnallthethings/status/1423752675049492481 https://twitter.com/pwnallthethings/status/14237526750494924...

gr__or 5y ago
I was about to post this. I am surprised most publications give FB/WhatsApp the moral highground, given what this tweet suggests. Is there an angle I am missing?

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

avalys 5y ago

Article in the NYT tomorrow: “Facebook continues to profit from allowing child predators to distribute pornography through WhatsApp, refuses to adopt industry-standard technology to block this”

cblconfederate 5y ago
Hide your children: predators are coming to whatsapp
nyx-aiur 5y ago
Facebook and it's subsidiaries use PhotoDNA since 2012.

05 5y ago

They don't need to. Apple will just scan app memory for wrongthink for them.

imglorp 5y ago

Unfortunately any time a National Security Letter comes along, whatever it asks for will get implemented and the company will be unable to communicate anything for the gag period. It may already have happened.

hellcow 5y ago
May have happened? Given what we've learned about the NSA over the years, the news that's leaked is consistently _worse_ than expected, not better. Pessimism is warranted. This policy provides cover for the NSA's PRISM partner Apple to search and exfiltrate data on devices en masse. Apple and the NSA no longer have to do this in a targeted way to remain undetected. It's now done to everyone. Obviously this is a huge problem for privacy. If Apple doesn't reverse course despite all this backlash, it's reasonable to assume the alternative for Apple must be worse. There must be an explanation for their behavior. Apple's decision makes sense if the NSA were already doing this on devices with Apple's cooperation, and Apple feared the scope of the operation would be discovered. Then making it public "to catch child predators" seems like far less damage to their brand than appearing to buddy up with the feds. I can't think of another reason which justifies Apple stomping on their own privacy narrative.

dmitrygr 5y ago

When Facebook out-privacies you, it may be time to give up...

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

neilv 5y ago

Apple let Facebook (WhatsApp) grab the high ground on privacy?! That's funny, in a boggling at a blunder of the powerful kind of way. It's also sad, if we're reduced to watching a handful of organizations battle over who's the most privacy-respecting, relatively speaking, when their standards are so low.

rudian 5y ago
Everything you do on Facebook is hosted on Facebook’s server. You can assume that it's already happening there via PhotoDNA.

villgax 5y ago

I guess it's back to SMS then

cblconfederate 5y ago

Phone software should be considered under constant surveillance by design , given their relatively blackbox design, and i think this is not a surprise to most of their users. It's more concerning that this is now coming to the desktop. How can we make sure that windows updates or virus definitions are what they say they are ?

YokoSix 5y ago

Now even WhatsApp is more privacy oriented than Apple? It's really surprising how one day can change everything.

rudian 5y ago

> The answer is not right now. Fixed it for you. Every answer is temporary. Apple also said they wouldn't install backdoors and here we are.

Beldin 5y ago

https://mobile.twitter.com/floorter/status/1423707725989654531 https://mobile.twitter.com/floorter/status/14237077259896545... "It's a bit awkward to see a Facebook representative dunking on Apple about privacy. But in the end it doesn't really matter if WhatsApp implements this if the underlying OS does."

hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago

Oh the irony, Facebook is now more privacy oriented than Apple... (Except that it's not, since they have been scanning Messenger photos for years.)

5faulker 5y ago
The other day I was texting Messenger about a stove and then some stove ad showed up on Facebook Marketplace, so you can bet that they keep track of your other inputs as well.