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An Apple recruiter recently reached out to me. I am in a fortunate position to turn down opportunities, so I made sure to explain that I am not interested in wo
by daenz 5y ago
An Apple recruiter recently reached out to me. I am in a fortunate position to turn down opportunities, so I made sure to explain that I am not interested in working for a company that is at the forefront of enabling further infringement on people's privacy. If you are able to push back, do it in any small way that you can.
- 88840-8855 5y agoI don't want to be that guy, but for this job there were lining up 300 more people. Nobody except of a tiny group of nerdy guys (including myself, ofc) is against this apple csam move. Just ask your parents or your non-tech friends if it's "ok" to scan people's phones to find those "bad pedophiles" in order to jail then up for the rest of their life. You will be surprised how much support Apple's initiative has in the broad public. And that's why apple made this move. They don't really care for the 3% of people who we belong to. They do it because they know they will have the public and political support.
- enw 5y agoEveryone I asked understood the potential for misuse it introduces.
- 2pEXgD0fZ5cF 5y ago> Nobody except of a tiny group of nerdy guys I think you oversimplify this by a lot. No, Apple reputation won't be severely damaged by this move immediately. But I do believe that those "nerdy guys" did a lot to push the Apple brand, and a big part of that push was due to security and privacy. Until recently Apple was always the "privacy brand" and it was hard to argue against it without going the full FSF route of argumentation. This is no longer the case and I'm sure this will deal some damage over time, even if it only starts with the "screeching voices" of the (nerdy) minority. Maybe not directly to their revenue, but certainly to their reputation. Nothing wrong with shaving off a bit of the prestige of working at Apple ;) > I don't want to be that guy, but for this job there were lining up 300 more people. This is the case for many jobs that don't come close to the holy "working at Apple".
- gefhfff 5y agoNo nerdy guy pushes apple for security and privacy. It is all closed source with data leaking by default - partially not possible to turn off. They rather push devices like librem 5, Pine phone, Fairphone with /e/os, but not Apple...
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- xvector 5y agoYou can't seriously be recommending a Librem 5 for mom and grandpa? That's absurd. The thing barely functions. As the parent commenter noted, Apple was really one of the only reasonable recommendations from privacy-oriented nerdy guys to their friends and family, if they didn't want to go the out-of-touch-with-reality route by recommending the phones you listed.
- alexvoda 5y agoAs I mentioned elsewhere in this discussion, when talking about privacy and security you need to talk about threat models. Privacy-oriented is not a single direction. Those recommending iPhones to parrents have a different threat model than those choosing FLOSS devices.
- oarsinsync 5y ago> But I do believe that those "nerdy guys" did a lot to push the Apple brand We sure did. We're also ignoring all the celebrities that helped to push the Apple brand (remember the iPod and it's terrible but iconic white headphones?). Popular culture has a much stronger influence on Apple's standing with non-nerds, than nerds do. We like to think we're important, and that people value our opinions, but increasingly that's not true. as the differences between the options diminish to 'probably bad for the world long term' (big tech) and 'probably bad for you today' (open source / pinephone / etc, they're just not usable enough yet), the value of our opinions drops, because there's no real choice between bad or badder.
- skinkestek 5y ago> Just ask your parents or your non-tech friends if it's "ok" to scan people's phones to find those "bad pedophiles" in order to jail then up for the rest of their life. You will be surprised how much support Apple's initiative has in the broad public. My Dad is an old teacher today and was formerly a farmer. My view is he clearly understands these issues and has done since I was a teenager sometime in the last millenium when I followed him around the farm and we talked about stuff. Maybe your parents are like what you describe but don't underestimate other peoples parents. They might not agree immediately, but if one is careful many actually aren't unreasonable. Also everyone: stop this defeatist attitude. Instead of asking leading questions, talk about it calmly and politely. Just explain that once this system is in place it will be used for anything, not just photos (or otherwise bad guys could just zip the files). And when everything is scanned some people will add terrorist material (i.e. history and chemistry books), other will add extremist material (religious writings), blasphemous material (Christian or Atheist teachings in Saudi Arabia), and other illegal content (Winnie the Pooh, man against tank etc in China). In the paragraph above there should be something to make everyone from Ateheists through Christians, Muslims, nerds, art lovers and Winnie the Pooh fans see why this is a bad idea.
- wruza 5y agosome people will add terrorist material (i.e. history and chemistry books), other will add extremist material (religious writings), blasphemous material (Christian or Atheist teachings in Saudi Arabia), and other illegal content Apple doesn’t seem to do that covertly, what is wrong with blaming them when they actually do above things? This is a genuine question, because rn I see no issue with automated searching CP through their my iphone. In theory, Apple could silently push above updates without any prior practice. Then why this issue became an issue only now?
- madaxe_again 5y agoYou know how in history, occasionally the good old king would die and his crazy nephew would take over and burn all the peasants? This was possible because the king had absolute power. Now, you might argue that this absolute power in this case is being used for good - but given the brush the US just had with accidental Nero, it’s worth being wary of how tools and powers might not only be used by current powers, but by future ones too.
- xunn0026 5y agoLuckily Apple is trying to hire nerdy guys. Though, they try very hard to expand their hiring reach to other groups which might also be less displeased about such moves. Remember Apple was convicted of colluding to keep programmer salaries low just as the mobile revolution was started. I think the impact of what they did on the world is undercounted (though, it was visible in the market capitalisation they reached in time).
- atoav 5y ago> I don't want to be that guy, but for this job there were lining up 300 more people. All of which could decide to stand up for individual rights, but won't with similar excuses to the one you formulated. I know in US culture some see it as a strength to be selfish, but yet they complain about the society and the politics this kind of mentality necessarily lead to. If all the others are selfish, why should I be the sucker who pays for having principles? Because suckers with principles shape a society until they don't.
- raxxorrax 5y agoI don't think this is true. If you tell people they scan your stuff if you upload it to the cloud, a lot of people ask for alternatives. I tell them that they can have a reasonable backup and network storage for a small amount of money and I believe their data is much safer on there.
- erhk 5y agoWe are a part of the public and we can influence politicians. Spread the word.
- hughrr 5y agoIf you think that you’re completely wrong. I have been asked about it by four non technical people so far after it made national news in the UK. There is a lot of anti surveillance sentiment here and it’s appearing in general public regularly. I regularly go out with groups of random people on Meetup with no shared technical interest as well and I’m surprised at how much anti tracking and surveillance sentiment there is. It got to the point that out of 25 people on a trip out no one used NHS track and trace because they don’t trust it or don’t own a smartphone. This is across the 20-50 age group.
- FridayoLeary 5y ago>no one used NHS track and trace Why would they? so they can get to stay quarantined for 2 weeks?
- npteljes 5y agoI agree with you, the general public doesn't give a shit. There will be headlines for a few times, some people change their phones, and that'll be it. The biggest of these movements, I think, is the "de-googling" one. There's a myriad of articles, subreddits, guides, websites even, listing alternatives. And look what happened to Google. Nothing. When the alternative to apple's surveillance is to smash the phone against a wall, and buy something that's much less convenient, suddenly surveillance is not that big of a problem. And this is very important to note because many world's powerful entities are moving in this direction.
- idunnoman 5y agoBut it doesn't happen over night. The cracks are forming though. Duckduckgo.com is now at 93,533,476 searches daily. My non-technical brother just purchased a 3 year Fastmail account and switched from Chrome to Firefox. For added effect, he bought a subscription to Bitwarden. I didn't push him to do any of this, I just told him what I'm using. His wife refused to put an internet enabled webcam in their new babies room, citing security concerns. It's happening. But Rome wasn't built in a day.
- ChrisRR 5y agoAnd so what? People are well within their rights not to work for companies they find unethical. Yes, it won't make a dent in Apple's finances, but at least that person can sleep better not supporting a company they find immoral
- lovelyviking 5y ago>Nobody except of a tiny group ... were against hitler, ussr (inside ussr), unlimited king's powers, religion fanaticism, witch hunting, etc ... in the beginning today it's surveillance and attempts to legalize such abuses by Apple using some BS cover story intended to create emotional response and this way to fog the real issue: Spyware Engine installation/legalization
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- trangus_1985 5y ago> but for this job there were lining up 300 more people let them take it then. I try to minimize the blood on my hands. >Just ask your parents or your non-tech friends My parents were unhappy with it - they're non technical and not particularly concerned with privacy. I don't think they'll switch but they did ask how to mitigate it. I'm currently scrambling for a (friendly) alternative to icloud photos. > They don't really care for the 3% of people who we belong to Welcome to cyberpunk dystopia! Grab a devterm by clockwork (no affiliation), and log in, cowboy.
- type0 5y ago> You will be surprised how much support Apple's initiative has in the broad public. I wouldn't be, but that's not the issue, the broad public is gullible, the overwhelming majority probably still believe that Iraq had WMDs before invasion.
- swiley 5y agoI visited my parent's church earlier this year and they're all freaking out. The general consensus is that everyone should stop using smartphones.
- deepstack 5y agoAs a long time Apple user and developer (since black and white Apple II), I have witness the rise/fall/rise again/and now fall again of Apple. The future computer I WILL be Linux/FreeBSD for all important stuff.
- DaveSapien 5y agoWell done, I'm with you. I've being doing similar in the games industry for years. If we, the actual makers stand against immoral action it will both build pressure and incentive for alternative ways of doing business.
- threatofrain 5y agoIn many ways Apple is also the world leader on consumer privacy, pushing for changes when the rest of the industry is walking in the opposite direction. Paying with Apple Pay makes you safer because it gives out minimal payment information; the Target fiasco would've been avoided. Sign in with Apple allows users to provide minimal information in signing up for accounts; the idea that casual users should know how to setup email aliases is a joke. Apple private relay is the closest to getting grandma to use TOR. Apple is working on stopping pixel tracking in email. Apple is also leading on the story of user permissions, which is a broken model where you blame users for accepting all the snooping in their lives, for not reading the TOS, and for their failure to negotiate against Walmart.
- paulcarroty 5y ago> is also the world leader on consumer privacy is also an early PRISM adopter and well known on cooperation with totalitarian regimes. Censoring Belarus protesters happened several months ago.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- xvector 5y agoApple also dropped the idea of E2EE iCloud backups at the FBI's behest. They've also handed over iCloud in China to GCBD creating an incredible apparatus for the surveillance state. And now we are supposed to believe they can resist adding a hash to a list if the government asks? Are they serious?
- natch 5y agoThey never said they will resist adding a hash. They just implied it with weasel words. They also said they will accept hashes from “other child protection organizations.” Which clearly means each country can define, with its own horrendous laws, what they think children need to be protected from… content showing children being put in unislamic situations (Saudi Arabia), content showing children living happily in a family with gay parents (Russia), content showing a child being abused by being forced to hold a Taiwanese flag (China), etc.
- amelius 5y agoBeing an employee of such a big company is close to being a public servant, which may not suit everybody, anyway.
- GeekyBear 5y ago> I am not interested in working for a company that is at the forefront of enabling further infringement on people's privacy Conducting scans on device instead of on server is your idea of infringement of privacy? Apple's system keeps everything off their servers until there is an instance where many images on device match known examples of child porn and a human review is triggered. Google's system scans everything on server, so a single false positive is open to misuse by anyone who can get a subpoena. We've seen Google data misused to persecute the innocent before. >Innocent man, 23, sues Arizona police for $1.5million after being arrested for murder and jailed for six days when Google's GPS tracker wrongly placed him at the scene of the 2018 crime https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7897319/Police-arrested-innocent-man-murder-using-Google-location-data.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7897319/Police-arre...
- hnrodey 5y ago>Conducting scans on device instead of on server is your idea of infringement of privacy? It's an infringement on my right to freedom of speech. Client-side scanning merely opens the door for my device to censor me from sending any message of my choosing and impacts my ability to freely communicate. What is today child abuse, tomorrow is health information and further descends to political and religious memes, or whatever other content is deemed problematic.
- GeekyBear 5y ago> Client-side scanning merely opens the door for my device to censor me from sending any message of my choosing and impacts my ability to freely communicate. Nonsense. Only photos you attempt to upload to Apple's iCloud are scanned. If you don't like it, turn off iCloud photos. >Q: So if iCloud Photos is disabled, the system does not work, which is the public language in the FAQ. I just wanted to ask specifically, when you disable iCloud Photos, does this system continue to create hashes of your photos on device, or is it completely inactive at that point? A: If users are not using iCloud Photos, NeuralHash will not run https://techcrunch.com/2021/08/10/interview-apples-head-of-privacy-details-child-abuse-detection-and-messages-safety-features/ https://techcrunch.com/2021/08/10/interview-apples-head-of-p... All the files you upload to your Google/Microsoft account are already being scanned today.
- fortran77 5y agoAlso, after you're hired, a group of Apple employees can sign a petition saying something you wrote 10 years ago--from which they saw an excerpt--bothers them....and Apple will fire you.