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> their intent is to scan cloud photos corrected: their intent is to scan all photos in your photo library, on your device, including images automatically pull

by flutas 5y ago

> their intent is to scan cloud photos corrected: their intent is to scan all photos in your photo library, on your device, including images automatically pulled in from from various sources such as messages, if you have iCloud Photo enabled.

simonh 5y ago
They do not have the ability to scan photos stored on your phone that are not uploaded to iCloud. The scan is only implemented in the iCloud photos upload system.
- gigel82 5y ago
  If that was the case they'd just implement it on their own servers, just like everybody else (it's not like iCloud is E2EE). In reality they probably have a "photoscanner.so / .dylib" that currently is only linked in by the iCloud uploader thing, but at any time could be called in by any other part of the system (or offer exploits new avenues for data exfiltration), which was actually spelled out in their initial announcement (there will be a system API for accessing it). So they absolutely have the ability to scan photos on your phone; the fact that they don't intend to currently use it outside of the iCloud uploader is totally immaterial to this debate (the thing I don't want on my phone is photoscanner.so or any such capability).
  - simonh 5y ago
    At any time they could implement a new feature in iPhone to do anything, yes that's true, and yes they could be flat out lying that this is how it's implemented. They could be lying about the whole thing. If they'd implemented it on their servers, they could still have taken that code and later put it on their phones and run it on whatever photos they liked. Come on, now you're really going off the rails. What we're discussing here is the system Apple has said they have implemented and described. Anything beyond that is hearsay and accusation, for which some evidence would be appreciated. If you're just going to believe whatever you want to, and damn the evidence or what anyone says, go ahead. There's nothing much more to say.
    - spacebear 5y ago
      I think that they can do that is the problem, though? If you don’t like the way Google is running things, you can swap out the OS on your Pixel for one of several open source privacy-focused Android forks. But if Apple does something to iOS you don’t like, you’re stuck with it.
      - simonh 5y ago
        That's got nothing to do with CSAM, or this change and isn't anything new. If we're going full tinfoil, Android manufacturers could force update, lock down or brick your Android phone any time they like anyway. If you allow remote updates, which I think we generally all want for security updates, it's all about trust.
  - concinds 5y ago
    > which was actually spelled out in their initial announcement (there will be a system API for accessing it). That is completely false. They announced, a week after the initial announcement, that the on-device nudity-detection they planned on implementing in iMessage would also be open to Snapchat and other messaging apps. That doesn't report anything to the police, isn't hash-based, and is done on-device; it just pops up a bypassable warning to allow child users who are part of "iCloud Family Sharing" to avoid seeing things they don't want to see. It has nothing to do with CSAM detection. I continue to be frustrated by the amount of misinformation on the anti-CSAM scanning side of the debate, including on HN (and it's orders of magnitude worse everywhere else).
marcellus23 5y ago
> images automatically pulled in from from various sources such as messages As far as I am aware, this is false and there is no mechanism on iOS by which images are "automatically pulled into" the photo library from anywhere, Messages or otherwise. Do you have a source or an example of how that could happen? (edit: people are mentioning Whatsapp, which I guess has an option to auto-save received photos. Fair enough, but that's a third-party app and requires you to enable photos access anyway, so it's pretty clearly not what the parent meant). > their intent is to scan all photos in your photo library, on your device ... if you have iCloud photos enabled Yes, that's what I said. Enabling iCloud photos uploads your photo library to the cloud, so it's scanning your cloud photos.
- flutas 5y ago
  > As far as I am aware, there is no mechanism on iOS by which images are "automatically pulled into" iCloud photos from anywhere, Messages or otherwise. Do you have a source or an example of how that could happen? When I receive images from my friends, they don't go into my photo library until I explicitly tap "save". Per Apple [0] >Shared with You works across the system to find the (...) photos, and more that are shared in Messages conversations, and conveniently surfaces them in apps like Photos (...) making it easy to quickly access the information in context. --- >Yes, that's what I said. Enabling iCloud photos uploads your photo library to the cloud, so it's scanning your cloud photos. Being disingenuous about it is still a thing though. You stated > More accurately put, their intent is to scan cloud photos (...) (like every other cloud provider, including Google) which makes it appear that the photos are only scanned server side "like every other cloud provider". Client side scanning is something that no other provider does, in contrast to what you stated. [0]: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/06/ios-15-brings-powerful-new-features-to-stay-connected-focus-explore-and-more/#:~:text=Shared%20with%20You,information%20in%20context https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/06/ios-15-brings-powerfu....
  - marcellus23 5y ago
    Shared with You does not actually save the images to your photo library. It just surfaces them inside the Photos app. I will admit it's not very clear from the press release, but those are the facts. I was not being disingenuous, frankly. I said that Apple is scanning your cloud photos, i.e. they are scanning photos that are uploaded to the cloud. Photos not being uploaded to the cloud are not scanned. I made no claims about where the scanning is happening, and I'm not particularly sure why it matters in any material sense.
jodrellblank 5y ago
"The CSAM scanning system is a part of the iCloud Photos upload process and it will be triggered once the upload is initiated. Keep in mind that it does not scan private photo libraries stored on iPhone devices" - https://medium.com/codequest/technologies-behind-the-apples-csam-detection-system-f5da1b257981 https://medium.com/codequest/technologies-behind-the-apples-... If you want to "correct" the claim to say their intent is to scan every photo, citation needed.
GeekyBear 5y ago
Apple does not scan on device photos at all. It's something they announced they might do to images you upload to iCloud Photos some day in the future. Google, on the other hand, has been scanning the entire contents of your account for the past decade. >a man [was] arrested on child pornography charges, after Google tipped off authorities about illegal images found in the Houston suspect’s Gmail account. https://techcrunch.com/2014/08/06/why-the-gmail-scan-that-led-to-a-mans-arrest-for-child-porn-was-not-a-privacy-violation/ https://techcrunch.com/2014/08/06/why-the-gmail-scan-that-le...
- 8note 5y ago
  I dont think you can verify that. Apple claims to not scan your pictures, but that's unrelated to whether they scan your pictures
  - GeekyBear 5y ago
    In the same way that you cannot verify that Google does not sell your data to third party data brokers. You either believe their corporate communications on the subject or you do not.
- lern_too_spel 5y ago
  You do not have to use Google Photos if you do not want to on any Android phone. You can upload photos to your own server in the background exactly like the Google Photos app does. On iOS, only iCloud Photos can do that. It is strictly worse for privacy.
  - GeekyBear 5y ago
    You do not have to use iCloud Photos either. However, Google is scanning everything in your account. We recently had a thread from a historian whose entire account was suspended after Google scanned all the files in his Google Drive, and didn't like what they saw (files on the history of tanks). https://support.google.com/accounts/thread/81988101/google-locked-my-account-for-sharing-a-historical-archive-they-labelled-as-terrorism-content?hl=en https://support.google.com/accounts/thread/81988101/google-l...

by flutas 5y ago

simonh 5y ago

They do not have the ability to scan photos stored on your phone that are not uploaded to iCloud. The scan is only implemented in the iCloud photos upload system.

gigel82 5y ago
If that was the case they'd just implement it on their own servers, just like everybody else (it's not like iCloud is E2EE). In reality they probably have a "photoscanner.so / .dylib" that currently is only linked in by the iCloud uploader thing, but at any time could be called in by any other part of the system (or offer exploits new avenues for data exfiltration), which was actually spelled out in their initial announcement (there will be a system API for accessing it). So they absolutely have the ability to scan photos on your phone; the fact that they don't intend to currently use it outside of the iCloud uploader is totally immaterial to this debate (the thing I don't want on my phone is photoscanner.so or any such capability).
- simonh 5y ago
  At any time they could implement a new feature in iPhone to do anything, yes that's true, and yes they could be flat out lying that this is how it's implemented. They could be lying about the whole thing. If they'd implemented it on their servers, they could still have taken that code and later put it on their phones and run it on whatever photos they liked. Come on, now you're really going off the rails. What we're discussing here is the system Apple has said they have implemented and described. Anything beyond that is hearsay and accusation, for which some evidence would be appreciated. If you're just going to believe whatever you want to, and damn the evidence or what anyone says, go ahead. There's nothing much more to say.
  - spacebear 5y ago
    I think that they can do that is the problem, though? If you don’t like the way Google is running things, you can swap out the OS on your Pixel for one of several open source privacy-focused Android forks. But if Apple does something to iOS you don’t like, you’re stuck with it.
    - simonh 5y ago
      That's got nothing to do with CSAM, or this change and isn't anything new. If we're going full tinfoil, Android manufacturers could force update, lock down or brick your Android phone any time they like anyway. If you allow remote updates, which I think we generally all want for security updates, it's all about trust.
- concinds 5y ago
  > which was actually spelled out in their initial announcement (there will be a system API for accessing it). That is completely false. They announced, a week after the initial announcement, that the on-device nudity-detection they planned on implementing in iMessage would also be open to Snapchat and other messaging apps. That doesn't report anything to the police, isn't hash-based, and is done on-device; it just pops up a bypassable warning to allow child users who are part of "iCloud Family Sharing" to avoid seeing things they don't want to see. It has nothing to do with CSAM detection. I continue to be frustrated by the amount of misinformation on the anti-CSAM scanning side of the debate, including on HN (and it's orders of magnitude worse everywhere else).

marcellus23 5y ago

> images automatically pulled in from from various sources such as messages As far as I am aware, this is false and there is no mechanism on iOS by which images are "automatically pulled into" the photo library from anywhere, Messages or otherwise. Do you have a source or an example of how that could happen? (edit: people are mentioning Whatsapp, which I guess has an option to auto-save received photos. Fair enough, but that's a third-party app and requires you to enable photos access anyway, so it's pretty clearly not what the parent meant). > their intent is to scan all photos in your photo library, on your device ... if you have iCloud photos enabled Yes, that's what I said. Enabling iCloud photos uploads your photo library to the cloud, so it's scanning your cloud photos.

flutas 5y ago
> As far as I am aware, there is no mechanism on iOS by which images are "automatically pulled into" iCloud photos from anywhere, Messages or otherwise. Do you have a source or an example of how that could happen? When I receive images from my friends, they don't go into my photo library until I explicitly tap "save". Per Apple [0] >Shared with You works across the system to find the (...) photos, and more that are shared in Messages conversations, and conveniently surfaces them in apps like Photos (...) making it easy to quickly access the information in context. --- >Yes, that's what I said. Enabling iCloud photos uploads your photo library to the cloud, so it's scanning your cloud photos. Being disingenuous about it is still a thing though. You stated > More accurately put, their intent is to scan cloud photos (...) (like every other cloud provider, including Google) which makes it appear that the photos are only scanned server side "like every other cloud provider". Client side scanning is something that no other provider does, in contrast to what you stated. [0]: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/06/ios-15-brings-powerful-new-features-to-stay-connected-focus-explore-and-more/#:~:text=Shared%20with%20You,information%20in%20context https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/06/ios-15-brings-powerfu....
- marcellus23 5y ago
  Shared with You does not actually save the images to your photo library. It just surfaces them inside the Photos app. I will admit it's not very clear from the press release, but those are the facts. I was not being disingenuous, frankly. I said that Apple is scanning your cloud photos, i.e. they are scanning photos that are uploaded to the cloud. Photos not being uploaded to the cloud are not scanned. I made no claims about where the scanning is happening, and I'm not particularly sure why it matters in any material sense.

jodrellblank 5y ago

"The CSAM scanning system is a part of the iCloud Photos upload process and it will be triggered once the upload is initiated. Keep in mind that it does not scan private photo libraries stored on iPhone devices" - https://medium.com/codequest/technologies-behind-the-apples-csam-detection-system-f5da1b257981 https://medium.com/codequest/technologies-behind-the-apples-... If you want to "correct" the claim to say their intent is to scan every photo, citation needed.

GeekyBear 5y ago

Apple does not scan on device photos at all. It's something they announced they might do to images you upload to iCloud Photos some day in the future. Google, on the other hand, has been scanning the entire contents of your account for the past decade. >a man [was] arrested on child pornography charges, after Google tipped off authorities about illegal images found in the Houston suspect’s Gmail account. https://techcrunch.com/2014/08/06/why-the-gmail-scan-that-led-to-a-mans-arrest-for-child-porn-was-not-a-privacy-violation/ https://techcrunch.com/2014/08/06/why-the-gmail-scan-that-le...

8note 5y ago
I dont think you can verify that. Apple claims to not scan your pictures, but that's unrelated to whether they scan your pictures
- GeekyBear 5y ago
  In the same way that you cannot verify that Google does not sell your data to third party data brokers. You either believe their corporate communications on the subject or you do not.
lern_too_spel 5y ago
You do not have to use Google Photos if you do not want to on any Android phone. You can upload photos to your own server in the background exactly like the Google Photos app does. On iOS, only iCloud Photos can do that. It is strictly worse for privacy.
- GeekyBear 5y ago
  You do not have to use iCloud Photos either. However, Google is scanning everything in your account. We recently had a thread from a historian whose entire account was suspended after Google scanned all the files in his Google Drive, and didn't like what they saw (files on the history of tanks). https://support.google.com/accounts/thread/81988101/google-locked-my-account-for-sharing-a-historical-archive-they-labelled-as-terrorism-content?hl=en https://support.google.com/accounts/thread/81988101/google-l...