4 ms·

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,

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...
  - lern_too_spel 5y ago
    > You do not have to use iCloud Photos either. If you want your photos to upload in the background, iCloud Photos is your only choice on iOS. Not so on Android. This makes backing up photos to a server privately on iOS essentially unusable. This kind of crippling anti-privacy pro-Apple-profits design permeates iOS. You cannot even install an app on your device without giving Apple your billing details and letting them know you installed it, which is used for ads. You cannot get your location without also telling it to Apple. You cannot tell Apple not to track your WiFi SSID's location. You cannot uninstall Apple News, which is filled with user tracking for ads. On and on. > We recently had a thread from a historian whose entire account was suspended after Google scanned all the files in his Google Drive, You're comparing iOS to the wrong entity when you compare it to Google instead of Android, but even your comparison to Google is faulty. Your link is about Google suspending an account for files shared publicly, not about Google scanning all the files in that account. Section V.B. of https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/icloud/ https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/icloud/ says that sharing those types of images publicly is also a violation of the iCloud TOS, and Apple has the right to do the same thing. The difference is that Apple will probably handle the customer complaint better, but that is an issue of customer service, not privacy.
    - GeekyBear 5y ago
      > If you want your photos to upload in the background, iCloud Photos is your only choice on iOS. Nope. Background App Refresh has allowed any iOS app to update data between the server and client in the background for more than half a decade. Apple has discussed scanning photos uploaded to the iCloud Photos portion of their cloud service in the future, but nothing is scanned now. Google has been scanning everything in in their user's cloud accounts for the past decade. Also, given Google's reluctance to pay human beings to supervise decisions made by their algorithms, I have zero doubt that Google is turning in users when they have a single false positive.
      - lern_too_spel 5y ago
        Background App Refresh was added in 2019. How did that more than half a decade pass in two years? You're right though, iOS is not as terrible as it used to be. For many years, Apple crippled other background sync services relative to its own, and it continues to cripple other services relative to its own on iOS. All the other privacy-invading criticisms remain, making iOS an awful choice for privacy. I still don't know why you're comparing iOS to Google. As I've already explained, that is the wrong comparison. I can use my own services on Android. Apple is planning to scan photos in iCloud (and already does in mail) and only hasn't because their services are still so basic, so it is just as bad as Google in that respect but only temporarily better due to incompetence. My own server does not scan and review photos and never will.

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...
- lern_too_spel 5y ago
  > You do not have to use iCloud Photos either. If you want your photos to upload in the background, iCloud Photos is your only choice on iOS. Not so on Android. This makes backing up photos to a server privately on iOS essentially unusable. This kind of crippling anti-privacy pro-Apple-profits design permeates iOS. You cannot even install an app on your device without giving Apple your billing details and letting them know you installed it, which is used for ads. You cannot get your location without also telling it to Apple. You cannot tell Apple not to track your WiFi SSID's location. You cannot uninstall Apple News, which is filled with user tracking for ads. On and on. > We recently had a thread from a historian whose entire account was suspended after Google scanned all the files in his Google Drive, You're comparing iOS to the wrong entity when you compare it to Google instead of Android, but even your comparison to Google is faulty. Your link is about Google suspending an account for files shared publicly, not about Google scanning all the files in that account. Section V.B. of https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/icloud/ https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/icloud/ says that sharing those types of images publicly is also a violation of the iCloud TOS, and Apple has the right to do the same thing. The difference is that Apple will probably handle the customer complaint better, but that is an issue of customer service, not privacy.
  - GeekyBear 5y ago
    > If you want your photos to upload in the background, iCloud Photos is your only choice on iOS. Nope. Background App Refresh has allowed any iOS app to update data between the server and client in the background for more than half a decade. Apple has discussed scanning photos uploaded to the iCloud Photos portion of their cloud service in the future, but nothing is scanned now. Google has been scanning everything in in their user's cloud accounts for the past decade. Also, given Google's reluctance to pay human beings to supervise decisions made by their algorithms, I have zero doubt that Google is turning in users when they have a single false positive.
    - lern_too_spel 5y ago
      Background App Refresh was added in 2019. How did that more than half a decade pass in two years? You're right though, iOS is not as terrible as it used to be. For many years, Apple crippled other background sync services relative to its own, and it continues to cripple other services relative to its own on iOS. All the other privacy-invading criticisms remain, making iOS an awful choice for privacy. I still don't know why you're comparing iOS to Google. As I've already explained, that is the wrong comparison. I can use my own services on Android. Apple is planning to scan photos in iCloud (and already does in mail) and only hasn't because their services are still so basic, so it is just as bad as Google in that respect but only temporarily better due to incompetence. My own server does not scan and review photos and never will.