4 ms·

I have zero idea what he's on about, and why it would be affected by apple's decisions. Can someone let me/us know?

donohoe 5y ago
Same. I read it and have no idea what he’s talking about. I can to the comments hoping someone has context. Otherwise it’s just a rant, and not a very lucid one at that.
- vanusa 5y ago
  It was a rant, sure. But I found it perfectly straightforward, and it was pretty clear at the very top what the main concern was, actually.
  - annadane 5y ago
    For every legitimate article that gets posted on HN you can guarantee someone comes along and says "I don't understand what this is all about". Come on, read.
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  It is very straightforward in that he has been using Apple for a while and made concessions on his idea of software freedom to use the "convenience of Apple products". however, with Apple's recent attempt to slip in on device scanning and reporting to police agencies and setting a precedent that this is acceptable it has pushed him over the edge. Even though apple backed off, they did just add the scan for nekkid pictures on your imessage if you're a kid and report it to your parents. He assume this is just step 0.1 of a multistep process to reinstate the scan all the things on your phone and report back to 3rd parties. He may be right, and it certainly wasn't hard to follow if you read it rather than scan it.
- WesolyKubeczek 5y ago
  I've heard HN was big on this concept called "empathy". A dude's project died of a thousand paper cuts. The dude's observations about Apple made him notice an emergent pattern of Apple being all but openly hostile towards any independent efforts of assuring one's privacy in a way the person themselves sees fit, as opposed to privacy as Apple sees fit, and all but openly hostile toward small developers in general. Think for a moment how lucid would you yourself be after a couple years or more of those things grating on your nerves. Read the thing again through this lens.
- h0h0h0h0111 5y ago
  I clicked through to the author's article on "small web" and also couldn't understand particularly what it was: "The Small Web, quite simply, is the polar opposite of the Big Web." ?!?!?
acomjean 5y ago
Better Blocker was a privacy plugin for apple browsers. https://better.fyi/ https://better.fyi/ It is no longer a thing as of Dec 15, 2021
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  Is that in retaliation for his criticism of apple?
  - endymi0n 5y ago
    As an industry insider, it sounds much more like ITP (by now in version 2.3) is just the far superior approach to privacy protection — and Apple killed off third party plugins as a result (and further security risk). Can understand he's salty about it, but looks like he's trying to use that fact as well as lots of unrelated stuff as leverage to pitch his foundation.
- mthld 5y ago
  To be honest it wasn’t a thing anymore since some years already. I was a client of them and I stopped using Better facing too many issues and no help from the maintainers…
bdowling 5y ago
It's about Apple's plan to add content-scanning to phones and reporting to the government if content matches images in the database. The concern is that it will be used by governments to identify political enemies who share memes, which is exactly the point. Apple's excuse to the world is that they want to protect children by identifying people who receive known CSAM and reporting them. There's no money in that, however, so the most obvious explanation is that Apple wants to keep operating in various countries whose governments want the feature.
- quitit 5y ago
  Quick question: How is Apple reporting you to the government, and Google not? When they both report to the exact same entity? (The NCMEC.) Also how do you rationalise Apple bad, everyone else Good. If Apple are actually the only company to have public consultation about the new feature - while the others implemented theirs silently and have been running for years? One last one: Why do you think political memes uploaded to an iCloud Photo Library are the target of governments, if such memes are trivially detected when posted online? Why do you think Apple would comply here if Google(et.al.) don't? If referencing China, are you not aware who runs their social media? Also why do you think that new memes can't be created on the fly - ones that wouldn't match a set of hashes used by nefarious governments. Side note: Are you aware Google uses hashes to detect CSAM imagery too? Better still, are you aware Google use AI to guess at what might be a CSAM image and report those as well? https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/10330933?hl=en https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/1033093... https://www.apple.com/child-safety/pdf/CSAM_Detection_Technical_Summary.pdf https://www.apple.com/child-safety/pdf/CSAM_Detection_Techni...
  - dncornholio 5y ago
    Does Google only scan images you send them or does it also scan every image you take, store or receive on your phone?
    - quitit 5y ago
      Are you using Google's cloud services? Then all of the above with exception to "receive" - just like Apple's messages, merely receiving a message doesn't add it to your library (even if it's surfaced there for convenience.) If using Whatsapp - turn off autosave on images.
1vuio0pswjnm7 5y ago
https://ar.al/2020/03/25/apple-just-killed-offline-web-apps-while-purporting-to-protect-your-privacy-why-thats-a-bad-thing-and-why-you-should-care/ https://ar.al/2020/03/25/apple-just-killed-offline-web-apps-... He is interested in the protection of user privacy. Author of "Better Blocker", an ad bocker for iOS/macOS.^1 Apple's decisions are making user privacy increasingly more difficult if not impossible when using an Apple computer. 1. https://web.archive.org/web/20211219053624if_/https://better.fyi/ https://web.archive.org/web/20211219053624if_/https://better...

Same. I read it and have no idea what he’s talking about. I can to the comments hoping someone has context. Otherwise it’s just a rant, and not a very lucid one at that.

vanusa 5y ago
It was a rant, sure. But I found it perfectly straightforward, and it was pretty clear at the very top what the main concern was, actually.
- annadane 5y ago
  For every legitimate article that gets posted on HN you can guarantee someone comes along and says "I don't understand what this is all about". Come on, read.
stjohnswarts 5y ago
It is very straightforward in that he has been using Apple for a while and made concessions on his idea of software freedom to use the "convenience of Apple products". however, with Apple's recent attempt to slip in on device scanning and reporting to police agencies and setting a precedent that this is acceptable it has pushed him over the edge. Even though apple backed off, they did just add the scan for nekkid pictures on your imessage if you're a kid and report it to your parents. He assume this is just step 0.1 of a multistep process to reinstate the scan all the things on your phone and report back to 3rd parties. He may be right, and it certainly wasn't hard to follow if you read it rather than scan it.
WesolyKubeczek 5y ago
I've heard HN was big on this concept called "empathy". A dude's project died of a thousand paper cuts. The dude's observations about Apple made him notice an emergent pattern of Apple being all but openly hostile towards any independent efforts of assuring one's privacy in a way the person themselves sees fit, as opposed to privacy as Apple sees fit, and all but openly hostile toward small developers in general. Think for a moment how lucid would you yourself be after a couple years or more of those things grating on your nerves. Read the thing again through this lens.
h0h0h0h0111 5y ago
I clicked through to the author's article on "small web" and also couldn't understand particularly what it was: "The Small Web, quite simply, is the polar opposite of the Big Web." ?!?!?

acomjean 5y ago

Better Blocker was a privacy plugin for apple browsers. https://better.fyi/ https://better.fyi/ It is no longer a thing as of Dec 15, 2021

stjohnswarts 5y ago
Is that in retaliation for his criticism of apple?
- endymi0n 5y ago
  As an industry insider, it sounds much more like ITP (by now in version 2.3) is just the far superior approach to privacy protection — and Apple killed off third party plugins as a result (and further security risk). Can understand he's salty about it, but looks like he's trying to use that fact as well as lots of unrelated stuff as leverage to pitch his foundation.
mthld 5y ago
To be honest it wasn’t a thing anymore since some years already. I was a client of them and I stopped using Better facing too many issues and no help from the maintainers…

bdowling 5y ago

It's about Apple's plan to add content-scanning to phones and reporting to the government if content matches images in the database. The concern is that it will be used by governments to identify political enemies who share memes, which is exactly the point. Apple's excuse to the world is that they want to protect children by identifying people who receive known CSAM and reporting them. There's no money in that, however, so the most obvious explanation is that Apple wants to keep operating in various countries whose governments want the feature.

quitit 5y ago
Quick question: How is Apple reporting you to the government, and Google not? When they both report to the exact same entity? (The NCMEC.) Also how do you rationalise Apple bad, everyone else Good. If Apple are actually the only company to have public consultation about the new feature - while the others implemented theirs silently and have been running for years? One last one: Why do you think political memes uploaded to an iCloud Photo Library are the target of governments, if such memes are trivially detected when posted online? Why do you think Apple would comply here if Google(et.al.) don't? If referencing China, are you not aware who runs their social media? Also why do you think that new memes can't be created on the fly - ones that wouldn't match a set of hashes used by nefarious governments. Side note: Are you aware Google uses hashes to detect CSAM imagery too? Better still, are you aware Google use AI to guess at what might be a CSAM image and report those as well? https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/10330933?hl=en https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/1033093... https://www.apple.com/child-safety/pdf/CSAM_Detection_Technical_Summary.pdf https://www.apple.com/child-safety/pdf/CSAM_Detection_Techni...
- dncornholio 5y ago
  Does Google only scan images you send them or does it also scan every image you take, store or receive on your phone?
  - quitit 5y ago
    Are you using Google's cloud services? Then all of the above with exception to "receive" - just like Apple's messages, merely receiving a message doesn't add it to your library (even if it's surfaced there for convenience.) If using Whatsapp - turn off autosave on images.

1vuio0pswjnm7 5y ago

https://ar.al/2020/03/25/apple-just-killed-offline-web-apps-while-purporting-to-protect-your-privacy-why-thats-a-bad-thing-and-why-you-should-care/ https://ar.al/2020/03/25/apple-just-killed-offline-web-apps-... He is interested in the protection of user privacy. Author of "Better Blocker", an ad bocker for iOS/macOS.^1 Apple's decisions are making user privacy increasingly more difficult if not impossible when using an Apple computer. 1. https://web.archive.org/web/20211219053624if_/https://better.fyi/ https://web.archive.org/web/20211219053624if_/https://better...