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How is Apple lying that it's all about the user? Their support documents clearly outline what is E2E encrypted and their explicit justification for not locking

How is Apple lying that it's all about the user? Their support documents clearly outline what is E2E encrypted and their explicit justification for not locking iCloud backups is specifically because of situations where users are locked out of all their information because of a forgotten password. Unless there's evidence that Apple has sustained a security breach as a result of this posture, it seems to me that they actually are caring about the user. The only incidents that I'm aware of with regard to Apple are social engineering and brute-forcing due to weak user passwords. Is there a situation or evidence that Apple is lying here?

FireBeyond 4y ago
"Lying" may be a little extreme. Deceptive, though, perhaps. 1. "We care about your privacy" 2. Introduce a bunch of privacy tracking controls to restrict what other parties and apps can retrieve and use vis-a-vis data and you. 3. Heavily increase your investment in your own ad network that is not subject to the same restrictions.
- agd 4y ago
  Could you be specific about what tracking restrictions Apple imposes on others which they don’t follow themselves? My understanding was that Apple asks for user consent before letting ad networks track users across many apps run by different companies. Apple doesn’t do that themselves as far as I know?
- dkonofalski 4y ago
  1. It seems to me that they do care about user privacy. I haven't seen any evidence yet to suggest that they don't. Tim Cook, of all people, has every reason for this to be a priority and a truthful statement. 2. The privacy tracking controls only restrict tracking across apps and websites. Individual apps are allowed to collect data and it would be impossible for Apple to guarantee that an app couldn't collect data since they clearly can't be aware of every since implementation within the app. Notice what the terms for end-users explicitly state since a company like Meta can't get info from Apple about users across FB and Insta, for example, but may have ways to tie users together based on data they're collecting on the platform itself. Apple can't really stop that. They can only make it more difficult (which they have, as evidence by FB's reaction to the new privacy controls). 3. Where do you get the idea that they're not subject to the same restrictions? I don't see any evidence that this is the case.
  - maskedinvader 4y ago
    3. Every other app has to ask user to "opt in", default is "opt out" while for apples own prompt the user has to "opt out", default is "opt in". This alone is evidence they are not subject to the same restrictions.
    - dkonofalski 4y ago
      Do you have any evidence of this? Setting up an iPhone or iPad asks the user to opt-in to Apple's tracking. The only reason it would be opt-out is if you opted in previously and a software update has revised the permissions/tracking for that app. If you've previously opted-in, then the default is not opt-in. You're just seeing it that way because of your previous allowance.
      - maskedinvader 4y ago
        Maybe youre right, that its remembering previous opt in setting and defaulting to opt when setting up new iphone, but I am 100% sure its not the same behavior for other 3rd party apps, they always default opt out regardless what option you chose the previous time you installed the app.
    - halostatue 4y ago
      Not quite. Apps subject to ATT rules have to ask permission to permit tracking across apps and/or websites. All apps have to declare what personal information that they’re interested in. Here’s a link to Numbers: https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/numbers/id409203825?mt=12 https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/numbers/id409203825?mt=12 It declares: Data Linked to You The following data, which may be collected and linked to your identity, may be used for the following purposes: Analytics Identifiers User ID Device ID Usage Data Product Interaction Diagnostics Performance Data Other Diagnostic Data App Functionality Contact Info Email Address Name Phone Number User Content Photos or Videos Audio Data Other User Content Identifiers User ID My bet is that the Stocks app says the same thing, and that people are confusing OS data collection permissions with app data collection permissions.
KaiserPro 4y ago
> Unless there's evidence that Apple has sustained a security breach I don't think thats a strong argument. FB's security was never actually breeched during cambridge analyitica. It was information given to a study by paid subjects, plus scraping of their friends graph, plus a fucktonne of PR to say how great their data was. Sure they had information on n million people. But they didn't have _detailed_ information. With apple, they have unrestricted access to the location of you, your laptop and tags. With that you can work out friendship graphs. Not only that but all the information that every app collects plus a boat load more metadata. If they cared about the user, they wouldn't be collecting this information, instead they seem to be wanting to muscle into FB and google's advert game. But, dont get this as me saying meta/google are good. No, they are just as bad as apple, but with varying levels of PR.

FireBeyond 4y ago

"Lying" may be a little extreme. Deceptive, though, perhaps. 1. "We care about your privacy" 2. Introduce a bunch of privacy tracking controls to restrict what other parties and apps can retrieve and use vis-a-vis data and you. 3. Heavily increase your investment in your own ad network that is not subject to the same restrictions.

agd 4y ago
Could you be specific about what tracking restrictions Apple imposes on others which they don’t follow themselves? My understanding was that Apple asks for user consent before letting ad networks track users across many apps run by different companies. Apple doesn’t do that themselves as far as I know?
dkonofalski 4y ago
1. It seems to me that they do care about user privacy. I haven't seen any evidence yet to suggest that they don't. Tim Cook, of all people, has every reason for this to be a priority and a truthful statement. 2. The privacy tracking controls only restrict tracking across apps and websites. Individual apps are allowed to collect data and it would be impossible for Apple to guarantee that an app couldn't collect data since they clearly can't be aware of every since implementation within the app. Notice what the terms for end-users explicitly state since a company like Meta can't get info from Apple about users across FB and Insta, for example, but may have ways to tie users together based on data they're collecting on the platform itself. Apple can't really stop that. They can only make it more difficult (which they have, as evidence by FB's reaction to the new privacy controls). 3. Where do you get the idea that they're not subject to the same restrictions? I don't see any evidence that this is the case.
- maskedinvader 4y ago
  3. Every other app has to ask user to "opt in", default is "opt out" while for apples own prompt the user has to "opt out", default is "opt in". This alone is evidence they are not subject to the same restrictions.
  - dkonofalski 4y ago
    Do you have any evidence of this? Setting up an iPhone or iPad asks the user to opt-in to Apple's tracking. The only reason it would be opt-out is if you opted in previously and a software update has revised the permissions/tracking for that app. If you've previously opted-in, then the default is not opt-in. You're just seeing it that way because of your previous allowance.
    - maskedinvader 4y ago
      Maybe youre right, that its remembering previous opt in setting and defaulting to opt when setting up new iphone, but I am 100% sure its not the same behavior for other 3rd party apps, they always default opt out regardless what option you chose the previous time you installed the app.
  - halostatue 4y ago
    Not quite. Apps subject to ATT rules have to ask permission to permit tracking across apps and/or websites. All apps have to declare what personal information that they’re interested in. Here’s a link to Numbers: https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/numbers/id409203825?mt=12 https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/numbers/id409203825?mt=12 It declares: Data Linked to You The following data, which may be collected and linked to your identity, may be used for the following purposes: Analytics Identifiers User ID Device ID Usage Data Product Interaction Diagnostics Performance Data Other Diagnostic Data App Functionality Contact Info Email Address Name Phone Number User Content Photos or Videos Audio Data Other User Content Identifiers User ID My bet is that the Stocks app says the same thing, and that people are confusing OS data collection permissions with app data collection permissions.

KaiserPro 4y ago

> Unless there's evidence that Apple has sustained a security breach I don't think thats a strong argument. FB's security was never actually breeched during cambridge analyitica. It was information given to a study by paid subjects, plus scraping of their friends graph, plus a fucktonne of PR to say how great their data was. Sure they had information on n million people. But they didn't have _detailed_ information. With apple, they have unrestricted access to the location of you, your laptop and tags. With that you can work out friendship graphs. Not only that but all the information that every app collects plus a boat load more metadata. If they cared about the user, they wouldn't be collecting this information, instead they seem to be wanting to muscle into FB and google's advert game. But, dont get this as me saying meta/google are good. No, they are just as bad as apple, but with varying levels of PR.