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They can still simply push a software update that sends the victim's keys to the mothership and/or simply decrypts everything. Can even be pushed silently. The
by AshamedCaptain 4y ago
They can still simply push a software update that sends the victim's keys to the mothership and/or simply decrypts everything. Can even be pushed silently. The victim cannot do anything, not even detect when this has happened.
Why would governments push back, when this hole which has already been used will _always_ be available?
- arch-ninja 4y agoHasn't the solution to this problem always been easy? Just encrypt before you type it into imessages; this applies to _all_ untrusted communication channels. Don't tell me base64-encoding/decoding is what's stopping you from having perfect security?
- TillE 4y agoExactly, if you're dealing with truly sensitive information where any leak is unacceptable, make your own encrypted blob. Don't trust any communication software to do it for you. The concern typically isn't backdoors, it's bugs. I've had plenty of terrible experiences with Enigmail.
- joosters 4y ago'easy' and 'just' are doing a lot of work in your assertion here!
- kube-system 4y agoThat doesn't solve the problem of needing a trusted communication channel. You'd still need one to exchange keys.
- mwint 4y agoThe difference is in asking Apple for something they already have access to, vs. asking them to create something entirely new (a signed software update). That’s what the FBI case a few years back was about.
- threeseed 4y ago> when this hole which has already been used You have evidence that Apple has been pushing silent updates to individual users ?
- biggoodwolf 4y ago
- etchalon 4y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot
- cantaloupe 4y agoThat’s along the lines of asking “Do you have evidence that UFOs have NEVER landed on earth?” in response to someone asking if you have evidence that UFOs have landed…
- biggoodwolf 4y agoI guess the same point could be made about religion. Call me an agnostic then when it comes to device security
- DonaldPShimoda 4y agoYou're asking for proof of a negative that cannot be fulfilled without having access to all copies of all versions of the source code deployed for every Apple device in the world for their entire history. This seems an unreasonable burden. Either we accept some amount of vulnerability at the minimum and deal in likelihoods rather than certainties, or we simply do not use modern communication devices whatsoever. Given we're here on HN, we all have clearly chosen the former, so the question becomes: "is it likely that Apple have violated individual users' privacy in this manner?", to which I think the answer is "no" because (a) it's never been necessary before given the availability of alternate methods, (b) we have absolutely no evidence to suggest otherwise, and (c) we do have evidence of a history of Apple being at least somewhat reluctant to cooperate with the federal government of the US when it comes to individuals' privacy, to the extent that they are able (e.g., the San Bernardino case). So although it is true that we cannot be certain of our privacy, it seems very likely that Apple's efforts to improve user privacy are not disingenuous.
- zinekeller 4y agoUh, because Apple specifically pushed back on this? (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI%E2%80%93Apple_encryption_dispute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI%E2%80%93Apple_encryption_d...) Sure, it's never a guarantee but they have some decency.
- eptcyka 4y ago
- adventured 4y agoIt's not an assumption. Apple has earned a decent reputation for being pro privacy through their actions over decades.
- jstummbillig 4y agoCan somebody explain the room for debate and expression of sentiment here? If Apple was legally required to do x in regards to privacy, I have to assume they would and everyone could know they would (because it does not seem very big US company to outright defy national law). If they were not, on what ground, could the gov pressure Apple?
- adventured 4y agoThe theory would be that it would be extralegal pressure. Out of the Snowden era, for this generation, came the belief that the government would use extralegal coercion to get what they want when it comes to domestic espionage. This showed up in eg how the government battled Yahoo over PRISM [0], and the story of Joseph Nacchio of QWest [1] supposedly being targeted by the Feds for refusing to go along with the program/s. For prior generations, Hoover, Nixon, MLK (how they targeted him), the Church hearings, and many other things provided evidence as to the extralegal behavior of the government at times. [0] https://www.wired.com/2014/09/feds-yahoo-fine-prism/ https://www.wired.com/2014/09/feds-yahoo-fine-prism/ [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/the-story-of-joseph-nacchio-and-the-nsa-2013-6 https://www.businessinsider.com/the-story-of-joseph-nacchio-...
- dxf 4y ago>Why would governments push back, when this hole which has already been used will _always_ be available? I'm not aware of a time when Apple pushed a software update (silently or otherwise) to defeat security for a user (or users). Can you provide a reference?
- bboygravity 4y agoThe entire precondition for being able to do that is that you're not aware of it. Ever.
- jodrellblank 4y agoThe parent comment said “hole which has already been used”, that’s a claim that Apple has actually done it, not only a speculation that they could. They are being asked to back up that claim.
- Melatonic 4y agoThe thing that people always miss is that the damn SIM card is running its own little processor already. If the government really wants to read your shit they can probably just do some behind the scenes work with your mobile ISP and find a way to access your phones screen output or microphone data or something.
- gumby 4y agoThe baseband module has a processor too, and you don't have access to it per FCC regulation.
- lilyball 4y agoiPhone 14 doesn't even have a SIM card anymore, it's strictly eSIM (and previous models could optionally use eSIM).
- astrange 4y agoeSIM isn't any different here, it still runs the same applets. What makes it secure is the IOMMU preventing it from accessing main memory.
- aborsy 4y agoAt least, data won’t be harvested for commercial use (as Google does). Apple clearly is leading in security.
- cglong 4y agoExcept that Android has had E2E encrypted backups since 2018 https://security.googleblog.com/2018/10/google-and-android-have-your-back-by.html https://security.googleblog.com/2018/10/google-and-android-h...
- aborsy 4y agoYou are right. I guess I was thinking that none of the FANG provides a “desktop” client app with e2e. But Android already collects a lot data from the device before encrypting.
- Melatonic 4y agoMost of which you can opt out of
- lern_too_spel 4y agoIndeed, you can opt out of more of it on Android than you can on iOS. Try to get your location on iOS without telling Apple. You can't. Try installing an app without telling Apple. Same. Even MacOS is infected with this privacy invading nonsense that I can't opt out of. It has an Apple News app that I can't uninstall, and whenever anybody sends an Apple News link, even in a private tab, it opens the Apple News app, a handler that I can't disable, sending the article I want to read together with my Apple ID to Apple.
- v0idzer0 4y agoAndroid is a steamy pile of privacy violations, but yes they do have this one feature
- 4y ago
- fsociety 4y agoYes true. What’s your threat model though? If my government wants to own me they can do that without going to Apple. For myself I’m quite happy with this as it is a huge improvement over what we had. My only irk is that they called themselves a champion of security and privacy before this..
- v0idzer0 4y agoYou’d detect a software update?
- infotogivenm 4y agoWhat? They have demonstrably gone toe-to-toe with the FBI to NOT ever have to create “special software updates for the government”. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI–Apple_encryption_dispute https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI–Apple_encryption_dispute Can you show me another company that has done this?
- Infinitesimus 4y agoThe tricky thing with Apple is that they sell phones in China, given that that govt demands visibility into what it's citizens do, it is reasonable to assume that anything Apple launches to secure your data from prying eyes will have an asterisk to accommodate a big part of their market.
- kube-system 4y agoThat's because Chinese and US law are fundamentally different. The US has laws that enable Apple to contest those requests. It is not just possible to run a large business in violation of any (competent) government. It doesn't matter who it is. FWIW, Apple does not treat US and Chinese users the same. If you have a Chinese mainland iPhone, you use a completely different iCloud that isn't even run by Apple.
- newaccount74 4y agoI'm going to assume that iCloud E2EE won't be available in China.
- TimTheTinker 4y agoIt looks to me like Apple and China have a complicated and somewhat adversarial relationship. Apple likely conceded early on that China-based iPhones use China-based iCloud, and the Chinese government likely conceded that Apple phones will use the same OS everywhere, with region-based feature blocking being as far as they'll go in customizing the OS. Both have a lot to lose from the other party terminating the relationship.
- macshome 4y agoIt’s not that tricky as iCloud in a China isn’t run by Apple at all. [0] The laws are different there and the only way that Apple could meet the requirements of the Chinese government without also weakening their product for the rest of the world was to cede control of iCloud there. [0] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351
- gjsman-1000 4y agoSo could your Android phone - even if it runs GrapheneOS. How do you know that GrapheneOS isn't a CIA project like ArcaneOS that won't push a sneaky software update to your device? You don't and you never know, so it's not really fair to target Apple for this. You will always be vulnerable to such an attack no matter what you choose. The only true secure option is to build the source yourself, sign it with your own keys, and run it. Assuming you can read all the code and make sure its safe, and read all the code on your compiler to make sure that is safe. And you'll still need to trust the Google-signed bootloader code, which totally hasn't had suspicious custom builds released previously (ArcaneOS?)
- fnordpiglet 4y agoThey couldn’t without bypassing all their controls and assurance measures, which are required by not just governments but corporations who don’t trust apple or the government, as well as regulators across the world who also don’t trust either apple or the us government. If you’ve ever worked in a highly regulated highly sensitive enterprise tech environment you would know this is hogwash.
- MaxBarraclough 4y agoYou missed out the punchline: all of this follows from that the software is proprietary/closed-source/non-Free. You can't see how it works, you can't change how it works, and you have to trust that it does as advertised. You must do all this in the knowledge that over the years plenty of proprietary software vendors have outright lied to their customers about exactly this kind of thing, e.g. [0][1]. I'm not aware of Apple ever doing so though, for what that's worth. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25044254 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25044254 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33820538 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33820538