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China Bans iPhone Use for Government Officials at Work

128 points by smugma 3y ago

smugma 3y ago
“China’s restriction mirrors similar bans in the U.S. against Huawei Technologies as well as against officials using Chinese-owned TikTok”
- baby 3y ago
  This is the correct explanation. And that makes sense as well. I think another insight might be that the Chinese gov doesn’t really like when large companies can influence their decisions. I’d imagine that if everyone in the gov has an iPhone it makes it harder to be tough on Tim Apple.
  - WhereIsTheTruth 3y ago
    The reciprocity is related to fear of spying In the age of AI and model training, data is more than ever precious The US spying on EU leaders and their industry is perhaps what China is worried about https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-security-agency-spied-merkel-other-top-european-officials-through-danish-2021-05-30/ https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-security-agency-spie... https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/290615/revealed-massive-us-industrial-espionage-against-france https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/290615/revealed-m... https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/russia-says-us-accessed-thousands-of-apple-phones-in-spy-plot/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/russia-s...
    - smoldesu 3y ago
      It's a shame that a superpower like China can't call out the United States on surveillance without it being hypocrisy. We need more countries objecting to unfair power-alignment like FIVE EYES, XKeyscore and PRISM. Unfortunately, most of them would rather build their own version rather than hold the US to a higher standard. Hopeless "violence begets violence" situations like this underscore how disastrous a full exposé of both governments would be. It's a sad time to be a global citizen.
      - kube-system 3y ago
        All major powers spy on everyone. It is a prerequisite for being a major power, and it always has been.
        smoldesu 3y ago
        I agree. In the same way we resent nuclear warfare though, we should want to "de-surveillance-ize" as much of the free world as possible. It's an unsafe deterrent and (as we're seeing now) a terrible precedent to set when things verge towards war.
        WillPostForFood 3y ago
        All major powers spy on everyone Can't we just say all nation states? It certainly isn't just major powers that have spy agencies. E.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_intelligence_agencies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_intelligence_agencies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Security_Agency_(South_Africa) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Security_Agency_(South_A...
        crazygringo 3y ago
        I don't think all nation states have spy agencies. Wikipedia lists them for 122 countries [1], out of 206 [2]. So about 60%. Maybe a little higher if a few are missing. I do wonder if there's also some kind of commonly accepted division within those that separates the "big guys" vs the "little guys", e.g. if there's a certain key spying ability that takes a certain level of funding and sophistication. I mean, I do have to assume that there is a qualitative difference between the kind of spying done by "major powers" and others. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_intelligence_agencies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_intelligence_agencies [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states
    - yorwba 3y ago
      More pertinent in this case, probably: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-09-15/china-wanted-ge-s-secrets-but-then-their-spy-got-caught https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-09-15/china-wan... When Xu was apprehended, he had with him an iPhone whose contents he’d faithfully backed up to the cloud, a lapse that allowed FBI investigators to recover all the data from Apple Inc. ... FBI search warrants to Apple and Google had opened up his iCloud and multiple Gmail accounts, and digital forensics experts at the bureau had mined the contents of the phones recovered at the arrest. (Investigators were not able to recover anything, however, from the iPhone Xu Heng had been carrying. The day after the arrest, someone remotely accessed the device and wiped it clean.)
      - saiya-jin 3y ago
        As simple as that. Apple's 'security' is type of selective security that looks great on PR campaigns (we encrypt this part of face scan, we do that to cloud), make users feel they have something better, yet if one actually has anything important to hide, its useless. Certain Israeli private company can hack through any phone security (at least both ios and android) like its not there, you just need to pay enough. You can be genocidal murderer too, doesnt matter. Good luck explaining this to nontrivial part of HN crowd who are absolutely uncritical of Apple. I think if google would be doing 100% as they do now but be a chinese company, they would be smeared to hell by the same crowd. At least both are US companies, so some diacussions with some can be had.
  - petesergeant 3y ago
    > And that makes sense as well I dunno, I think I'd rather a group of people I was trying to hack were using a collection of random devices with vendor-supplied customer Android builds on them than iOS. > if everyone in the gov has an iPhone it makes it harder to be tough on Tim Apple Everyone in the government is a party member and will toe the line. It's the middle-class public you need to keep your eye on.
  - ksec 3y ago
    > it makes it harder to be tough on Tim Apple. Considering China's Biggest Export are Consumer Electronics and its adjacent industry, Apple has been the biggest help to that in the past 15 years. Not just on its products, but also the whole Supply Chain from Display to NAND. I warned about BOE and YMTC in 2016 on SemiWiki before both names enter into mainstream media. And it seems only Financial Times [1] ( or arguably Patrick McGee ) is getting it. Almost every comments on HN hate Qualcomm, during the Apple vs Qualcomm trial, the company that sided with Apple most was interestingly ( or not ) Huawei. So no, there are still no signs they are tough on Apple. If anything Apple are helping Chinese companies to set up base outside of China to continue their operation. Actively funding and directing resources. This trend has only recently stopped some what after India demanded more local company to be used inside supply chains. Again, if anything Tim Cook is very much Pro China. [1] https://www.ft.com/content/bf8e3846-2421-4f91-becf-2dfe39ec9941 https://www.ft.com/content/bf8e3846-2421-4f91-becf-2dfe39ec9...
    - dr-detroit 3y ago
      [dead]
- lewdev 3y ago
  But are the mirrored for the same reasons? If I'm not mistaken Isn't Tiktok famously misusing private data of its users? Which I believe was the reason for the US ban.
- kornhole 3y ago
  It more closely resembles Russia's bans on Iphones due to security reasons. https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/russia-says-us-hacked-thousands-iphones-espionage-operation https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/russia-says-us-hacked...
ftxbro 3y ago
first they evade the U.S. chip bans, now they ban U.S. phones, how can they be so hypocritical
- arrowsmith 3y ago
  [flagged]
- InitialLastName 3y ago
  Both actions are perfectly reasonably justified by self-interest, and I don't see them saying it's anything else.
  - ftxbro 3y ago
    > Both actions are perfectly reasonably justified by self-interest If that's a justification then isn't every kind of hypocrisy justified by self-interest?
    - lenkite 3y ago
      All nations look out for their self-interest first and foremost over any concerns of hypocrisy. The US is a prime example.
    - InitialLastName 3y ago
      Hypocrisy is characterized (to my mind) by criticism of the actions of others that one undertakes oneself, with a presumed unawareness that the conflict exists. The Chinese government is not acting with any sort of denial; these two actions may hold others to standards that they don't follow, but they don't seem to be avoiding that fact.
flykespice 3y ago
uno reverse card play against US ban I see
- cynicalsecurity 3y ago
  Yes, except US is not trying to destroy China while China seems to be secretly dreaming of destroying the West and becoming a global authoritarian hegemon. All after the US did for them.
  - bigbacaloa 3y ago
    Nonsense. US just as badly motivated as China.
  - rayval 3y ago
    "Secretly dreaming" sounds like a thought-crime. In terms of real-world actions, the US has more 750 military bases in 80 countries, including 300 in Asia. China has 8 overseas bases: one in Djibouti and the rest in islands near China. China is definitely trying to advance its economic interests throughout the world, by investing in infrastructure in Africa and Latin America. That's what every country does or aspires to do. It's just business. Better transparent soft power that delivers tangible results for the local populace rather than opaque coups, mercenary armies, and funding dictators and warlords.
  - marsa 3y ago
    why do you think that? like sure, i suppose every nation dreams of being the top dog ruling the world, and China even has a realistic shot at it but i never got any 'we want to destroy the west' vibes from China
    - tylerthetiger 3y ago
      The best example of we want to destroy the west vibes is - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atBDuJBuKpQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atBDuJBuKpQ
yohannparis 3y ago
I mean, seems fair to have a huge US company with an history of giving most of their data to their government to not be used.
- testfrequency 3y ago
  Apple has a history of giving most of their data to the US government? Did you mean to say “Apple has had to follow federal law when handed subpoena requests”?
  - fendy3002 3y ago
    The problem is when the data is related with foreign country that's been asked by the US govt. Can apple not follow it, and will they protect it? Maybe someone with better knowledge on this topic can answer.
  - onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago
    Apple doesn't have access to anything remotely to hand over data stored on your phone or in iCould, right? What are they even handing over in subpoenas?
    - mdorazio 3y ago
      Until very recently, iCloud was not encrypted by default. So in the case of a subpoena, they handed over all your unencrypted iCloud files, chat logs, backups, etc. That's much more difficult due to changes that just happened this year.
      - slaw 3y ago
        You need to turn on 'Advanced Data Protection for iCloud' to have data encrypted. Mail, Contacts and Calendars are still not encrypted (Apple has key). https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303
  - petesergeant 3y ago
meyum33 3y ago
They’ve banned Teslas from government compounds and big state-owned companies for a few years. There are even occasional reports of Tesla cars being diverted from certain roads for reasons the police wouldn’t disclose. Edit: It could be retaliations against US sanctions. But there’s a difference: All these kinds of orders are made without any written documents. These are just part of the general decline of the rule of law in China, which there weren’t much to begin with.
- toomuchtodo 3y ago
  Tesla concern is autopilot cameras shipping images back to Tesla, which is valid; Tesla does ship stills back for training if enabled in the data sharing configuration.
  - l33t7332273 3y ago
    Also Tesla is an absolute security nightmare.
    - john_alan 3y ago
      Got any evidence?
      - l33t7332273 3y ago
        Every security lab I’ve ever been around was picking lots of low hanging fruit from the fertile tree of that infotainment system.
        fooker 3y ago
        Do you have any evidence for this?
        l33t7332273 3y ago
        I’ve reached the limit of my personal experiences that I will be sharing. But, if you don’t know anyone in the offensive security space and still want to get some general feelings, perhaps you can start by looking into things like “Tesla CAN bus security,” “Tesla infotainment security,” and “Tesla NFC fob security.” Plus, here’s a heuristic for why they would have horrible security: they a are poorly built product which focuses more on flash than substance made by a company with an owner that is known to cut corners, and security is absolutely not one of the key selling points of this(or any other) car.
darknavi 3y ago
What is with the URL? stocks.apple.com redirects to wsj.com?
- brandonscott 3y ago
  it was shared from the apple stocks app
- seabass 3y ago
  On an iPhone it opens the stocks app into that article but with a paywall for Apple News+. Interesting that the desktop behavior is to redirect to wsj.
ramshanker 3y ago
Since when stocks.apple.com redirects to Wall Street Journal?
- Scoundreller 3y ago
  They embed news links in the stocks app, so probably an artefact of that.
- nashashmi 3y ago
  stocks apple is a goto shortcut url. But even then the paywall stays. The link should be changed.
jcrash 3y ago
Wouldn't be surprised if this is because the phones are TOO secure. Maybe they want them to use phones with built-in back-doors so they can keep an eye on them.
- c7DJTLrn 3y ago
  Not really, it's just tit-for-tat because Western governments banned use of phones from Chinese companies such as Huawei. It's the same game we've been playing for years.
  - manuelabeledo 3y ago
    Then they should have banned iPhone sales across China, as the US did with Huawei.
    - lenkite 3y ago
      The public ban will also come in due time. Probably when the US carries out another equipment ban against China. This is a way to manage public perceptions.
- Calvin02 3y ago
  I think MDM systems enable governments to track quite a bit these days. I think the real issue probably is somewhere between retaliation and the desire to support a domestic competitor. China has long had a view that it can't be reliant on a foreign company and that's especially true for the tech sector.
- politelemon 3y ago
  It's got backdoors, just not to the places they want it going to.
- smoldesu 3y ago
  I'd doubt it. Apple regularly provides the Chinese government with device data[0], and iCloud data is already stored in state-owned[1] servers. I struggle to imagine what more surveillance you could ask for. [0] https://www.apple.com/legal/transparency/cn.html https://www.apple.com/legal/transparency/cn.html [1] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351
zelphirkalt 3y ago
Might be that they have too much internal stuff going on, that they don't want phone makers to know about. The more leverage the phone makers have, the more difficult to rein them in.
sampa 3y ago
no surprise, considering every bodyshop now has a working iOS bugs chain to hack any iphone
- manuelabeledo 3y ago
  > working iOS bugs chain to hack any iphone I don't think this is true.
  - sampa 3y ago
    I cannot wait to be deceived! (c)
cabirum 3y ago
iPhones are also banned in Russia for govt officials. I believe that was after Kaspersky reported on the targeted vuln/backdoor attack ("Operation Triangulation")
- manuelabeledo 3y ago
  > I believe that was after Kaspersky reported on the targeted vuln/backdoor attack If that is true, what a bizarre reaction. Apple wasn't behind this, and, if anything, it highlighted Kaspersky shortcomings.
  - cabirum 3y ago
    Kaspersky exposed apple devices are backdoored and cannot be trusted. These devices are essentially black boxes controlled by adversary that cannot be properly audited. Apple obviously cooperates with Western govts providing/injecting backdoors, so it's prudent to ban them. What "kaspersky shortcomings" are you talking about?
    - manuelabeledo 3y ago
      > Kaspersky exposed apple devices are backdoored and cannot be trusted. iPhones are of course not invulnerable to malware, no one is claiming that. Android devices aren't either. What Kaspersky "exposed" was that their corporate devices were compromised. They claimed victory afterwards when they found the fact. But the truth is that they inadvertently allowed malware to roam free in their corporate devices for several years, which is quite telling, especially for a security company. Them shifting the blame to Apple is like blaming Cisco for a corporate network hack, when your personnel left a device exposed to the internet with no appropriate protections in place. Yeah, a Meraki could be as much of a "black box" as a mobile device. I get that Kaspersky has no business with Apple, but the whole saga was bizarrely unprofessional from their part.
seatac76 3y ago
Expect more and more of this. The ultimate prize are technology standards, right now the West dominates that and China is actively trying to dethrone them. The world will sort itself in two camps again, Cold War is back functionally.
- FirmwareBurner 3y ago
  >the West dominates You mean the US dominates. I don't see any EU, Canadian or Australian designed smart-phones, Office365, Google, Chat-GPT, AWS, I can buy reaching critical mass. Edit: INB4 the chip hipsters who found out about ASML during the pandemic chip shortage, chime in with "but muh ASML is European!". Yes, it is European(Dutch), it's also based on EUV tech licensed from the US, and has EUV light sources at it's core secret sauce, made by Cymer, a US company, but I was talking about software products and services which are the big money makers. EU, Canada, and the rest of the west are lacking in world dominating SW companies and rely exclusively on the US, which the US can always use as leverage. Ironically, China's detachment form the US SW companies and the need to develop it's own giants, will give it a major advantage long term, versus US's allies which will keep relying on it.
  - emodendroket 3y ago
    No but it’s a symbiotic system with EU companies being key parts of the system. Or am I missing some way I can buy a top-of-the-line cell phone not created with Taiwan-manufactured chips built using Dutch equipment? This is on purpose: the system is designed to create an important role for partners albeit a subordinate one. Though one might argue that they let Taiwan become too important. Either way, the recent book a Chip War is illuminating.
  - seatac76 3y ago
    Ahh yes, good point it is mostly the US, but US allies do own a lot of IP and supply chain capability, particularly Japan and SK. I don’t agree China will have the advantage though, it will certainly develop its own standards and mandate it internally but it remains to be seen if it will be able to export those standards, it tried with BRI and that did not work, but that was more manufacturing oriented. It’ll try to tech again but it will be a tough sell. It simply does not have the goodwill required. Will see gains in Russia, Pakistan and Cambodia, some countries in Africa but that’s about it.
greenyoda 3y ago
Archive of article with full text: https://archive.ph/MN7rx https://archive.ph/MN7rx
politician 3y ago
Not a surprise given Apple relocating their manufacturing to southeast Asia and out of China.
manuelabeledo 3y ago
This just seems like a logical reaction to unknown supply chain attacks. The DoD has restrictions on acquisition of Chinese hardware, for example. Some HN posters believe that this is a tit-for-tat move regarding the Huawei sales ban, which is hardly comparable, as Huawei hardware cannot be legally distributed or sold by US companies.
- emodendroket 3y ago
  Even if it were the latter thing promoting domestic industry is a pretty logical thing to do in their shoes. Restricting supply of tech to China may make perfect sense from a US perspective but we can hardly expect them to play along.
- fouc 3y ago
  > unknown supply chain attacks. Is that the case given that iPhones are manufactured in China? My tinfoil hat theory is that they find it harder to hack iPhones to monitor their government officials.
  - SkyMarshal 3y ago
    The hardware is made in China but not the software. So it probably depends on how much oversight of the software the CCP has, and this decision implies not enough for their comfort.
    - bityard 3y ago
      Is it impossible for an adversary in China to modify an iPhone during manufacture in a way that Apple can't detect?
  - emodendroket 3y ago
    Maybe they do but one could just as well apply this logic to bans on Huawei telecom equipment.
  - Terretta 3y ago
    > My tinfoil hat theory is that they find it harder to hack iPhones to monitor their government officials. It is a fact that certain US agencies required Blackberry or Android, rather than iOS on iPhone, for this reason.
bouke 3y ago
Maybe this is when Apple finally decides to encrypt all iCloud storage?
- systemz 3y ago
  It's almost all e2ee https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36734905 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36734905
drcongo 3y ago
What a fantastic advert for Apple products. I remember when the G4 was banned from sale to Iran because it was a "super computer" - of course everyone wanted one then.
koprulusector 3y ago
Just a thought, but could they be worried about privacy features of the iPhone? Whistle blowers, dissidents, etc., would benefit from iOS Security relative to Android. Then again, I don’t know the export laws of China, for all I know, they require weak security to sell the iPhone in China.
nologic01 3y ago
The question is, how many mutually disjoint digital domains will the planet eventually split into? Countries have their own everything (laws, regulations, money, taxes etc) given that this is how the world's political power is managed. Digital tech and information flow spread like if it is a universal something, but that is not how the worlds political power is managed. At most you might have coalitions of allies that trust each other enough to have a joint info-space. But there isnt much trust even between EU and US, and ultimately its every truly sovereign entity for itself.
- imiric 3y ago
  Humans are tribal by nature. Countries and borders exist precisely because we can't agree on the same set of laws, forms of government, and how society is structured. In that sense, an open and universal internet is an anomaly. It was a great thought experiment by hippie technophiles, and "connecting the world" is a commonly parroted platitude by social media executives, but humans are far from ready to interact with millions of strangers from their own country, let alone from around the world. If anything, all this technology that was supposed to bring us together, has instead driven us further apart. The internet is our main source of information, yet it's been corrupted by advertising, corporations and governments to spread disinformation and propaganda on an unprecedented scale, and influence the masses towards their own agenda. We're still in the early stages of the technological revolution, but it's clear that a universal communication medium cannot exist yet. We're not ready for it. China and Russia already have isolated alternatives, and it's only a matter of time before other countries or coalitions follow suit. In any case, we can safely assume that all of it will be heavily censored and controlled by each government. Cryptography will exist in some form, but there will be backdoors for any government to exploit as needed. Is this too pessimistic? :) I'd really like to be wrong about all this, but I can't picture a scenario where billions of us happily sing kumbaya together around a virtual campfire.
  - nologic01 3y ago
    No, I don't think its too pessimistic. In fact the illusion of a global digital village lasts longer than what one might expect, probably because of tech illiteracy and the capture of various local elites. But I also dont think that the hippy technofiles were all wrong. Ironically, when you combine the finite Earth with extreme levels of digital information gathering and the zero cost of replication and transmission it is very hard to keep silos. E.g., pretty soon automated translation is a thing (and I am not an AI bro :-). Also you cant do much about joint dependencies on environmental deterioration without global coordination. How its going to play out is unclear but the scenario of the same old clans fighting it out in the same old ways is not a given in the longer term. There are centripetal and centrifugal forces. For now the pattern seems to be tearing apart.
impish9208 3y ago
Dupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37403089 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37403089
pgt 3y ago
My initial (unconfirmed) suspicion would be that the CCP has discovered the US is spying on their party members via Apple devices.
- lewdev 3y ago
  Isn't it more difficult to hack Apple devices than Android? Also, would Apple allow the US government to plant spyware on their devices sold in China? I also would more likely believe that China wants to monitor their own party members and thus, force them to use Android devices.
aaron695 3y ago
[dead]

128 points by smugma 3y ago

“China’s restriction mirrors similar bans in the U.S. against Huawei Technologies as well as against officials using Chinese-owned TikTok”

baby 3y ago
This is the correct explanation. And that makes sense as well. I think another insight might be that the Chinese gov doesn’t really like when large companies can influence their decisions. I’d imagine that if everyone in the gov has an iPhone it makes it harder to be tough on Tim Apple.
- WhereIsTheTruth 3y ago
  The reciprocity is related to fear of spying In the age of AI and model training, data is more than ever precious The US spying on EU leaders and their industry is perhaps what China is worried about https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-security-agency-spied-merkel-other-top-european-officials-through-danish-2021-05-30/ https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-security-agency-spie... https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/290615/revealed-massive-us-industrial-espionage-against-france https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/290615/revealed-m... https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/russia-says-us-accessed-thousands-of-apple-phones-in-spy-plot/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/russia-s...
  - smoldesu 3y ago
    It's a shame that a superpower like China can't call out the United States on surveillance without it being hypocrisy. We need more countries objecting to unfair power-alignment like FIVE EYES, XKeyscore and PRISM. Unfortunately, most of them would rather build their own version rather than hold the US to a higher standard. Hopeless "violence begets violence" situations like this underscore how disastrous a full exposé of both governments would be. It's a sad time to be a global citizen.
    - kube-system 3y ago
      All major powers spy on everyone. It is a prerequisite for being a major power, and it always has been.
      - smoldesu 3y ago
        I agree. In the same way we resent nuclear warfare though, we should want to "de-surveillance-ize" as much of the free world as possible. It's an unsafe deterrent and (as we're seeing now) a terrible precedent to set when things verge towards war.
      - WillPostForFood 3y ago
        All major powers spy on everyone Can't we just say all nation states? It certainly isn't just major powers that have spy agencies. E.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_intelligence_agencies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_intelligence_agencies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Security_Agency_(South_Africa) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Security_Agency_(South_A...
        crazygringo 3y ago
        I don't think all nation states have spy agencies. Wikipedia lists them for 122 countries [1], out of 206 [2]. So about 60%. Maybe a little higher if a few are missing. I do wonder if there's also some kind of commonly accepted division within those that separates the "big guys" vs the "little guys", e.g. if there's a certain key spying ability that takes a certain level of funding and sophistication. I mean, I do have to assume that there is a qualitative difference between the kind of spying done by "major powers" and others. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_intelligence_agencies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_intelligence_agencies [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states
  - yorwba 3y ago
    More pertinent in this case, probably: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-09-15/china-wanted-ge-s-secrets-but-then-their-spy-got-caught https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-09-15/china-wan... When Xu was apprehended, he had with him an iPhone whose contents he’d faithfully backed up to the cloud, a lapse that allowed FBI investigators to recover all the data from Apple Inc. ... FBI search warrants to Apple and Google had opened up his iCloud and multiple Gmail accounts, and digital forensics experts at the bureau had mined the contents of the phones recovered at the arrest. (Investigators were not able to recover anything, however, from the iPhone Xu Heng had been carrying. The day after the arrest, someone remotely accessed the device and wiped it clean.)
    - saiya-jin 3y ago
      As simple as that. Apple's 'security' is type of selective security that looks great on PR campaigns (we encrypt this part of face scan, we do that to cloud), make users feel they have something better, yet if one actually has anything important to hide, its useless. Certain Israeli private company can hack through any phone security (at least both ios and android) like its not there, you just need to pay enough. You can be genocidal murderer too, doesnt matter. Good luck explaining this to nontrivial part of HN crowd who are absolutely uncritical of Apple. I think if google would be doing 100% as they do now but be a chinese company, they would be smeared to hell by the same crowd. At least both are US companies, so some diacussions with some can be had.
- petesergeant 3y ago
  > And that makes sense as well I dunno, I think I'd rather a group of people I was trying to hack were using a collection of random devices with vendor-supplied customer Android builds on them than iOS. > if everyone in the gov has an iPhone it makes it harder to be tough on Tim Apple Everyone in the government is a party member and will toe the line. It's the middle-class public you need to keep your eye on.
- ksec 3y ago
  > it makes it harder to be tough on Tim Apple. Considering China's Biggest Export are Consumer Electronics and its adjacent industry, Apple has been the biggest help to that in the past 15 years. Not just on its products, but also the whole Supply Chain from Display to NAND. I warned about BOE and YMTC in 2016 on SemiWiki before both names enter into mainstream media. And it seems only Financial Times [1] ( or arguably Patrick McGee ) is getting it. Almost every comments on HN hate Qualcomm, during the Apple vs Qualcomm trial, the company that sided with Apple most was interestingly ( or not ) Huawei. So no, there are still no signs they are tough on Apple. If anything Apple are helping Chinese companies to set up base outside of China to continue their operation. Actively funding and directing resources. This trend has only recently stopped some what after India demanded more local company to be used inside supply chains. Again, if anything Tim Cook is very much Pro China. [1] https://www.ft.com/content/bf8e3846-2421-4f91-becf-2dfe39ec9941 https://www.ft.com/content/bf8e3846-2421-4f91-becf-2dfe39ec9...
  - dr-detroit 3y ago
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lewdev 3y ago
But are the mirrored for the same reasons? If I'm not mistaken Isn't Tiktok famously misusing private data of its users? Which I believe was the reason for the US ban.
kornhole 3y ago
It more closely resembles Russia's bans on Iphones due to security reasons. https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/russia-says-us-hacked-thousands-iphones-espionage-operation https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/russia-says-us-hacked...

ftxbro 3y ago

first they evade the U.S. chip bans, now they ban U.S. phones, how can they be so hypocritical

arrowsmith 3y ago
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InitialLastName 3y ago
Both actions are perfectly reasonably justified by self-interest, and I don't see them saying it's anything else.
- ftxbro 3y ago
  > Both actions are perfectly reasonably justified by self-interest If that's a justification then isn't every kind of hypocrisy justified by self-interest?
  - lenkite 3y ago
    All nations look out for their self-interest first and foremost over any concerns of hypocrisy. The US is a prime example.
  - InitialLastName 3y ago
    Hypocrisy is characterized (to my mind) by criticism of the actions of others that one undertakes oneself, with a presumed unawareness that the conflict exists. The Chinese government is not acting with any sort of denial; these two actions may hold others to standards that they don't follow, but they don't seem to be avoiding that fact.

flykespice 3y ago

uno reverse card play against US ban I see

cynicalsecurity 3y ago
Yes, except US is not trying to destroy China while China seems to be secretly dreaming of destroying the West and becoming a global authoritarian hegemon. All after the US did for them.
- bigbacaloa 3y ago
  Nonsense. US just as badly motivated as China.
- rayval 3y ago
  "Secretly dreaming" sounds like a thought-crime. In terms of real-world actions, the US has more 750 military bases in 80 countries, including 300 in Asia. China has 8 overseas bases: one in Djibouti and the rest in islands near China. China is definitely trying to advance its economic interests throughout the world, by investing in infrastructure in Africa and Latin America. That's what every country does or aspires to do. It's just business. Better transparent soft power that delivers tangible results for the local populace rather than opaque coups, mercenary armies, and funding dictators and warlords.
- marsa 3y ago
  why do you think that? like sure, i suppose every nation dreams of being the top dog ruling the world, and China even has a realistic shot at it but i never got any 'we want to destroy the west' vibes from China
  - tylerthetiger 3y ago
    The best example of we want to destroy the west vibes is - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atBDuJBuKpQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atBDuJBuKpQ

yohannparis 3y ago

I mean, seems fair to have a huge US company with an history of giving most of their data to their government to not be used.

testfrequency 3y ago
Apple has a history of giving most of their data to the US government? Did you mean to say “Apple has had to follow federal law when handed subpoena requests”?
- fendy3002 3y ago
  The problem is when the data is related with foreign country that's been asked by the US govt. Can apple not follow it, and will they protect it? Maybe someone with better knowledge on this topic can answer.
- onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago
  Apple doesn't have access to anything remotely to hand over data stored on your phone or in iCould, right? What are they even handing over in subpoenas?
  - mdorazio 3y ago
    Until very recently, iCloud was not encrypted by default. So in the case of a subpoena, they handed over all your unencrypted iCloud files, chat logs, backups, etc. That's much more difficult due to changes that just happened this year.
    - slaw 3y ago
      You need to turn on 'Advanced Data Protection for iCloud' to have data encrypted. Mail, Contacts and Calendars are still not encrypted (Apple has key). https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303
- petesergeant 3y ago

meyum33 3y ago

They’ve banned Teslas from government compounds and big state-owned companies for a few years. There are even occasional reports of Tesla cars being diverted from certain roads for reasons the police wouldn’t disclose. Edit: It could be retaliations against US sanctions. But there’s a difference: All these kinds of orders are made without any written documents. These are just part of the general decline of the rule of law in China, which there weren’t much to begin with.

toomuchtodo 3y ago
Tesla concern is autopilot cameras shipping images back to Tesla, which is valid; Tesla does ship stills back for training if enabled in the data sharing configuration.
- l33t7332273 3y ago
  Also Tesla is an absolute security nightmare.
  - john_alan 3y ago
    Got any evidence?
    - l33t7332273 3y ago
      Every security lab I’ve ever been around was picking lots of low hanging fruit from the fertile tree of that infotainment system.
      - fooker 3y ago
        Do you have any evidence for this?
        l33t7332273 3y ago
        I’ve reached the limit of my personal experiences that I will be sharing. But, if you don’t know anyone in the offensive security space and still want to get some general feelings, perhaps you can start by looking into things like “Tesla CAN bus security,” “Tesla infotainment security,” and “Tesla NFC fob security.” Plus, here’s a heuristic for why they would have horrible security: they a are poorly built product which focuses more on flash than substance made by a company with an owner that is known to cut corners, and security is absolutely not one of the key selling points of this(or any other) car.

darknavi 3y ago

What is with the URL? stocks.apple.com redirects to wsj.com?

brandonscott 3y ago
it was shared from the apple stocks app
seabass 3y ago
On an iPhone it opens the stocks app into that article but with a paywall for Apple News+. Interesting that the desktop behavior is to redirect to wsj.

ramshanker 3y ago

Since when stocks.apple.com redirects to Wall Street Journal?

Scoundreller 3y ago
They embed news links in the stocks app, so probably an artefact of that.
nashashmi 3y ago
stocks apple is a goto shortcut url. But even then the paywall stays. The link should be changed.

jcrash 3y ago

Wouldn't be surprised if this is because the phones are TOO secure. Maybe they want them to use phones with built-in back-doors so they can keep an eye on them.

c7DJTLrn 3y ago
Not really, it's just tit-for-tat because Western governments banned use of phones from Chinese companies such as Huawei. It's the same game we've been playing for years.
- manuelabeledo 3y ago
  Then they should have banned iPhone sales across China, as the US did with Huawei.
  - lenkite 3y ago
    The public ban will also come in due time. Probably when the US carries out another equipment ban against China. This is a way to manage public perceptions.
Calvin02 3y ago
I think MDM systems enable governments to track quite a bit these days. I think the real issue probably is somewhere between retaliation and the desire to support a domestic competitor. China has long had a view that it can't be reliant on a foreign company and that's especially true for the tech sector.
politelemon 3y ago
It's got backdoors, just not to the places they want it going to.
smoldesu 3y ago
I'd doubt it. Apple regularly provides the Chinese government with device data[0], and iCloud data is already stored in state-owned[1] servers. I struggle to imagine what more surveillance you could ask for. [0] https://www.apple.com/legal/transparency/cn.html https://www.apple.com/legal/transparency/cn.html [1] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351

zelphirkalt 3y ago

Might be that they have too much internal stuff going on, that they don't want phone makers to know about. The more leverage the phone makers have, the more difficult to rein them in.

sampa 3y ago

no surprise, considering every bodyshop now has a working iOS bugs chain to hack any iphone

manuelabeledo 3y ago
> working iOS bugs chain to hack any iphone I don't think this is true.
- sampa 3y ago
  I cannot wait to be deceived! (c)

cabirum 3y ago

iPhones are also banned in Russia for govt officials. I believe that was after Kaspersky reported on the targeted vuln/backdoor attack ("Operation Triangulation")

manuelabeledo 3y ago
> I believe that was after Kaspersky reported on the targeted vuln/backdoor attack If that is true, what a bizarre reaction. Apple wasn't behind this, and, if anything, it highlighted Kaspersky shortcomings.
- cabirum 3y ago
  Kaspersky exposed apple devices are backdoored and cannot be trusted. These devices are essentially black boxes controlled by adversary that cannot be properly audited. Apple obviously cooperates with Western govts providing/injecting backdoors, so it's prudent to ban them. What "kaspersky shortcomings" are you talking about?
  - manuelabeledo 3y ago
    > Kaspersky exposed apple devices are backdoored and cannot be trusted. iPhones are of course not invulnerable to malware, no one is claiming that. Android devices aren't either. What Kaspersky "exposed" was that their corporate devices were compromised. They claimed victory afterwards when they found the fact. But the truth is that they inadvertently allowed malware to roam free in their corporate devices for several years, which is quite telling, especially for a security company. Them shifting the blame to Apple is like blaming Cisco for a corporate network hack, when your personnel left a device exposed to the internet with no appropriate protections in place. Yeah, a Meraki could be as much of a "black box" as a mobile device. I get that Kaspersky has no business with Apple, but the whole saga was bizarrely unprofessional from their part.

seatac76 3y ago

Expect more and more of this. The ultimate prize are technology standards, right now the West dominates that and China is actively trying to dethrone them. The world will sort itself in two camps again, Cold War is back functionally.

FirmwareBurner 3y ago
>the West dominates You mean the US dominates. I don't see any EU, Canadian or Australian designed smart-phones, Office365, Google, Chat-GPT, AWS, I can buy reaching critical mass. Edit: INB4 the chip hipsters who found out about ASML during the pandemic chip shortage, chime in with "but muh ASML is European!". Yes, it is European(Dutch), it's also based on EUV tech licensed from the US, and has EUV light sources at it's core secret sauce, made by Cymer, a US company, but I was talking about software products and services which are the big money makers. EU, Canada, and the rest of the west are lacking in world dominating SW companies and rely exclusively on the US, which the US can always use as leverage. Ironically, China's detachment form the US SW companies and the need to develop it's own giants, will give it a major advantage long term, versus US's allies which will keep relying on it.
- emodendroket 3y ago
  No but it’s a symbiotic system with EU companies being key parts of the system. Or am I missing some way I can buy a top-of-the-line cell phone not created with Taiwan-manufactured chips built using Dutch equipment? This is on purpose: the system is designed to create an important role for partners albeit a subordinate one. Though one might argue that they let Taiwan become too important. Either way, the recent book a Chip War is illuminating.
- seatac76 3y ago
  Ahh yes, good point it is mostly the US, but US allies do own a lot of IP and supply chain capability, particularly Japan and SK. I don’t agree China will have the advantage though, it will certainly develop its own standards and mandate it internally but it remains to be seen if it will be able to export those standards, it tried with BRI and that did not work, but that was more manufacturing oriented. It’ll try to tech again but it will be a tough sell. It simply does not have the goodwill required. Will see gains in Russia, Pakistan and Cambodia, some countries in Africa but that’s about it.

greenyoda 3y ago

Archive of article with full text: https://archive.ph/MN7rx https://archive.ph/MN7rx

politician 3y ago

Not a surprise given Apple relocating their manufacturing to southeast Asia and out of China.

manuelabeledo 3y ago

This just seems like a logical reaction to unknown supply chain attacks. The DoD has restrictions on acquisition of Chinese hardware, for example. Some HN posters believe that this is a tit-for-tat move regarding the Huawei sales ban, which is hardly comparable, as Huawei hardware cannot be legally distributed or sold by US companies.

emodendroket 3y ago
Even if it were the latter thing promoting domestic industry is a pretty logical thing to do in their shoes. Restricting supply of tech to China may make perfect sense from a US perspective but we can hardly expect them to play along.
fouc 3y ago
> unknown supply chain attacks. Is that the case given that iPhones are manufactured in China? My tinfoil hat theory is that they find it harder to hack iPhones to monitor their government officials.
- SkyMarshal 3y ago
  The hardware is made in China but not the software. So it probably depends on how much oversight of the software the CCP has, and this decision implies not enough for their comfort.
  - bityard 3y ago
    Is it impossible for an adversary in China to modify an iPhone during manufacture in a way that Apple can't detect?
- emodendroket 3y ago
  Maybe they do but one could just as well apply this logic to bans on Huawei telecom equipment.
- Terretta 3y ago
  > My tinfoil hat theory is that they find it harder to hack iPhones to monitor their government officials. It is a fact that certain US agencies required Blackberry or Android, rather than iOS on iPhone, for this reason.

bouke 3y ago

Maybe this is when Apple finally decides to encrypt all iCloud storage?

systemz 3y ago
It's almost all e2ee https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36734905 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36734905

drcongo 3y ago

What a fantastic advert for Apple products. I remember when the G4 was banned from sale to Iran because it was a "super computer" - of course everyone wanted one then.

koprulusector 3y ago

Just a thought, but could they be worried about privacy features of the iPhone? Whistle blowers, dissidents, etc., would benefit from iOS Security relative to Android. Then again, I don’t know the export laws of China, for all I know, they require weak security to sell the iPhone in China.

nologic01 3y ago

The question is, how many mutually disjoint digital domains will the planet eventually split into? Countries have their own everything (laws, regulations, money, taxes etc) given that this is how the world's political power is managed. Digital tech and information flow spread like if it is a universal something, but that is not how the worlds political power is managed. At most you might have coalitions of allies that trust each other enough to have a joint info-space. But there isnt much trust even between EU and US, and ultimately its every truly sovereign entity for itself.

imiric 3y ago
Humans are tribal by nature. Countries and borders exist precisely because we can't agree on the same set of laws, forms of government, and how society is structured. In that sense, an open and universal internet is an anomaly. It was a great thought experiment by hippie technophiles, and "connecting the world" is a commonly parroted platitude by social media executives, but humans are far from ready to interact with millions of strangers from their own country, let alone from around the world. If anything, all this technology that was supposed to bring us together, has instead driven us further apart. The internet is our main source of information, yet it's been corrupted by advertising, corporations and governments to spread disinformation and propaganda on an unprecedented scale, and influence the masses towards their own agenda. We're still in the early stages of the technological revolution, but it's clear that a universal communication medium cannot exist yet. We're not ready for it. China and Russia already have isolated alternatives, and it's only a matter of time before other countries or coalitions follow suit. In any case, we can safely assume that all of it will be heavily censored and controlled by each government. Cryptography will exist in some form, but there will be backdoors for any government to exploit as needed. Is this too pessimistic? :) I'd really like to be wrong about all this, but I can't picture a scenario where billions of us happily sing kumbaya together around a virtual campfire.
- nologic01 3y ago
  No, I don't think its too pessimistic. In fact the illusion of a global digital village lasts longer than what one might expect, probably because of tech illiteracy and the capture of various local elites. But I also dont think that the hippy technofiles were all wrong. Ironically, when you combine the finite Earth with extreme levels of digital information gathering and the zero cost of replication and transmission it is very hard to keep silos. E.g., pretty soon automated translation is a thing (and I am not an AI bro :-). Also you cant do much about joint dependencies on environmental deterioration without global coordination. How its going to play out is unclear but the scenario of the same old clans fighting it out in the same old ways is not a given in the longer term. There are centripetal and centrifugal forces. For now the pattern seems to be tearing apart.

impish9208 3y ago

Dupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37403089 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37403089

pgt 3y ago

My initial (unconfirmed) suspicion would be that the CCP has discovered the US is spying on their party members via Apple devices.

lewdev 3y ago
Isn't it more difficult to hack Apple devices than Android? Also, would Apple allow the US government to plant spyware on their devices sold in China? I also would more likely believe that China wants to monitor their own party members and thus, force them to use Android devices.

aaron695 3y ago

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