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This is so crazy to see. Usually when Apple faces the public, everything is super curated to sound pro-consumer, even if its anti-consumer. Sure this PDF doesn

This is so crazy to see. Usually when Apple faces the public, everything is super curated to sound pro-consumer, even if its anti-consumer. Sure this PDF doesnt venture far from it, they still paint Apple in the prettiest picture, but the terminology shows that Apple is basically doing the same thing as google but with slightly different methods to blur it. Heck, we don't actually know what is going on inside an iPhone, they could be combining accounts and sending data to Cambridge Analytica for all we know. At least with a degoogled Android, you know exactly where everything is going. This is the classic gaslighting that I've come to expect.

HumblyTossed 3y ago
> Heck, we don't actually know what is going on inside an iPhone, they could be combining accounts and sending data to Cambridge Analytica for all we know. You have a point. Apple depends so much on security by obscurity.
- brookst 3y ago
  That’s true of everything you haven’t compiled yourself, using a compiler you wrote and bootstrapped yourself. There is no technical proof that any of the software or hardware we use every day is trustworthy. There is, however, incentive alignment that makes it unlikely that companies do wild and crazy things.
  - rekoil 3y ago
    > That’s true of everything you haven’t compiled yourself, using a compiler you wrote and bootstrapped yourself. Don't forget the hardware you built yourself. [1] 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Management_Engine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Management_Engine
  - fsflover 3y ago
    > That’s true of everything you haven’t compiled yourself Except if your software is reproducible: https://reproducible-builds.org/ https://reproducible-builds.org/
    - brookst 3y ago
      Still not 100% secure. Someone can MITM your connection and forge the info used to verify builds. It’s a silly example, but the point stands: there is no 100% security for anything that any other person or system has had any access to. It’s not a reasonable standard to demand.
      - fsflover 3y ago
        There is no 100% of anything, but there is a reasonable security.
realusername 3y ago
In the Apple world, they basically carefully redefined privacy as "anyones else besides us getting access". They put themselves as a fully trusted party for everything.
- brookst 3y ago
  How do you square that claim with E2EE and the way Find My works?
  - eimrine 3y ago
    Not everything is under E2EE and the Find My is probably not the biggest privacy problem of Apple.
    - rekoil 3y ago
      Everything except specifically iCloud Mail, Contacts, and Calendar is E2EE when Advanced Data Protection is enabled. See this for what is and isn't encrypted: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303
    - brookst 3y ago
      Ah, I stand corrected. They do monitor and intercept everything, then.
  - rekoil 3y ago
    You can finally have your entire iCloud account end-to-end encrypted using Advanced Data Protection since earlier this year. iCloud Backups, iCloud drive, passwords, health data, basically everything except specifically iCloud Mail, Contacts, and Calendar [1] is all inaccessible to Apple when Advanced Data Protection is enabled. 1: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303
    - fsflover 3y ago
      https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveillance/ https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveil... > First, iCloud E2EE is opt-in. > Second, iCloud E2EE is woefully incomplete. When you iMessage with someone, they have iCloud Backup on by default, and non-E2EE by default, which means that approximately all of your iMessages (including all image and document attachments) will still be readable by Apple and the FBI because they are backed up twice: once from each end of the conversation. > Furthermore, the E2EE for iCloud Photos is not designed to preserve privacy. Even though iCloud Photos now supports E2EE for the content of the photos and videos stored, the file metadata is not E2EE, and the metadata includes the FILENAME and also a unique hash of the unencrypted file content.
dm319 3y ago
I always felt Apple pivoted to 'privacy' when they saw they had missed the race to harvest and monetise personal information.
- germandiago 3y ago
  Could be but anyways this is why competition is good.
- ubermonkey 3y ago
  That doesn't really bear scrutiny. Apple has always been a hardware company. Even before the ad economy online, they were a hardware company. Google was always a "harvest and monetize data" company.
asimpletune 3y ago
I don't understand from this document how you mean Apple is doing the same thing? In what sense do you mean? Also, how can you consider it "gaslighting" if it's a private document not intended for the public? Who are they gaslighting?
RockRobotRock 3y ago
Apple sells expensive hardware and Google sells ads and data. I agree that we will never know for sure what Apple does, but follow the incentives and you will know which company has more to lose.
- izacus 3y ago
  Apple also now sells a big advertising network, tracking devices and online services that compete with Google. They're way past hardware.
- hu3 3y ago
  https://searchads.apple.com/ https://searchads.apple.com/
- fsflover 3y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34299433 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34299433
  - RockRobotRock 3y ago
    damn

HumblyTossed 3y ago

> Heck, we don't actually know what is going on inside an iPhone, they could be combining accounts and sending data to Cambridge Analytica for all we know. You have a point. Apple depends so much on security by obscurity.

brookst 3y ago
That’s true of everything you haven’t compiled yourself, using a compiler you wrote and bootstrapped yourself. There is no technical proof that any of the software or hardware we use every day is trustworthy. There is, however, incentive alignment that makes it unlikely that companies do wild and crazy things.
- rekoil 3y ago
  > That’s true of everything you haven’t compiled yourself, using a compiler you wrote and bootstrapped yourself. Don't forget the hardware you built yourself. [1] 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Management_Engine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Management_Engine
- fsflover 3y ago
  > That’s true of everything you haven’t compiled yourself Except if your software is reproducible: https://reproducible-builds.org/ https://reproducible-builds.org/
  - brookst 3y ago
    Still not 100% secure. Someone can MITM your connection and forge the info used to verify builds. It’s a silly example, but the point stands: there is no 100% security for anything that any other person or system has had any access to. It’s not a reasonable standard to demand.
    - fsflover 3y ago
      There is no 100% of anything, but there is a reasonable security.

realusername 3y ago

In the Apple world, they basically carefully redefined privacy as "anyones else besides us getting access". They put themselves as a fully trusted party for everything.

brookst 3y ago
How do you square that claim with E2EE and the way Find My works?
- eimrine 3y ago
  Not everything is under E2EE and the Find My is probably not the biggest privacy problem of Apple.
  - rekoil 3y ago
    Everything except specifically iCloud Mail, Contacts, and Calendar is E2EE when Advanced Data Protection is enabled. See this for what is and isn't encrypted: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303
  - brookst 3y ago
    Ah, I stand corrected. They do monitor and intercept everything, then.
- rekoil 3y ago
  You can finally have your entire iCloud account end-to-end encrypted using Advanced Data Protection since earlier this year. iCloud Backups, iCloud drive, passwords, health data, basically everything except specifically iCloud Mail, Contacts, and Calendar [1] is all inaccessible to Apple when Advanced Data Protection is enabled. 1: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303
  - fsflover 3y ago
    https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveillance/ https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveil... > First, iCloud E2EE is opt-in. > Second, iCloud E2EE is woefully incomplete. When you iMessage with someone, they have iCloud Backup on by default, and non-E2EE by default, which means that approximately all of your iMessages (including all image and document attachments) will still be readable by Apple and the FBI because they are backed up twice: once from each end of the conversation. > Furthermore, the E2EE for iCloud Photos is not designed to preserve privacy. Even though iCloud Photos now supports E2EE for the content of the photos and videos stored, the file metadata is not E2EE, and the metadata includes the FILENAME and also a unique hash of the unencrypted file content.

dm319 3y ago

I always felt Apple pivoted to 'privacy' when they saw they had missed the race to harvest and monetise personal information.

germandiago 3y ago
Could be but anyways this is why competition is good.
ubermonkey 3y ago
That doesn't really bear scrutiny. Apple has always been a hardware company. Even before the ad economy online, they were a hardware company. Google was always a "harvest and monetize data" company.

asimpletune 3y ago

I don't understand from this document how you mean Apple is doing the same thing? In what sense do you mean? Also, how can you consider it "gaslighting" if it's a private document not intended for the public? Who are they gaslighting?

RockRobotRock 3y ago

Apple sells expensive hardware and Google sells ads and data. I agree that we will never know for sure what Apple does, but follow the incentives and you will know which company has more to lose.

izacus 3y ago
Apple also now sells a big advertising network, tracking devices and online services that compete with Google. They're way past hardware.
hu3 3y ago
https://searchads.apple.com/ https://searchads.apple.com/
fsflover 3y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34299433 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34299433
- RockRobotRock 3y ago
  damn