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Apple engineer says he was fired after refusing to send cust. device IDs to AT&T
- mohamedkoubaa 2mo ago[flagged]
- m3kw9 2mo ago[flagged]
- radium3d 2mo agoAT&T looking for more user data to leak to everyone? Already did the SSNs
- tdeck 2mo agoI have to say this sounds like an extremely believable form of shoddy PII stewardship.
- sigmonsays 2mo agoLink to non paywall version?
- ryanmerket 2mo agowe don't monetize yet, it's just email
- gortok 2mo agoBut we don’t want to have to give you our email.
- ryanmerket 2mo agoall good, i removed it
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- wmf 2mo agoThis guy is going to lose. If a company is violating no laws and your manager tells you to drop it, you can either drop it or quit. You don't get to choose how to interpret company policy.
- applfanboysbgon 2mo agoThere's a non-zero chance that Apple might settle if this gets sufficient media coverage, rather than letting it drag on for years making headlines and causing PR damage that exceeds what it would take to buy him off. Even if not illegal, this is surely not the kind of headline Apple wants to be in the news for.
- mike_d 2mo agoAt any large employer you sign an agreement to follow the employee handbook and internal policies. They all say the same thing: don't violate the policies even if directed to by your manager. In this case Apple's legal department had identified the serials and IMEIs as PII. This is why the case is in civil court and not criminal (because Apple didn't violate any "laws" as you claim). It is a contract dispute.
- otterley 2mo agoBoardman notified Apple’s legal team. At that point it was their decision to make. If they had told him to stop, that’d be one thing. But they didn’t, and it wasn’t up to Boardman to interpret the policy differently.
- chasil 2mo agoThe apparent takeaway is that Apple devices on AT&T have reduced privacy. This may change, obviously. Likely for the worse.
- codedokode 2mo agoThis is why you should use open-source firmware where there is no registration and customer IDs. Also, the software should allow overwrite IMEI to a random value daily. > Boardman believed the meeting would finally address both issues. > Apple fired him the next day. This is a reminder that being honest with a company doesn't benefit you.
- noman-land 2mo agoAny recs for such firmware (that randomizes IMEI)?
- dredmorbius 2mo agoLinked from Wikipedia's IMEI article, though apparently not a particularly solid source: <https://www.imeichanger.net/ https://www.imeichanger.net/>
- scheme271 2mo agoHow would that work? Wouldn't changing the IMEI regularly either get your phone blacklisted or it may not even get service due to the IMEI not being in your cell provider's system?
- happymellon 2mo agoDo all IMEIs get published to all networks globally whenever it is assigned to a phone? I'm not sure how changing your IMEI would get you blacklisted any more then if you switched your SIM between phones.
- codedokode 2mo agoIMEI is like a MAC address. You are identified by the data in the SIM card and not by IMEI.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- hilbert42 2mo agoThere are two laws missing that allow such privacy violations to occur. First is strong and enforceable law that makes it unlawful to violate one's privacy. The second is to prosecute violators directly—that is, employees cannot hide behind corporate walls and allow the corporate entity to take the blame. Irrespective of what employers demand, employees have a responsibility to obey the law. Risk of individual employees being chucked in the slammer would change corporate culture overnight. Fining corporations alone is a waste of time, they see such fines as the cost of doing business, losing one's freedom for an individual is another matter altogether. Employees must be frightened of the consequences of violating the law or the practice will continue.
- rileymat2 2mo agoThe main federal laws that are missing is a formal definition of what data you own and expect privacy and what data on you the company owns. In this case it is specified by contract which may or may not have been breached not law.
- nissa-seru 2mo agoI do not have enough pangram credits (free) to check the whole article, but running significant parts of it through, I am getting 100% AI generated. This is not an indictment - it is merely an observation. (to mimic gpt-style for a moment)
- burnt-resistor 2mo agoEthical consistency is more important than any job. Without this, one may become a Palantir engineer... completely lacking in morals and enabling real world evil.
- opengrass 2mo agoWhat a drama queen, guy never even had to step into the office.
- sleight42 2mo agoI don't care that Apple isn't violating laws sharing this information with carriers. For a company that likes to portray itself as respecting customer privacy, this is a failure. Shame on you, Apple. If you want to keep your reputation, be better.