8 ms·

If the NSA intercepts data "near" Googles data centers, what's to believe they don't do that at Apple too? I'm really not worried about warrants and gag orders

by aet 13y ago

If the NSA intercepts data "near" Googles data centers, what's to believe they don't do that at Apple too? I'm really not worried about warrants and gag orders and all that. What about the fact that all (lots of) the traffic is being pulled straight off the fiber all over the place? Anyone with more technical background care to comment?

benihana 13y ago
Because Google is in the business of aggregating, storing and analyzing huge amounts of customer data. Apple is not. Google is a much more attractive target for a spy agency trying to poach data from. Apple has gone on record saying they encrypt data and they don't store it in any recognizable form. I tend to believe that, as if it wasn't the truth, they wouldn't lie about it - they just wouldn't mention it. The fact that they would say that seems to indicate they're pretty confident it's true - if it turned out they were lying, the public backlash would be ruthless. So yeah, google's data is much more attractive.
- Intermernet 13y ago
  "Apple has gone on record saying they encrypt data and they don't store it in any recognizable form. I tend to believe that, as if it wasn't the truth, they wouldn't lie about it - they just wouldn't mention it." Until very recently Adobe claimed the same. I'd be very careful about trusting such claims.
MichaelGG 13y ago
With the interesting revelation of private fiber being tapped, I'd expect more companies to start encrypting if they haven't already. Google was sending information over unsecured circuits without encryption. I'd expect Microsoft and others will make an announcement. With MS's overly zealous security handling these days, I'd be slightly surprised to find out that they were transmitting in the clear outside their datacenter. If there were actual taps _inside_ the datacenters, like on top of racks and so on, that'd be quite the spectacle.
- hackula1 13y ago
  When the message is basically "the government is collecting your emails" I am skeptical that the public would get that much more mad at a technical distinction like this. If there has not been an actionable backlash yet, what really could cause it? I am thinking that the leaks need to be something along the lines of "Kate Johnson of Columbus Ohio (made up name) had her explicit text message viewed by her ex husband, an NSA analyst, on N occasions." We have not had a leak that hits home yet for everyday people (non-tech non-world-leader).
  - rpearl 13y ago
    http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/27/politics/nsa-snooping/ http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/27/politics/nsa-snooping/ "In one 2004 case, a civilian employee told NSA security that she had spied on a foreign phone number because she found it on her husband's cell phone and suspected he was being unfaithful."

by aet 13y ago

benihana 13y ago

Because Google is in the business of aggregating, storing and analyzing huge amounts of customer data. Apple is not. Google is a much more attractive target for a spy agency trying to poach data from. Apple has gone on record saying they encrypt data and they don't store it in any recognizable form. I tend to believe that, as if it wasn't the truth, they wouldn't lie about it - they just wouldn't mention it. The fact that they would say that seems to indicate they're pretty confident it's true - if it turned out they were lying, the public backlash would be ruthless. So yeah, google's data is much more attractive.

Intermernet 13y ago
"Apple has gone on record saying they encrypt data and they don't store it in any recognizable form. I tend to believe that, as if it wasn't the truth, they wouldn't lie about it - they just wouldn't mention it." Until very recently Adobe claimed the same. I'd be very careful about trusting such claims.

MichaelGG 13y ago

With the interesting revelation of private fiber being tapped, I'd expect more companies to start encrypting if they haven't already. Google was sending information over unsecured circuits without encryption. I'd expect Microsoft and others will make an announcement. With MS's overly zealous security handling these days, I'd be slightly surprised to find out that they were transmitting in the clear outside their datacenter. If there were actual taps _inside_ the datacenters, like on top of racks and so on, that'd be quite the spectacle.

hackula1 13y ago
When the message is basically "the government is collecting your emails" I am skeptical that the public would get that much more mad at a technical distinction like this. If there has not been an actionable backlash yet, what really could cause it? I am thinking that the leaks need to be something along the lines of "Kate Johnson of Columbus Ohio (made up name) had her explicit text message viewed by her ex husband, an NSA analyst, on N occasions." We have not had a leak that hits home yet for everyday people (non-tech non-world-leader).
- rpearl 13y ago
  http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/27/politics/nsa-snooping/ http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/27/politics/nsa-snooping/ "In one 2004 case, a civilian employee told NSA security that she had spied on a foreign phone number because she found it on her husband's cell phone and suspected he was being unfaithful."