4 ms·

"We should not share the control we have over our consumers with the NSA!"

• morgante 12y ago
  Apple, unlike other major tech companies, has a business model which is completely compatible with privacy. If anything, I suspect they would prefer a world where consumers demanded strict privacy and fewer online services.
  • hahainternet 12y ago
    > If anything, I suspect they would prefer a world where consumers demanded strict privacy and fewer online services. Because they are shit at building online services and excellent at selling people overpriced devices. Oh and FWIW. Apple also operates iAd, a locked down ad program targeted at their customers specifically.
  • pdkl95 12y ago
    Yes, Apple is different. Their business model is one of the few that is actually worse than the "big data" surveillance companies such as Google. Instead of attacking privacy, Apple has become one of the worst of the rent-seekers trying to control the General Purpose Computer. They have done most of what we feared Microsoft would do, and they have an entire generation of people who now think in terms of their walled garden. I respect Tim Cook quite a bit for making this effort to argue for privacy and the rule of law, but that doesn't excuse the incredible damage his company has done over the last decade.
    • amirmc 12y ago
      They make products people want. Lots of people buy them. As far as I'm aware, there aren't any nefarious tactics involved (eg embrace, extend, extinguish) - so they're not trying to distort the market (pls correct me if I'm wrong). Given that, why do you claim Apple has done damage, when really it's people who chose with their wallets?
  • walshemj 12y ago
    In that Case why is apple acting as the gate keeper for what I can or cant do with my phone?
    • sosborn 12y ago
      What the hell does that have to do with privacy?
      • walshemj 12y ago
        If you run the shop/walled garden that defines what you can put on your phone. Apple says you can be private just as long as you use our apps and obey our rules? That's corporate slavery
  • Logmix 12y ago
    Bullshit. iOS devices have only one way to do wireless backups, and that's with the Apple cloud. Apple could decide that it only does wireless backups with a little home server that you put into your own home, but they decided against that. Apple also could allow users to secure their cloud backups against anybody. But they decided they include mandatory key escrow by Apple itself. The mud puddle test proves that Apple and the NSA can access all your backup data. How is that a business model "completely compatible with privacy"?
    • TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
      iOS lets you do secure non-wireless backups. And the reason they do key escrow otherwise is simple: most people forget passwords.
      • Logmix 12y ago
        Yes but the don't offer an option without key escrow, which was my point.
    • ff10 12y ago
      iOS lets you do backups wirelessly and wired with iTunes, the former while you are within reach of your own network. Their business model can potentially be compatible with privacy since it does not rely on personal data gathering. Their profit is generated by actually selling devices and digital goods.
      • Logmix 12y ago
        I should have been a bit clearer. Your iOS devices are mobile - you may not be at home for days. iOS does indeed offer wireless backups, but only if you're at home. And by the way, I find that downmodding that hit me appaling and a sign of unhealthy group-think.
  • TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
    Similarly, Microsoft's business model is (or at least largely was) compatible with privacy.