Apple Can't Get Out of Siri Privacy Lawsuit, Says Judge

[PlayUltimate]

A lot of ignorants support Apple, it’s sad and a waste of time trying to convince them a surveillance algorithm is not good.

The surveillance is going to take place regardless. The question is does it take place in the cloud where it can be seen everywhere or will it take place on device so that the questionable image does not go to the cloud. If iCloud photo sync is turned off, nothing will be scanned.

 

[visualseed]

What are you talking about? The reference hash is a known set distributed by NCMEC. Every tech company uses it. So when researchers look at the phone they will either see the expected NCMEC hash values, or they will see something else. If they see something else they will raise the alarm - “apple appears to be looking for something other than child porn!”. If the hash values DO match the NCMEC values, then the chances that they are all actually searching for something else is astronomically small.

You are spreading incredibly false conspiracy theories here.

I'm not saying there is a conspiracy. You insist there is transparency and you reference a database of hashes but can't evaluate its contents. That not transparency. That's blind trust. I'm not saying Apple or NCMEC is doing anything nefarious, but if Apple does end-to-end encrypt iCloud data as it is suspected they may, the pressure by governments to access your phone's data through this mechanism will make the various AppStore fights seem like a Sunday walk in the park and Apple will have given them all the tools to do it and security researchers disputing the size and checksum of the reference hash database won't mean squat. Because even if it changes you will still have no idea why and and on who's authority and you won't even know if it's still looking at only iCloud photos or even scanning photos. And don't believe that Apple will be in any position to say "no" as they claim they will because they already debased themselves by saying "yes" to scanning for CSAM.

And just as a note to ponder their future intent and possible indemnification of past acts: in Apple's EULA they already claim to have the right not only to scan for CSAM but for any “potentially illegal content.”

 

[techfreak23]

One user in the lawsuit claimed that his private discussions with his doctor about a "brand name surgical treatment" caused him to receive targeted ads for that treatment, while others said that their discussions about Air Jordan sneakers, Pit Viper sunglasses, and Olive Garden resulted in targeted ads.

GTFO with that BS. Someone in line for surgery is bound to be doing research on it through Google... that is from where your targeted ads are coming, not accidental Siri activations. Same thing with people who actually talk about shoes like Air Jordans... I've never once had a conversation with someone about shoes, and if any person ever did talk to me about, they likely are one of those crazy shoe freaks and are already plastered to the web for new shoe drops and trying to get ahead of scalpers.

Targeted ads are also worthless most of the time. Most of the targeted ads I see are things I already subscribe to or have purchased. It actually becomes extremely annoying to see ads for thing you already own or have subscribed to.

 

[Duane Martin]

I have a feeling this is a frivolous lawsuit, but it's also an accusation that Apple should have to prove is false in court, if the accusers really want to go to court over it. I don't see why Apple should get a free pass to not even have to defend themselves over it?

This is the way the law works in the English judical system from which the American system has evolved. The defendant does not have to prove their innocence, the plaintiff has to prove their guilt. And that is a very good thing. Apple made an argument that the lawsuit was frivolous, which they have the right to do. That was dismissed. Apple is not getting a free pass.

The problem is so many on MacRumours want Apple to be tried and convicted without evidence. Screw the fair trail, members here are going for their torches and pitchforks. It has been more than 300 years since the Salem witch trials but that mentality is alive and well on MacRumours these days.

 

[MuppetGate]

This is nothing new. When required by a government, they have always searched for whatever the government demanded.

The difference, now, is that by using this system Apple can switch to end-to-end encryption for icloud photos, so that they cannot, ,in the future, search your icloud photos.

Turning on encryption is pretty useless, now that we know they‘re happy to scan and report on your personal files before they’re encrypted.

If they‘re doing this so they can encrypt iCloud photos then they don‘t understand folk as well as they thought. People don’t really care if their photos are encrypted or not because most people regard photos as something to be seen by others. That’s why they took the picture in the first place.

And Apple and its supporters rattling off convoluted technical arguments as to why this isn’t spyware isn’t going to make a jot of difference. At the end of the day, this is what folk are thinking:

By putting spyware on my phone that scans my photos against a database of hashed kiddie porn that you’ve also loaded onto my phone, you are assuming that I am a pedophile, and you will report me as a pedophile without giving me the chance to prove otherwise. And you’re doing this on my personal device, without my permission. Your privacy schtick is a joke. Why should I trust you again?

This is what people think, and reeling of specs and pointing to Apple PDFs isn’t going to change that.

Saying that folk can just avoid it by turning off iCloud Photos is also demonstrating that they’ve lost touch with their users. People rely on iCloud to store thousands of pictures. Apple believes that the effort of moving them will mean everyone will shut up and just accept it. Most people will, but will also harbour deep resentment for how they’ve been put into this position and will also feel that Apple is holding their data hostage.

 

[visualseed]

Turning on encryption is pretty useless, now that we know they‘re happy to scan and report on your personal files before they’re encrypted.

I never had a problem with Apple scanning for CSAM or anything else they want scan for as long they do it on their servers. They can scope creep and partner up with any government agency or third party they want to. It's their servers and I'm fine with that. I will still use iCloud because I determine what data I share and sync. Moving their agent to my phone is a bridge too far. Not because I disagree with CSAM scanning, it's because mandates change and the local software agent now has potential access to data that I have chosen not to share and Apple is free to change their mind about what they are scanning for with little or no notification to users. It's also possible their software can have bugs or make mistakes.

On my phone there is no separate "iCloud data" free for Apple to scan. It is all personal data. It doesn't become "iCloud data" until it is on their servers. If I seal a letter in an envelope and place it on my desk it is not suddenly free for the postmaster to come in my house and inspect for mail fraud. He can't argue that I intend to mail it and use my resources to inspect and report its content (and while he is there do I have to worry that he is reading something that just came out of my printer even though he swears he is just there to inspect the mail?) They can wait until I actually put a stamp on it and mail it and use their own resources once it is in their control.

It's not that I don't trust Apple. I am probably one of the biggest supporters of Apple in these forums. I love their hardware. I support their App Store policies and their right to run their business as they see fit. I think the free market should decide winners and loser. Not legislators. But it doesn't mean I accept everything they do as being right and just. Their intentions do not have to be nefarious to be harmful. Apple also has a long history of not asking for permission to do things and just hoping for forgiveness later. Usually in the form of settling class-action lawsuits.

Those saying "you can just turn off iCloud photos" seem to have forgotten the various bugs in the past that re-enabled system settings after an update or restart of the phone. I would hate for participation in a mass surveillance program to be determined by a simple software toggle switch that may not be 100% in my control.

 

[iZac]

It's funny that people jump straight to "my phone is listening to my conversations" when talking about things like this.

I'm not defending Apple as an unimpeachable entity or anything but there's a much more likely scenario about this "brand name surgery" that could go something like this:


*Doctor spends all morning searching about this 'Embarrassing Surgical Treatment' on Google on his work PC*

*Doctor is logged into YouTube so Google tags this IP address to him.*

*Doctor is also logged into YouTube on his Phone so it pulls his GeoLocation via GPS*

*Man through his search history Google has identified as being say ... 30-40, married, weighing 200 lbs and has two kids and a dog, walks into same GPS location as Doctor*

*'Embarrassing Surgical Treatment' company has AdChoice account targeting 35 year old, overweight, married men who walk the dog every morning for exercise*

*Man walks out of Doctors office and Ad is served to him based on his aggregated profile and the fact his GeoLocation overlapped with the Doctors for 45 minutes*

Sorry that was actually a rather convoluted explanation

Ah Reply All explained it better:

https://gimletmedia.com/shows/reply-all/z3hlwr

Among other things this episode does a good job of explaining that however unique we think we are, a thousand people have already done exactly the same thing given the same basic experiences.

 

[Marshall73]

They have more chance of proving god exists.

 

[cyanite]

Facebook absolutely records audio for targeted advertising. Mostly using the messenger app and while the screen is off.

That’s not a fact, that’s an often repeated anecdote with no substantial evidence.

I did not kew Apple was selling our information to advertisers like Google and Facebook are.

None of them are. Google and Facebook are advertisers (or advertisement placers), so they don’t sell data to advertisers.

hmmm. Fact amazon and google both send targeted ads based on conversations overheard, it has happened to people in my family. Seeing apple doesn't sell that info, but we know google and amazon do, how about suing them, wouldn't there be more money for the lawyers? A quandary

That’s not a fact, that’s an often repeated anecdote with no substantial evidence.

Apple collects billions from Google to allow Google to scan your iPhone for targeted advertisement.

They absolutely do not, that’s a ridiculous claim.

Turning on encryption is pretty useless, now that we know they‘re happy to scan and report on your personal files before they’re encrypted.

Doing it on the device means that less-auditable server side code doesn’t need to access the data. Otherwise the result is the same.

It's their servers and I'm fine with that. I will still use iCloud because I determine what data I share and sync.

No you don’t. iCloud Photo Library is an all or nothing service. You can switch it off, in which case the new scanning features are off as well.

 

[kk200]

Apple is going to have it rough the next years now all the big boys are out to get them.

Weird how suddenly everybody stopped talking about CSAM though. Seems people got tired of complaining about it lol

Before I hear anything from Apple on fixing this, no further purchase on iOS15 devices. I'm glad my smart home system is not on homekit and my iMac is not M1. I can switch to Android and save a lot of money.

 

[MuppetGate]

Don't forget Google, Amazon and Microsoft record you as well. Amazon's Alexa has the worst security on the planet and is easily hackable. There was a video a few years back where a hacker was talking to a child.

While I'm happy the lawsuit has made Siri dumb, but the amount of people who are willing to have Google Assistant, Alexa and Cortana on all the time blows my mind. Where are those lawsuits?

Good question.

I suspect part of the reason is that Google and Amazon have never claimed to be paragons of privacy, so there’s no point attacking them for their publicly acknowledged business model.

Apple, on the other hand, has spent years touting themselves as the self-appointed champions of privacy, and now that they’ve thrown all that out the window, it’s hardly surprising the shady legal bods circling: Apple has a massive self-inflicted wound that’s still bleeding, so expect to see more vultures start to pick at it to see what they might find.

 

[laptech]

I thnk those in the class action suit are going to find it difficult to prove their case because so many apps and websites are interlinked via 'cookies' that it is very easy to get targeted adverts. For me, Amazon is the worst one, it does not matter what website I visit, if it has ad potential I will get an email from Amazon advertising that they are selling that product in their store. I was looking at footwear from Sports direct, few hours later I get an email from Amazon about sports footwear. I visited an online toy store to look for toys for my niece and nephew birthday, few hours later I get an email from Amazon about the specific toys I looked at which they happen to have in their store. I visited Creative Labs website to see what computer audio stuff they had, yes you guessed it, a few hours later I get an email from Amazon telling me what Creative labs items they have in their store.

If you look at the 'cookies' that get hidden inside your browser, you will see a list of 'Associated partners' and other 'partners' and advertisers who are associated with the company that the 'cookie' is assigned to. I read the online news at Yahoo and at the time, a box came up asking me to accept or deny the cookie settings. I checked the list of companies that was linked to Yahoo that would be requesting my information and browser activity, at the time there was over 400 companies listed and each one i had to tick a box that said do i give permission for them to have my information, i ticked NO. This is only one example but it happens to every website.

People think Google is bad with it's persistant collection of peoples information, people do not realise just how bad Amazon is. Every website that has a popup that requests me to accept the 'cookie' has Amazon as one of it's prime 'Associated partners' meaning you are not able to disble it's tracking (i check each and everytime).

Instagram, WhatsApp, Snapchat, Twitter, Facebook, WeChat and many others, they all have Amazon as prime 'Associated partner' which means if your talking about something that Amazon just so happens to have in it's store, BAM you will get a targeted ad. This is why I think it is going to be very hard to prove that Apple is the cause of the directed ads.

 

[SBlue1]

Turns out the same law Firm was also suing Google earlier (July 1st)
see Google must face Voice Assistant privacy lawsuit -U.S. judge also Reuters article

Could be the people really get targeted ads but its not Siri that was doing the spying but Google?

 

[MuppetGate]

Doing it on the device means that less-auditable server side code doesn’t need to access the data. Otherwise the result is the same.

All that’s leaving the phone is an encrypted package that can be unlocked at Apple’s end. Auditors won‘t know what was sent from the phone, because only Apple’s reviewers (or whatever China’s equivalent will be) can see the pictures. The difference is that everyone else scans server side, so folk can still encrypt data before it’s sent to the cloud. Under Apple’s system, encrypting photos is useless because they’ve already been scanned.

 

[Jason2000]

"One user in the lawsuit claimed that his private discussions with his doctor about a "brand name surgical treatment" caused him to receive targeted ads for that treatment, while others said that their discussions about Air Jordan sneakers, Pit Viper sunglasses, and Olive Garden resulted in targeted ads."

Unless I am wrong Apple doesn't do targeted ads via Siri do they ? My wife and I use Siri a lot and have never gotten an ad for something we said to her.

 

[Jason2000]

hmmm. Fact amazon and google both send targeted ads based on conversations overheard, it has happened to people in my family. Seeing apple doesn't sell that info, but we know google and amazon do, how about suing them, wouldn't there be more money for the lawyers? A quandary

I have had Echo devices in my house since they came out and have never received targeted ads from Amazon because of something we have said. Yes the devices are always listening because they need to hear the wake word however Echo devices do not send everything they hear to Amazon. I can tell by monitoring the data leaving my network. So if you have FACTS that state otherwise please share the source. Matter of fact I have all 3 smart assistants and my HomePods send more data back to Apple than either Google or Amazon.

 

[PC_tech]

Give examples of trolls that get angry at "imagined and fabricated stories on social media." Do you think the CSAM story was fabricated? Also when did I say everyone that disagrees with me has a "false sense of loyalty"?

Don’t you know? If you don’t defend Apple like it’s your mother, you’re a troll 🙄

 

[PC_tech]

Most are aware considering it’s been all over the MSM 🙄

Meanwhile most consumers don’t know or don’t care about it because they don’t follow tech news

 

[PC_tech]

This is the way the law works in the English judical system from which the American system has evolved. The defendant does not have to prove their innocence, the plaintiff has to prove their guilt. And that is a very good thing. Apple made an argument that the lawsuit was frivolous, which they have the right to do. That was dismissed. Apple is not getting a free pass.

The problem is so many on MacRumours want Apple to be tried and convicted without evidence. Screw the fair trail, members here are going for their torches and pitchforks. It has been more than 300 years since the Salem witch trials but that mentality is alive and well on MacRumours these days.

Apple claims ALL are frivolous until it’s not 🙄

 

[Websnapx2]

Well, they're not selling the data but they do have in their terms of service that they can provide the data to their partners. So yeah.. they're basically selling your data and you agreed with it.

The partners were the third-party consultants that were verifying Siri data — not advertisers — they were pretty clear about that during the listening fiasco (that every other company did as well). Just because they mention a third party doesn't mean they are selling it or providing it to be sold for advertising.

 

[McTaste]

or how do you know they do when all of the evidence is to the contrary? I know we all just live in a world where anything can be made up at any time about any subject and someone will believe it. But sell advertising data, there would be a trail dude, people would know

I never claimed they do or do not, but the author of this article sure stated it as a fact.

 

[Steve121178]

does anyone know of any company anywhere that gets sued more than Apple?

They need to start implementing things better. The sloppy & rushed way they implement a lot of things is costing them billions a year.

There's also a lot of old practises they need to be modernised, especially anything that can potentially collect or use personal data. This is the same for any business.

Until Apple sorts out a lot of internal processes, they can expect lawsuit after lawsuit as its easy money for the lawyers.

 

[Feyl]

The partners were the third-party consultants that were verifying Siri data — not advertisers — they were pretty clear about that during the listening fiasco (that every other company did as well). Just because they mention a third party doesn't mean they are selling it or providing it to be sold for advertising.

Again.. I meant it in general.. Just go read App Store terms of service for example.

 

[Websnapx2]

Again.. I meant it in general.. Just go read App Store terms of service for example.

That was misleading as it wasn't the context of the conversation. Apple is open about the fact they do not house all the data, some are encrypted on AWS servers — that's just one example of how that line can be misconstrued to apply to a larger context than it realistically covers.

In this conversation, it doesn't apply.

 

[Feyl]

That was misleading as it wasn't the context of the conversation. Apple is open about the fact they do not house all the data, some are encrypted on AWS servers — that's just one example of how that line can be misconstrued to apply to a larger context than it realistically covers.

In this conversation, it doesn't apply.

It might not be relevant to Siri but Apple in general and that's the same thing.