Ok, so you upload photos through the web. Wouldn't they then sync to the device, the device check the photo, and then upload the security voucher back to iCloud?
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Apple's Proposed Phone-Scanning Child Safety Features 'Invasive, Ineffective, and Dangerous,' Say Cybersecurity Researchers in New Study
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If that is turned on.
When this was announced, (I don’t use iCloud Photo Backup), I loaded a couple via the web and while I could go and view them, they did not auto sync across my iPhone, iPad, and MB. I do not have auto sync turned on. I don’t use iCloud photos personally except for beta testing.
One of the biggest concerns about this process is that an update/upgrade in the OS will turn it on.
So, you still have to keep iCloud Photos off to prevent web-uploaded photos from being subject to scanning. You could make photos part of a device backup, but I think that's even worse as those also upload your device's E2EE keys in a non-E2EE format. It is an option for those that just need/want a rolling backup if photo scanning becomes a thing.
iCloud Photos keeps a single library in-sync and accessible on all devices. Now that I reverted to my iPhone X, I actually do have enough storage to once-again sync my entire library via cable. That pesky iPad throws a wrench in doing only cable-sync, though. I don't use iCloud so much for backups but to keep my files in order.
I use a dongle for physical photo backup and Files to backup to a personal cloud.
A big concern is I could see Apple in the future expanding this scan feature to more than Photos … like Files.
My MacBook (and Time Machine) are my photo backups. Apple, just give me iCloud functionality between my Mac and my phone/iPad already. As it is right now, I either live in 2021 or 2005. Syncing photos via cable is for view-only on the phone. Why can't photos 2-way sync over Wi-Fi between the Mac and iPhone and cut out the whole server-storage thing? Then, I wouldn't have to pay $10/month to worry if my files are being used against me.
I gave up on iCloud for photo backups after having my photo library trashed twice by an iCloud “hiccup”. The latest was about 3 years ago. My current iCloud Photo library should be empty however the recent download of Apple data shows I have almost a gig of photos that I cannot see. Apple has been no help determining what is actually there. This is just one of the issues I have had with Apple Cloud services over the last few years. I do not find them to be as reliable as I need.
For sharing across devices; I use Windows 10, Linux, MacOS, Android, iOS, and iPadOS - having a centrally accessible location is more important.
I have a personal cloud setup I use for across the board backups.
I also use DropBox for business stuff.
I have a Uni (brand name) dongle I use to temporarily store files (512gb card) and can load / download across all my devices.
Currently playing around with iDrive as it looks like a fit for all my needs. I don’t mind paying for cloud service as long as I get my needs met for the cost and security.
Looks like another credible institution has discovered shortcomings in Apple's vision of Big Brother...
www.forbes.com
Researchers Expose Fundamental Flaws In Apple’s CSAM Image Scanning Technology
A serious new warning has been issued for all iPhone and iPad owners ahead of Apple's controversial plan to scan users' photos...
www.forbes.com
My personal cloud is just an NAS. If I take a new photo, I just fire up ES File Explorer and copy it to the NAS manually. It only takes a moment. I don't do anything daily that requires constant backups. I hardly download anything aside music and I can back up those albums easily the same way.
We've become too comfortable with algorithms and AIs doing everything for us. We need to start using our brains again.
We've become too comfortable with algorithms and AIs doing everything for us. We need to start using our brains again.
Thank you for posting this. The manuscript cited by the Forbes article is at: https://www.usenix.org/system/files/sec22summer_jain.pdf. To quote the conclusion of the Jain et al. manuscript:Looks like another credible institution has discovered shortcomings in Apple's vision of Big Brother...
Researchers Expose Fundamental Flaws In Apple’s CSAM Image Scanning Technology
A serious new warning has been issued for all iPhone and iPad owners ahead of Apple's controversial plan to scan users' photos...
'In this paper, we introduced the first framework to evaluate the robustness of perceptual hashing-based client-side scanning against adversarial attacks. We proposed a general black-box attack and showed that >99.9% of images can be successfully modified while preserving the image content. We also show our attack to generate diverse perturbations preventing straightforward mitigation strategies such as expanding the database with modified images. We finally propose two white-box attacks, providing a theoretical basis for attacks.
Taken together, our results shed strong doubt on the robustness to adversarial black-box attacks of perceptual hashing-based client-side scanning as currently proposed. The detection thresholds necessary to make the attack harder are likely to be very large, probably requiring more than one billion images to be wrongly flagged daily, raising strong privacy concerns.'
In short, Apple's CSAM could trigger a computational arms race between those trying to detect illegal images and those wanting to hide them. Because Apple's system is based fundamentally on similarity between scanned images and known illegal images, paedophiles are likely to modify images. If they do so according to the algorithms described in the manuscript, Apple would have to make thresholds more lax to detect these modified images (which look to the human eye like the original BTW) resulting in many more false positives. In short you don't get a computational something for nothing. If you want to detect images modified to avoid detection, your thresholds have to be more lenient and this entails more false positives.
For those of you who stated that people who posted with concerns about Apple's CSAM system simply did not know what they were talking about, we await your apologies after you read the document above, so that you know what you're talking about.
EDIT: Added reference to authors of the manuscript
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Interesting take. I was already fully against this whole affair, but this makes a lot of sense & solidifies it even more.
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I both turned off iCloud backup as well as downgraded back to the free 5GB plan and cancelled the paid plan. Oddly enough, they sent me an email a day later saying I've been upgraded to iCloud+ 50GB for free. Odd? Should I worry?
I'm just suspicious why they gave me this 'free' option just after cancelling the paid option over this mess?
I don't need either one personally. I turned it off on my Mac. At least, I hope I did, I'll have to check. I can't trust Apple with anything anymore.
EDIT: I'm still on the 5GB free plan, backup is off. Email scam? I trashed it.
I don't need either one personally. I turned it off on my Mac. At least, I hope I did, I'll have to check. I can't trust Apple with anything anymore.
EDIT: I'm still on the 5GB free plan, backup is off. Email scam? I trashed it.
Due to events ^, all I have to say now is:
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I didn't have a 50GB plan. I had one of the lower tier paid plans before finding out about all this CSAM stuff. I think I was paying for 10GB, because all the podcasts that kept getting transferred from local storage to iCloud drive (I never asked my iPhone to do that, it just up and did it all on its own and I couldn't stop it) took up all 5GBs.
Your issue with disappearing albums on streaming is why I always buy any music I discover via such services. I might have a hard time finding the likes of Mflex Sounds though on Amazon (recently discovered his albums--if you are into the 80s synth style music, that one is worth checking out! nothing like modern 80's music!)
But I hate having things vanish when relying on streaming and I don't care if it's 'the future' I have to be able to play my songs when there's no signal (90% of places I go!) and know the songs won't suddenly vanish if the license deal breaks down!
One of the reasons I don't do 'the cloud' is because 1) I lost data when Ubuntu One shut down, and 2) I still remember hearing news of one person losing their entire MP3 library they backed up to a cloud service because the RIAA took issue with some of the content so the service just deleted all of it. I got over 2,000 MP3s I've had since the Napster days all the way to the iTunes and Amazon MP3 purchases of recent.
Your issue with disappearing albums on streaming is why I always buy any music I discover via such services. I might have a hard time finding the likes of Mflex Sounds though on Amazon (recently discovered his albums--if you are into the 80s synth style music, that one is worth checking out! nothing like modern 80's music!)
But I hate having things vanish when relying on streaming and I don't care if it's 'the future' I have to be able to play my songs when there's no signal (90% of places I go!) and know the songs won't suddenly vanish if the license deal breaks down!
One of the reasons I don't do 'the cloud' is because 1) I lost data when Ubuntu One shut down, and 2) I still remember hearing news of one person losing their entire MP3 library they backed up to a cloud service because the RIAA took issue with some of the content so the service just deleted all of it. I got over 2,000 MP3s I've had since the Napster days all the way to the iTunes and Amazon MP3 purchases of recent.
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Due to events ^, all I have to say now is:
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Oh it was definitely a 10GB plan, I signed up for it earlier last spring. It was $10 per month for 10GB. I never did figure out how to stop the iPhone from sending every downloaded file to iCloud Drive either, which was super annoying when I downloaded a few podcasts to listen to at work (one of many places where there's zero service) only to find out my files weren't playable since they were sent to iCloud Drive and not accessible until I got service.
But since it kept nagging me about 5GB being full and it wouldn't even download them locally since it couldn't send them to the iCloud Drive I paid for the 10GBs. Eventually I just switched back to Android since it doesn't suddenly delete local files and put them on a cloud without permission.
I'm lucky if I get LTE anywhere where I live; outside the city if I'm nature walking or at work I either drop to 1x (useless) or no service (it doesn't show the no signal symbol, just empty bars and an alert saying my voice service is disabled by my carrier temporarily)
But since it kept nagging me about 5GB being full and it wouldn't even download them locally since it couldn't send them to the iCloud Drive I paid for the 10GBs. Eventually I just switched back to Android since it doesn't suddenly delete local files and put them on a cloud without permission.
I'm lucky if I get LTE anywhere where I live; outside the city if I'm nature walking or at work I either drop to 1x (useless) or no service (it doesn't show the no signal symbol, just empty bars and an alert saying my voice service is disabled by my carrier temporarily)
As was stated in the classic horror movie "The Fly", "be afraid, be very afraid."
My girlfriend is really into classic horror herself, but I bet she never saw that movie or its sequel. I'll have to look into that! She religiously watches Svengoolie every Sunday, but their horror collection is limited to Universal stuff.
Introducing her for the first time to Friday the 13th films peaked her interest though! She never heard of them!
Wow, never watched the 'Friday the 13th" series.....Your girlfriend has a lot of great films ahead of her.
As for the 'The Fly", there are two equally good movies. Both different, but fabulous, a bit like apples and mandarin oranges. The first is 1959(?), and great. The second is mid-1980's by David Cronenberg and all the great stuff he does. The quote I gave is from the newer movie. Happy viewing!
I'm sort of surprised, given how big the name is! But then I grew up in the 80s, when those were released pretty regularly. Never saw any, then (I know I've seen Friday the 13th--but it was probably 2000-2005 when I saw it). But I certainly heard the name mentioned as a teenager.
I remembered there were two. I've never seen the second, but I'm surprised by positive commentary--often remakes are, ah, disappointing! I remember seeing the first on TV when I was probably as a teenager. It might be interesting to see both versions now.
I've surprisingly been watching more horror recently. It's not a genre that I historically avoided, but it wasn't something I watched much of most of the time.
She has always been into the more black and white classic horror, and just never heard of Friday the 13th. She did see Nightmare on Elm Street, however.'
She saw the original trilogy of Friday the 13th, as well as the Lawnmower Man, Cujo, Christine, as well as Pet Sematary (Never knew Fred Gwyne was in that as a kid!)
I still have yet to show her Event Horizon, and I'll remember The Fly (I've been into insects since I were a child, although deer are my favorite animal today, insects enamor me) and I got Dark Star set up too. Now that is great '70s camp. Beachball Alien, talking bomb and all!
She's 500 miles away at the moment, locked down in North Carolina. She doesn't live with me just yet.
I also think she might enjoy Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Being a vegan animal lover, she might enjoy the killer rabbit scene! I think she'll laugh madly at the Black Knight as well "tis but a scratch!"
She saw the original trilogy of Friday the 13th, as well as the Lawnmower Man, Cujo, Christine, as well as Pet Sematary (Never knew Fred Gwyne was in that as a kid!)
I still have yet to show her Event Horizon, and I'll remember The Fly (I've been into insects since I were a child, although deer are my favorite animal today, insects enamor me) and I got Dark Star set up too. Now that is great '70s camp. Beachball Alien, talking bomb and all!
She's 500 miles away at the moment, locked down in North Carolina. She doesn't live with me just yet.
I also think she might enjoy Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Being a vegan animal lover, she might enjoy the killer rabbit scene! I think she'll laugh madly at the Black Knight as well "tis but a scratch!"
See, I don't need to cancel my iCloud or turn off iCloud Photos, or anything else in response to this, because I use them knowing full well that none of it is private. I don't operate under the delusion that most people do that stuff you upload is not accessible by anyone but you. So when things like this come up, I don't need to foment faux outrage. I just shrug and say, "told ya".
In this instance, the very real outrage is not about what is uploaded where by who, when and why. Rather, what is peeked and poked at on your devices before the upload.
Again, no illusions on my part that this isn't already happening in some capacity and has been all along. They're just telling you about it now.