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iCloud Backups Not as Secure as iOS Devices to Make Restoring Data Easier

Rocco83 said:
So I guess it is a good thing my iCloud storage is filled with phantom backups and I can't save backups there anymore without purchasing more space. I always figured it was a ploy for Apple to force me to buy more space. Now I know it is just their way of protecting all the sensitive pictures on my phone.
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So...you know you can just delete those phantom backups, right?
 
tentales said:
Email & security are mutually exclusive. Unless you encrypt your email with strong encryption prior to sending and your opposite party knows the key, email data in motion is clear text and can be intercepted at any ISP or man-in-the-middle PoA, eg. when you're connected to public WiFi.
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Most email is encrypted in transit today (both between user and email servers and between the major email providers), so it's not that easy to intercept emails on the open Internet anymore. But the email providers themselves are of course able to intercept them (and store them on their servers anyway in most cases).
 
I've been avoiding iCloud because of Apples track record of failure so serious even Steve Jobs admitted publicly that MobileMe was Apple's greatest failure. While slightly better I'm still not trusting Apple's iCloud.

Besides for years I've maintained my own server with Synology DiskStation Multibay NAS. Five terabytes of secure storage.

I do enjoy the convenience of Google Drive to store current non-personal files that I share with family and friends. That's my preferred way of safely using a cloud, a method that has worked very well over the last five years.
 
This is why I don't trust Apple, though of course they're more trustworthy than any gov agency.
But Apple should encrypt iCloud storage in such a way that they cannot access it themselves if they really care about customer privacy.
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goobot said:
They already got the iCloud back ups. But there were no backups a month from the event. They want to get into the phone to get more recent data.
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The guy worked for the local government and it was a work phone. A report said he destroyed his personal phone. There's no evidence whatsoever on this iPhone, the FBI is simply trying to get people to rally behind them.
 
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ParanoidDroid said:
This case has never been about that specific iPhone, to begin with. It's all about constructing a precedent under the smoke screen of islamic terrorism and national security.
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It also revealed the incompetence of the FBI. Somebody changed the password on the iCloud back up within 24hours of getting the phone. Apple suggested taking the iPhone to a known Wifi network which would have allowed an updated backup to be created, but since the password was changed, that strategy didn't work.
 
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news for everyone else. not news for me who *read* the TOS

If everyone actually read this they would have known cloud backup, like any cloud service Dropbox, MS One drive, the all must decrypt and comply.. If a cloud service existed that couldn't (and wouldn't) comply at all,,, that would be a first.

You are probably right too.... Whats the point of a backup service, if Apple doesn't keep copies of their own ? We keep hearing 3-2-1-backup analogy... but i'd be surprised if cloud services don't do that do.... If they only kept your data and no backup elsewhere, wouldn't that going against their own business?
 
ParanoidDroid said:
I guessed that already, but now it's a fact on public record. The only 'safe' solution is to delete all our iCloud backups data, and not use any iCloud services.

But here is the problem! Apple is increasingly integrating iCloud services deep into its iOS and Mac OS X. It's almost impossible to use Apple products without iCloud. This is scary... 😱

We're all already trapped deep in total surveillance by the NSA and god knows by whom else. The orwellian society is real! 🙁

I feel like a chimp sitting in a zoo while constantly being watched. Welcome to the 21st century's privacy striptease.

The only way out of our modern tech zoo is going low-tech and to move to an isolated island, dig a cave there (beware spy satellites), and hide there forever.
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I've sort of acknowledged the "surveillance system" by intentionally going by an alias and not giving away true information about myself. And apparently it works, if targeted ads think I'm an 80-year-old grandma and are trying to sell me completely irrelevant products.
 
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ParanoidDroid said:
But here is the problem! Apple is increasingly integrating iCloud services deep into its iOS and Mac OS X. It's almost impossible to use Apple products without iCloud. This is scary... 😱
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Scary as hell.... but what do u do when u only have 64gig iOS and u have cloud storage that keeps growing as appetite to store more data ? Convenience still and always win.

And that's why i do what i do...

no real info anywhere... i am not getting anything delivered why does Apple need to know my payment info, or shipping details for other than just convenience of being "there"?

not everything u CAN avoid,,, but for the most part, u can.
 
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I've always backed up to my laptop. Never the cloud. Only sensitive data that goes via iCloud syncing is my 1Password keychain, which is separately 256-bit AES encrypted with an alphanumeric master password. Maybe They can get at my email somewhere in IMAP land, but I sleep pretty well at night.
 
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tentales said:
Although, given the spotlight on this issue, there's now the distinct possibility of silent backups for law enforcement, until the next Snowden-type revelations.
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Exactly right! We don't know for sure whether that silent backup option is already in our phones, because Apple had to comply with the USA PATRIOT Act.

It even makes sense, because we all probably experienced already running into the 'free' 5 GB limit on iCloud.
 
tentales said:
1TB hard drives are very inexpensive nowadays. Unless you don't have access to a computer, backing your iPhone up to an encrypted drive or two or three, storing one in a bank vault, you're more secure than backing up to any cloud.
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Lol storing a backup of a phone in a bank vault? Seriously?

unless you go to the bank every week then that backup seems a bit pointless to me. Am I missing something? Do people keep life critical things carried around with them on their mobile phone *and nowhere else*? (A backup of a full computer operating system is different, but the stuff stored on my phone at least is much more current...)
 
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Apple does encrypt to store in the cloud, but the only way i know is Apple never to decrpt since u only have the keys is to encrypt yourself, but users don't do that because its easier to just upload.


Alternately just use File Transporter

or everyone get gets a NAS.
 
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ParanoidDroid said:
I guessed that already, but now it's a fact on public record. The only 'safe' solution is to delete all our iCloud backups data, and not use any iCloud services.

But here is the problem! Apple is increasingly integrating iCloud services deep into its iOS and Mac OS X. It's almost impossible to use Apple products without iCloud. This is scary... 😱

We're all already trapped deep in total surveillance by the NSA and god knows by whom else. The orwellian society is real! 🙁

I feel like a chimp sitting in a zoo while constantly being watched. Welcome to the 21st century's privacy striptease.

The only way out of our modern tech zoo is going low-tech and to move to an isolated island, dig a cave there (beware spy satellites), and hide there forever.
Click to expand...

It's been public and published by Apple for their users' knowledge. Very transparent and nothing secret about it. People just don't read. And shame on Walt Mossberg if he didn't already know this.

I thought I read somewhere that Apple is slowly moving to fully encrypt everything (ie including iCloud) but imagine it's quite a project and pieces of it will be done as it gets tested and then released.

I'm slow to adopt stuff and keep my devices for a few years before updating and don't use the cloud except for find my device and to get News since it apparently resides there and the only way to view it I think. I do enjoy using Apple's News app. Those are the only 2 things I use it for. For backups I've always used iTunes and it's just been easy enough to keep doing so right now. You can always go into your iCloud settings and select what you want to use the cloud for.
 
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As with some other users here, I thought this is not new/news. And the same applies to most cloud services, for obvious reasons.

Anyway, I don't use iCloud backup because it's slooooow. Unless I have gigabit broadband access, I will never use iCloud backup. And it's not 100% foolproof either. Just read about users having problems restoring when they wanted to do a full restore. Heck, even local iTunes backup is not bug free either (being stuck at steps 6 or 7 issues).

This brings me another point how the iPad will not be able to be a totally PC replacement despite its features if I would still be forced to rely on backing it up on a PC.
 
SanDisk-820x420.jpg
 
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ParanoidDroid said:
You probably have never been robbed or had fire in your house?
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good selective quoting. If you reread, I don't think a phone backup is analogous to a computer backup where that behaviour would be appropriate.

What content do you create and store in a phone, except for contacts, text messages etc and photos? Contacts and calendar events, many use cloud services for anyway. Will old messages be a huge loss? Very much dependent on the person.

Are you going to go to the bank to retrieve this backup before making any os updates? And then return it? Or make another to take there first? What if you take a beautiful photo of a swan on the way and it's lost forever because your backup is actually a few hours old at installation

All I'm saying is, the practicalities of backing up a phone and putting it in a bank vault seem to make it kind of like bottling up sunshine in case it's a rainy day.
 
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I heard SpiderOak has a "zero-knowledge" policies backups. It means their backup system is set up in a way that even if they wanted to see your files, they can't.

tentales said:
No they won't. Your access to them will, but Apple keeps multiple realtime backup locations and authorities would be able to subpoena those records. Going forward, new data won't be backed up.

Although, given the spotlight on this issue, there's now the distinct possibility of silent backups for law enforcement, until the next Snowden-type revelations.
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If I delete my iCloud backups, they will still not delete them?
 
Lots of people and companies do off-site backups. That's how I view iCloud. Have to admit sharing across devices on compatible OS software is nice. One day...
 
ParanoidDroid said:
I guessed that already, but now it's a fact on public record. The only 'safe' solution is to delete all our iCloud backups data, and not use any iCloud services.

But here is the problem! Apple is increasingly integrating iCloud services deep into its iOS and Mac OS X. It's almost impossible to use Apple products without iCloud. This is scary... 😱

We're all already trapped deep in total surveillance by the NSA and god knows by whom else. The orwellian society is real! 🙁

I feel like a chimp sitting in a zoo while constantly being watched. Welcome to the 21st century's privacy striptease.

The only way out of our modern tech zoo is going low-tech and to move to an isolated island, dig a cave there (beware spy satellites), and hide there forever.
Click to expand...

Not to make you even more paranoid but in case you missed it, Maryland public busses already record passenger conversations... https://www.washingtonpost.com/loca...5e1d1e-df36-11e5-8d98-4b3d9215ade1_story.html

And police in Hartford are lobbying for not just surveillance drones, they want ARMED drones... http://fox61.com/2016/03/01/police-appeal-to-lawmakers-for-future-options-on-arming-drones/

What could possibly go wrong?
 
Hi, this is John Doe, and thanks for watching fox news weather report...and this year's weather forcast is......
 
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