iPhone 18 Pro Introduces 'Apple Reference Image' to Verify Photo Authenticity

[darthbane2k]

One would think this is also in the iPhone Duo yes?

If it’s not on all new models then it’s kind of pointless

 

[aptay10r]

is this not going to take up more storage? I hope this is something we can disable for those that don't need this

It says "opt-in", so if you don't need it then don't opt-in.

 

[BSDnostalgia]

Things like this have been talked about, but, Apple actually did it -- without much fanfare. It looks rather brilliant, actually. And yes, if you edit the photo, you will have two photos now. Twice the storage consumed at every level. That is probably how they got management to approve that feature. More iCloud consumed.) Same as you do now, of course, if you keep original unedited photos.

 

[Casshan]

I wish we had more technical detail about why the photo is sent to private cloud compute and what exactly that service is doing with the photo. If we just want a cryptographic guarantee that the photo was taken with the iPhone, it's not clear why the photo needs to leave the device at all.

I imagine it functions like a notary. You can’t simply sign an important legal document, it must be done in front of a notary who will attest that you are the person signing the document. In this case, Apple is attesting that it’s actually an iPhone that took the image, not a reverse engineered algorithm. I doubt the image itself is sent to Apple, probably a signature.