Privacy Whistleblower Edward Snowden and EFF Slam Apple's Plans to Scan Messages and iCloud Images

[lysingur]

For the past four years, I have put most of my photos on iCloud. I started sorting through them yesterday and plan to turn off iCloud Photos before iOS 15 comes out. The convenience is worth neither the sacrifice that we're asked to make in privacy nor the nobility of the cause.

It's really naïve on the part of Apple and law enforcement to think that they can catch people spreading child pornography when this security feature can be easily bypassed by going offline with one's photos. It's like the security measures they implemented at the airport. Few if any terrorists are caught because of it but it adds a tremendous burden on regular citizens like you and me.

 

[lysingur]

Who’s the genius who presented this idea to Tim Cook? Scan our library? That’s what Google, Amazon and Facebook do, not Apple!

Is it Apple job to policing our contents? People buying iPhone because of opposite reason.

Most likely not internally. This has outside pressure written all over it.

 

[lysingur]

So all it takes now to land someone in jail is for a pedo to Airdrop (with his iCloud Photos turned off) you some child porn while you're in a crowded area. Great. Some people are just so naïve as to think hash technology can't be used against innocent people.

Even if you end up proven innocent, it could really mess up your life. Your entire photo library probably has to be submitted to law enforcement for review. Your emails. Your message history. Just because someone airdropped you some child porn while you're attending a football game.

 

[Naraxus]

This joker is nothing more than a traitor and should be executed as such

 

[_Spinn_]

Most likely not internally. This has outside pressure written all over it.

I thought the same thing. Maybe they are being forced by the government to put this in or be broken up via antitrust? Otherwise why wouldn’t they have announced this late Friday evening when fewer people would notice?

 

[Somian]

You are confused. Your iPhone's contents are still as private as ever. The ONLY thing Apple will know is the hashes of any flagged images that you sync to iCloud from your phone if the number of those flagged images exceeds the threshold they have set. They were already scanning your iCloud content for violations on the cloud, so this makes things more private by moving the scanning to your phone, which Apple can't see. So they're actually living up to their reputation for valuing user privacy by voluntarily restricting the information they see. But you have always given up privacy by putting anything on iCloud vs. keeping it just on your phone. Go read the legal agreement for iCloud services. They can do lots of things with your files including share them with third parties (and not just law enforcement).

If you put it that way, it doesn't sound as bad.

What I'm concerned about is that this is crossing one red line: your phone generates data that can be used against you.

If you upload ChildP to iCloud, knowing that it's not encrypted, you're incriminating yourself. But with what apple is proposing (and apparently pulling off) is that the phone itself is incriminating you. This is a whole new level of creepy, out of a dystopian Sci-Fi novel.

A feature like this on your computer, you could manipulate to only push empty or default hashes or you could check against the reference database and if there's a collision, randomize. But on a closed platform like iOS you cannot so you depend on the goodwill of Apple to keep you and your data secure.

What's happening here is depriving the user of their rights to inspect or consent to the data that is transmitted. This is against the very "data transparency" thing apple is advocating. There's no opt-out, except not using iCloud photos (which I don't, for other reasons).

The only purpose of this metadata is to incriminate you. Why would anyone ever want that data sent if the only purpose is to incriminate you? Any reasonable person would opt out of they could, even if they have "nothing to hide" because it serves no other purpose. This is different from uploading the picture itself, because the purpose of uploading the picture is...for the picture to be accessible through the cloud.

I appreciate that Apple is trying to do this in a way (according to their whitepapers) that they cannot access the pictures unless a user's phone sent suspicious metadata (and the decryption keys with that, in a way). But I still think, this is the box of Pandora.

 

[coachgq]

Wide awake here. See you in camp…

Like jail? Remember. Don’t be a criminal and you have nothing to worry about. Really makes me nervous that a

Such as? Protesting on the street was ok in Sydney before, but during lockdown, it is illegal.
Slave was legal back in 1800. It is not today.

you have pictures of either of those stored on your phone that you are afraid of people finding?

 

[opfreak]

I don't follow this slippery slope thought process. He is essentially saying he doesn't trust Apple not to abuse this functionality. You could literally apply this to anything if you believe Apple has ill-intentions.

If we believe Apple has some master plan to abuse this then this opens open every part of their ecosystem to the same "it could be abused if they want to" statement.

apple has a history of doing what 'evil' countries want.

Why are you supporting literal spyware installed on your phone?

 

[mazz0]

Um, isn't that exactly what they're doing? If the law requires consent here, it will be in an updated TOS the user is required to agree to when they install the iOS update where this scanning takes effect. And they HAVE told us what they're looking for. Some of you are sounding like Alex Jones level conspiracy theorists here. Again, I understand the concerns about the bigger picture and what this step might mean for the future, but it sounds like Apple is being quite transparent about this (I mean, isn't this news all over the place now and everyone's talking about it, including many threads on just this site? Not exactly something they're hiding, LOL!). https://www.apple.com/child-safety/

There is a very large difference between us knowing about it cos we read Macrumours, and a prompt appearing on the phone advising normal people of this action.

 

[loby]

Agree here. This opens the door for Apple to have to comply with broad government requests to scan people's messages (if backed up to iCloud) and photos for things going forward. Not sure what Apple is doing here.

Just need the right leaders to exploit this. Want to know who was at the rallies you don't like or didn't say good things about current leader, piece of cake. The current U.S. president wouldn't do it for example, but its easy to imagine one that would want this information and punish the non supporters

Apple has the ideology of “changing the world” in its bones and making the planet “a safe and wonderful place for all..’

Sounds good in words… but over time and the evolution of this belief (and if you go to their theatre in some of their stores while waiting for repairs etc. you will see) they clearly have an ideological and political agenda that they are working hard on to “change the world” to what they believe and included in their ideology an intolerance of contrary opinions.

The very thing before they were against when their beliefs were not tolerated years ago they themselves do…and it is now “ok” because they are doing it..?

Their News app is propaganda, iTunes, App Store etc. Nothing is new.

But…now (part of the machine and plan) over time they are beginning to eliminate “choice” and push acceptance for their “they know better” ideology. It has expanded from just technology to moral and societal beliefs etc.

Of course anything to do with abuses of children should not be tolerated.

But even that..over time…the definition of “abuse” will change if saturated with all avenues of influences concerning a belief or a desire…

I have no interest in “Snow” or who or what’s his name? or whatever his opinions are…but he is correct…

Though Apple’s nobility “sounds” good in theory, it eventually over time leads to complete censorship of contrary beliefs, especially if you disagree with Apple. Maybe they are getting pointers from China…

Apple..stick with technology..not shaping people’s morality. You sound like a religion..

Let the law enforcement and government etc. do their job with going after petiphiles. Eventually they will get caught..

Crossing completely to becoming “Big Brother who knows better..” as you fought against in the beginning is not in your best interest…

Again, sounds noble and “a good thing”, but this kind of activity leads to more law suits and government intervention. Stick with making “great products”

 

[Apple_Robert]

Hey macrumors, every notification on this post was negative. I’m beginning to think you have a bunch of criminals amongst your ranks.

Hitting the alarm bells to call attention to the privacy concerns involved and the potential for abuse is not the equivalent of being a criminal.

 

[DaveN]

Snowden, the guy who leaked so much classified information, says that from where????? Oh, that's right.... Russia.

 

[jntdroid]

Snowden, the guy who leaked so much classified information, says that from where????? Oh, that's right.... Russia.

Doesn't mean he's wrong, though.

It's interesting to me that mainstream news sites haven't said anything about this yet. Maybe it just hasn't worked its way to them, yet...

 

[09872738]

Snowden, the guy who leaked so much classified information, says that from where????? Oh, that's right.... Russia.

He leaked information on crimes committed by your very government against its own citizens. He‘s a man of honor and incredible courage who stood up for you

 

[cwosigns]

Snowden, the guy who leaked so much classified information, says that from where????? Oh, that's right.... Russia.

Classified information that revealed our government was conducting warrantless surveillance.

 

[bryn0076]

My problem is parents taking a picture of a Father/Mother kissing their child in cute situation that would reported in this new system! I sure hope Apple realizes this until it's to late!

That’s not how it works.

 

[bryn0076]

Here’s what I find problematic: How do they know the intentions of the photographer?

I have two kids, and like many, many other parents, when they were babies and toddlers I used to take pics of them playing in the house, outside or in the bath in diapers or underwear, or even nude. Obviously the intention is to capture memories of my kids doing hilarious things, and to privately save them for the future memories. But how would apple know this? Unless I’m missing something this is a grotesque over reach and one destined to scoop up innocent people.

That’s not how it works.

 

[bryn0076]

So every family photo of the kids at the beach/pool or running around the house in only their diaper are going to get flagged and the feds knock on your door?

Are you trolling, or did you genuinely not read and understand the article?

 

[bryn0076]

Yes, I don't understand. If iCloud photos aren't end-to-end encrypted anyway, why not do its in the cloud and let people opt out if they don't want their photos x-rayed.

seriously? Hey Mr Paedophile , would you like to opt in to our new child protection system?

 

[baypharm]

Yea….but I’m not. Wake up.

Not yet anyway

 

[baypharm]

These are not "nudes"... they are known images and/or videos of CSAM (child pornography). It's not 15-17 year olds on social media, it's largely pre-pubescent young children involved in lascivious acts. You obviously don't understand how it all works, since parents with naked kids in the tub have NOTHING to worry about. Read a bit about CSAM and known hashes and I think your blood pressure will come down.

Yeah..you keep on believing that

 

[Act3]

Why not just destroy these photos so they cannot be shared to begin with ? Hash tag match with local scan on device , then photo is deleted before it can even be viewed. No more distributing illegal images using iOS. Similar to a virus scan. Also could protect users from receiving unsolicited malicious photos.

 

[incoherent_1]

I think you seem to (intentionally) miss the point here. I'm not sure the statue of David would be on the list of known child porn images to reference against.

There are multiple features being discussed here. This is the feature I’m referring to:

“One of the new features, Communication Safety, has raised privacy concerns because it allows Apple to scan images sent and received by the Messages app for sexually explicit content

 

[baypharm]

So I have to put up with battery life being used, processor resources being consumed and storage space being taken up just so Apple can sniff through my photos to make sure I'm not a pedo? Personally I'm offended that Apple are treating me like a criminal and looking at my data without my consent.

Enjoy all the photos of the insides of my arcade machines Tim Cook you creepy voyeur.

Well said

 

[usagora]

. . . a prompt appearing on the phone advising normal people of this action.

How do you know this won't be there? And even if it's not, it's people's own responsibility to read the TOS. And the files a user uploads to iCloud were already being scanned anyway - it's just now that's happening on your phone, but that scan has no affect on your life or privacy unless 1. it detects illegal material AND 2. you then upload those files (a certain number of them) to iCloud. SO it's actually far more private than before since Apple has no access to the scan data unless you trigger the review process by uploading illegal material to the cloud.