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Forget iPhone X–Apple's Best Product Is Its Privacy Stance

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Re: Forget iPhone X–Apple's Best Product Is Its Privacy Stance

#31

Post by fhood »

rSi wrote: post #4
r3bl wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I couldn't agree more. The only reason I would consider getting an iPhone too is Apple's privacy stance. They seem like the only company in the big five (Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft) that don't seem to be that interested in my data. They just want to sell me the product, and that product is, in essence, a piece of hardware.

I don't get why people believe that Apple is so much better than any of the other big ones.. http://www.businessinsider.com/uber-iphone-app-secret-access... Apple always refuses to comment on bugs, security holes and basically anything they can not use for marketing. You WANT to believe that Apple is better.

No, from a security stand point I can feel pretty confidant that Apple is better so long as iOS 0days are still selling for 10x that of their counterparts.

Re: Forget iPhone X–Apple's Best Product Is Its Privacy Stance

#33

Post by 0xJRS »

seba_dos1 wrote: post #16
mcphage wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Despite this I am seriously considering an iPhone, their stance on privacy is the only reason. That's definitely a great reason to get one. A nice bonus you'll find, once you do, is that they're nowhere near as fragile as you fear.

Nor as private as you wish.

As someone who does own an iPhone i'm genuinely curious what your largest concerns are about its privacy

Re: Forget iPhone X–Apple's Best Product Is Its Privacy Stance

#34

Post by 013a »

adamlett wrote: post #27
fredleblanc wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it's chicken and egg, right? They don't have that particular business because they made the choice of privacy long ago? Even if they're not in the ads business because of a series of lucky decisions that just happened to steer them this way, there's nothing wrong with touting a selling point.

No. Apple has had the same business model always, which is to sell you hardware differentiated by software at a premium. Apple doesn't have an advertising-based business model[1] because such a model is fundamentally incompatible with their existing business model. The reason is that for an advertising based model to be truly successful, you have to reach as many consumers as possible, which ultimately means that you…

I think its more complicated than that.

There are reports that Apple has an internal committee, including a high level executive, dubbed their "privacy czars" which are required to unanimously sign off on any instance of user data collection, and this committee has actively limited products like Siri over concerns [1]

There's also the San Bernadino customer letter, which has become a defining point in their privacy history [2]. They didn't have to publish that letter; they could have fought it privately or not fought it.

There's really no fundamental reason why iAd couldn't have become a more powerful revenue generating part of their platform. They sell enough iPhones to reach a broad market. But, per [1], reports say that the team ran into internal privacy concerns which constantly forced limiting its capabilities.

Apple is fundamentally different, in ways that can't solely be explained by their product history and revenue sources. Companies like HP and Samsung make consumer hardware, but also generate revenue by selling their customers' data to third parties. Its clear to me that Apple does consider Privacy a revenue-generating product that they sell.

Of course, you can argue that maybe they wouldn't take that stance if they weren't so successful in hardware; that Privacy is a privilege afforded to them because of their success, and less successful companies need that advertising revenue. But now we're arguing hypotheticals, and I'm not going to partake in that.

[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-encryption-privacy-...

[2] https://www.apple.com/customer-letter/

Re: Forget iPhone X–Apple's Best Product Is Its Privacy Stance

#35

Post by wolfgke »

tcfunk wrote: post #22
skrowl wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I clicked on this to see why too. My understanding is that they were just as anti-privacy as Google or Samsung. They signed on to PRISM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program) , they happily work with the government over user privacy in articles all the time, and those are just the things we know about. I'm sure there are more PRISM-like back room government deals that we haven't heard of out there…

Is this related to Purism announcing that they had successfully disabled the Intel Management Engine on their laptops? Or is that unrelated? Sorry, this is all new info to me.

> Is this related to Purism announcing that they had successfully disabled the Intel Management Engine on their laptops? Or is that unrelated?

It is completely unrelated.

Intel ME is about a remote servicing interface that exists on all current Intel processors. While it has some usages for managing computers in a corporate setting or managing servers (keyword to look for: Intel Active Management Technology (Intel AMT), which needs Intel vPro), it exists on nearly all current Intel processors (except, I think, Intel, Quark; but this processor is built for completely different purposes). Thus there are rumors that it is a backdoor for, say, 3-letter agencies. I don't want to spread any rumors here, but just say: Because Intel ME is very large and complicated (according to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iffTJ1vPCSo 5 MB in size) it is a real concern that lots of security gaps will be found (and some have been found in the past), which, because of Intel ME's structure (according to https://schd.ws/hosted_files/osseu17/84/Replace%20UEFI%20wit... it runs on ring -3) can easily lead to really dangerous security holes. Just for this reason alone any responsible admin should try to disable Intel ME so that this security liability does not have to stay open.

PRISM is a surveillance program by the NSA.

Re: Forget iPhone X–Apple's Best Product Is Its Privacy Stance

#36

Post by ashark »

dep_b wrote: post #28
new299 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel this is a legitimate criticism of Apple. Not only do they sell the product at a price that funds development (and gives them a healthy profit) they also sell unavoidable Ads (in the AppStore). Ads in apps themselves I'm reasonably ok with (just avoid those apps). But having an unavoidable advert in the Appstore is annoying. Overall however, I find it to be a minor annoyance.

The ad system for apps doesn't even exist anymore.

Seriously? The App Store ads? Great. I was getting really sick of searching for exactly the app I want then having the first result be an ad for something else. So user-hostile.

Re: Forget iPhone X–Apple's Best Product Is Its Privacy Stance

#37

Post by wolfgke »

terlisimo wrote: post #17
tonysdg wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the whole idea behind the RISC-V platform [1]. It's well-funded, well-designed, has amazing pedigree (David Patterson literally wrote the book on computer architecture). It's even licensed such that companies can use it in proprietary designs. And yet, making the actual switch is a tremendously difficult task. On the software side alone, it requires recompiling every application you want to run on your platfor…

This would be a bit different. Itanium, Sparc, Crusoe, ARM... all these CPUs were offering is the promise of better performance in some aspect. Nobody expects RISC-V to beat i7 or Ryzen in any benchmarks. IMO its purpose is to be the in hardware what GNU/Linux was in software. edit: GNU/Linux, not just Linux :)

> This would be a bit different. Itanium, Sparc, Crusoe, ARM... all these CPUs were offering is the promise of better performance in some aspect.

Crusoe and ARM were not about the promise of better performance, but of being much more energy-efficient for the intended purpose (though since a few years ARM tries to get into a (more) high-performance field).

Re: Forget iPhone X–Apple's Best Product Is Its Privacy Stance

#38

Post by jkestner »

dep_b wrote: post #28
new299 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel this is a legitimate criticism of Apple. Not only do they sell the product at a price that funds development (and gives them a healthy profit) they also sell unavoidable Ads (in the AppStore). Ads in apps themselves I'm reasonably ok with (just avoid those apps). But having an unavoidable advert in the Appstore is annoying. Overall however, I find it to be a minor annoyance.

The ad system for apps doesn't even exist anymore.

Yes, Apple itself gives me more control over privacy than just about anyone. On the other hand, it facilitated an app ecosystem where most apps have to make money through ads, data collection, or crappy in-game purchases, and there goes my privacy. Maybe the largest company in the world is powerless to stop people from wanting free software, but that's also a major reason it's the largest company in the world.

Re: Forget iPhone X–Apple's Best Product Is Its Privacy Stance

#40

Post by 45h34jh53k4j »

BillinghamJ wrote: post #23
dingaling wrote: post #11

Apple itself may well have a pro-privacy stance regarding the data associated with their products & services, but if I can't even install a firewall on one of their phones then that doesn't protect my privacy much against malicious or deceptive third-parties. I don't much like Android as a system but at least I can strip it of Google services and install a firewall and feel reasonably private. It's not an ideal optio…

It does have a firewall. The configuration is static: no incoming connections. You might be thinking about not being able to have an antivirus? In which case, that is certainly a feature - not a bug. Allowing the privileges required to enable an AV to operate on iOS would severely degrade the security of your device. The losses would massively outweigh any potential benefits of having an AV.

I ran an outgoing firewall on ios from about ios5 to ios8 (FirewallIP -- jb only). I lament every day since ios9 (and not jailbreaking) about its loss. Its a killer feature that apple should implement.

Many apps connects back frequently -- sometimes every action I take. Enough!

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