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TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

arstechnica.com

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Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#81

Post by CountSessine »

topspin wrote: post #45
tediousdemise wrote: post #28

As much as I like Apple products, it looks like the privacy buck stops at China. The western world needs to desperately work on making their supply chains independent of the CCP, lest they'd like their supply chains to be poisoned at some point in the future. I'm a big fan of Purism and everything that they are doing. I hope their software and hardware matures with the same level of polish we've come to know and expe…

> The western world needs to desperately work on making their supply chains independent of the CCP The western world can't. The world is only so big and the remaining sites of refuge for cheap, exploitable labor and Potemkin regulatory regimes are few. Almost any alternative place you might cite is either already beholden to China (the viable parts of Africa) or too unstable (due to endemic corruption, external threa…

Yes - because manufacturing in the West is ultimately self-defeating. Success breeds complacency and labor unrest. This isn't just a China-thing (I have no idea what your Potemkin regulation is or why you would mix those metaphors).

When Westerners see an absurdly profitable company, they think, "why aren't they paying their employees more??!" and start a union to parasitize earnings.

When Asians (including the Japanese and Koreans) see an absurdly profitably company, they think, "why are they able to charge such high prices???!" and they kneecap the company's ability to exploit their market.

It's an important difference for manufacturing physical things and it's why the West loses out to Asia in manufacturing outside cutting-edge tech. It's defective wetware in our heads and how we think about wealth and creating value, so don't expect manufacturing supply chains to return to Western countries any time soon.

Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#82

Post by sangnoir »

reaperducer wrote: post #60
anon9001 wrote: post #38

Technically, what's going on here? "CAID" isn't a public iOS technology, and the article doesn't say what it means. Some googling returns: https://mmachina.cn/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/MMA%E4%B8%AD%... Apparently it means "CAA Advertising Id", where "CAA" appears to be the "Creative Artists Agency", some sort of Chinese advertising group. (edit: wrong organization, it's actually "Chinese Anonymization ID", not a gro…

In the US, the analogy would be if apps had tracking SDKs in them, that fingerprinted users across apps, in order to better target them for advertisements, and then the US government can pick up that data and do whatever they'd like with it. I've never really thought about it before, but it would be pretty easy for a three-letter agency to set up an online advertising company for this purpose. They start their own ai…

> I've never really thought about it before, but it would be pretty easy for a three-letter agency to set up an online advertising company for this purpose.

There's no need to set one up when you can break into many/all the existing advertising companies; remember "SSL added and removed here :^)" written on an NSA slide, referring to Google's clear-text internal data-center traffic? Also, the NSA spent a fuck-ton of money on compute to factor enough primes to trivially break 20-40%[1] of SSL traffic of the day...in real time.

1. This was about 6 years ago, I can't remember exact percentage, but it was definitely at least 20%, IIRC, the attack was on the key-exchange step

Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#83

Post by ng12 »

schiang wrote: post #54
tediousdemise wrote: post #28

As much as I like Apple products, it looks like the privacy buck stops at China. The western world needs to desperately work on making their supply chains independent of the CCP, lest they'd like their supply chains to be poisoned at some point in the future. I'm a big fan of Purism and everything that they are doing. I hope their software and hardware matures with the same level of polish we've come to know and expe…

China doesn't just provide supply chain anymore. They are also a huge market now because of its growing middle class. China has money to spend and US companies need to tap into that market.

Is there a good reason why we shouldn't sanction China like we do Russia, NK, and Iran? There's plenty of money to be made in those countries too.

Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#84

Post by publicola1990 »

soheil wrote: post #78

This is a story because it's fashionable to hate on China. This has been going on in the US for years already. Using terms like CAID without an explanation to what it is makes the reader scared that China has somehow been able to infiltrate iOS to track users, this is bad journalism. CAID is a simple advertising id used across apps, there is no hacking of iOS or an incredible technical prowess on the the side of Chin…

Indeed is Instagram or Snapchat doing possibly something similar?

Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#85

Post by JustSomeNobody »

schiang wrote: post #54
tediousdemise wrote: post #28

As much as I like Apple products, it looks like the privacy buck stops at China. The western world needs to desperately work on making their supply chains independent of the CCP, lest they'd like their supply chains to be poisoned at some point in the future. I'm a big fan of Purism and everything that they are doing. I hope their software and hardware matures with the same level of polish we've come to know and expe…

China doesn't just provide supply chain anymore. They are also a huge market now because of its growing middle class. China has money to spend and US companies need to tap into that market.

Apple has a $2T market cap. Do they truly "need" China? I know, I know, they have a responsibility to their shareholders, blah blah. But Two Trillion Dollars.

Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#86

Post by tediousdemise »

reaperducer wrote: post #70
tediousdemise wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China is their bottom line when it comes to fab. If China kicks Apple out, we can expect 50k dollar iPhones soon thereafter. It's sad that China has outcompeted the western world, but it makes sense when you consider the fact that they engage in human rights abuses to do so.

If China kicks Apple out, we can expect 50k dollar iPhones soon thereafter Do you really believe that people in India spend $50,000 on the iPhones that are made in India, or are you just being hyperbolic?

It's just my pessimism about greedy American companies, who pass all costs onto the consumer without remorse.

Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#87

Post by tw04 »

CountSessine wrote: post #81
topspin wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The western world needs to desperately work on making their supply chains independent of the CCP The western world can't. The world is only so big and the remaining sites of refuge for cheap, exploitable labor and Potemkin regulatory regimes are few. Almost any alternative place you might cite is either already beholden to China (the viable parts of Africa) or too unstable (due to endemic corruption, external threa…

Yes - because manufacturing in the West is ultimately self-defeating. Success breeds complacency and labor unrest. This isn't just a China-thing (I have no idea what your Potemkin regulation is or why you would mix those metaphors). When Westerners see an absurdly profitable company, they think, "why aren't they paying their employees more??!" and start a union to parasitize earnings. When Asians (including the Japan…

>When Westerners see an absurdly profitable company, they think, "why aren't they paying their employees more??!" and start a union to parasitize earnings.

Saying that employees expecting a livable wage is "parasitizing earnings" is a pretty outrageous claim.

>It's an important difference for manufacturing physical things and it's why the West loses out to Asia in manufacturing outside cutting-edge tech.

The West lost out to Asia because their standard of living was so much lower that it was basically slave labor for a decade. You apparently have missed out on the repeated protests at factories across China with their workers demanding better working conditions and wages.

Expecting to be able to be able to do something more than just not starve to death isn't a western ideal, it's a human ideal. When the company you work for is printing money and you're living in poverty, something eventually gives. As has happened at literally every point in human history to date. Sometimes through violence, sometimes through government intervention. But the "unwashed masses" won't stay ignorant forever.

Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#88

Post by tinus_hn »

anon9001 wrote: post #74
DLay wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is the CAID spec: https://web.archive.org/web/20210316035745/docs.trackingio.c...

That's very helpful and adds a lot of clarity. You can tell from the code that the "exploit" here is abusing keychain sharing. iOS has a feature where you can pack a surprising amount of generic data into keychain storage, intended for passwords or auth credentials. iOS also lets app developers opt-in to shared credential storage, so that if you have multiple apps, the user only needs to login once. Here's a blog pos…

Credential sharing only works between apps registered to the same developer. So no, this does not allow an tracking ID usable by all apps.

And remember, any trick abused to create tracking IDs stands the risk of being detected and blocked by Apple in the next iOS update. It has been announced, it has happened, it will keep happening.

Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#89

Post by elteto »

CountSessine wrote: post #81
topspin wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The western world needs to desperately work on making their supply chains independent of the CCP The western world can't. The world is only so big and the remaining sites of refuge for cheap, exploitable labor and Potemkin regulatory regimes are few. Almost any alternative place you might cite is either already beholden to China (the viable parts of Africa) or too unstable (due to endemic corruption, external threa…

Yes - because manufacturing in the West is ultimately self-defeating. Success breeds complacency and labor unrest. This isn't just a China-thing (I have no idea what your Potemkin regulation is or why you would mix those metaphors). When Westerners see an absurdly profitable company, they think, "why aren't they paying their employees more??!" and start a union to parasitize earnings. When Asians (including the Japan…

> ... start a union to parasitize earnings.

Yes, those pesky employees should just STFU and be thankful for the scraps.

Re: TikTok wants to keep tracking iPhone users with state-backed workaround

#90

Post by mullingitover »

ng12 wrote: post #83
schiang wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China doesn't just provide supply chain anymore. They are also a huge market now because of its growing middle class. China has money to spend and US companies need to tap into that market.

Is there a good reason why we shouldn't sanction China like we do Russia, NK, and Iran? There's plenty of money to be made in those countries too.

> There's plenty of money to be made in those countries too.

Russia GDP: ~1.7 trillion

Iran GDP: ~0.45 trillion

North Korea GDP: ~0.028 trillion

Meanwhile, China GDP: ~14.34 trillion

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