I think it is our role to educate our relatives on this subject: any text that refer to child pornography or similar "save our children" shall immediately trigger the idea association: "written by a Nazi posing as a sheep to reduce out freedom". Shoot! Goldwin's law strikes again!
In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
261–270 of 430 posts
Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
#262Apple's mistake is that they seemingly believe there is pushback because people misunderstand how it works. The reality is more nuanced: People understand exactly how it works, and how it works is that it is turn-key onboard spyware, that Apple pinky-swears isn't being used wrong today . For example if the scope/mission expands (e.g. foreign governments), suddenly you've created a drag-net for whatever "badness" is o…
About that "manual review"... Refer to pages 10 and 11 of the technical paper. >The server then uses the decryption key to decrypt the inner encryption layer and extract the NeuralHash and visual derivatives for the CSAM matches. This "visual derivative" term shows up repeatedly. To me, the implication seems to be that Apple doesn't look at the actual suspected image before deciding whether to proceed with a report.…
> who would want to be in the business of reviewing reports of probably-illegal images?
I could think of a couple of companies this could be outsourced to, with strict business and privacy agreements in place, of course, and also conveniently on the lowest end of European minimum wage for the tier 1 reviewers.
Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
#263Isn't this covered by the 4th Amendment? The fact that Apple is doing it and not US.GOV is irrelevant, because the explicit intent is to check for content-deemed-illegal on a personal device and Apple is clearly just a cutout.
Worse - unless the "perceptual hash" tech is better than anyone suspects, most of the images flagged will be personal images of consenting adults.
So Apple - and possibly US.GOV - ends up with a huge collection of intimate photos of many of its users. Plus everyone's porn stash.
I'm finding it very hard to understand why no one at Apple realised this would be a PR disaster.
Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
#264As a thought experiment, why not allow us to disable the scanning feature in our iPhone settings? The entire premise of this system is that the targeted users are ignorant of its existence. If we can be so sure they don't know it exists, then surely having an option to disable it would cause no difference in outcome. If the people in favor of this system don't like the idea of making it optional, perhaps that shows t…
You can disable it by turning off iCloud Photos. For now at least, who knows about the future since it's on-device and doesn't actually require you to upload anything.
That's only for iCloud Photos, if you send a photo to a phone on a parental account, you have no control whether the image is uploaded to Apple.
Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
#265Earlier quoted context omitted.
'the other one is plain hash matching, which does not “save the children” but rather is “catch the viewer” — exclusively. This has no impact on the abuse of the CSAM subjects because it only matches publicly-known content.' Are you claiming victims of child sexual abuse wouldn't care if images of the abuse are circulating freely and being viewed with impunity by pedophiles?
So stop the circulating. This is like trying to stop people from using drugs by searching EVERYONE’S homes and reporting suspicious looking substances.
"So stop the circulating." Good idea. Any ideas how we could do that? Perhaps one thing that would help is to implement a system that hashes circulating images to ensure they aren't known images of child sexual abuse. Just a thought.
Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
#266Earlier quoted context omitted.
'the other one is plain hash matching, which does not “save the children” but rather is “catch the viewer” — exclusively. This has no impact on the abuse of the CSAM subjects because it only matches publicly-known content.' Are you claiming victims of child sexual abuse wouldn't care if images of the abuse are circulating freely and being viewed with impunity by pedophiles?
Read the note: > many thousands of sexually exploited victimized children will be rescued This does not aid rescue.
Generally what happens is that some fraction of viewers are abusers, and investigating them uncovers that abuse.
Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
#267Earlier quoted context omitted.
A lot of people not in government are also fiercely opposed to raping children and are willing to compromise, and understand that Apple can already do whatever they want to your phone, so this specific thing isn't the straw that breaks the camel's back. All the "what if Apple turns evil one day" applies equally well to iOS without this feature.
I believe a lot of the outrage brewing now against Apple’s CSAM scanning is misdirected, and might actually be hurting the larger cause. Most ordinary people, especially those who have kids, won’t have a problem with a well-implemented, E2E encryption compatible scheme that is legally limited to only apply to this type of material. If explained the hash collision issue, they’d reasonably point out that Apple does man…
Wow, “potentially illegal” is extremely broad indeed.
Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
#268I really don’t understand why apple is doing this. What point are they trying to score and from whom ? Do they think implementing a spyware in iPhone would boost sales? Or does it bring revenue from charging government agency to use this feature? I just don’t get it.
So they can claim only Pedos use android
Android could take the opposite approach. I.e. someone can write an app that generates CP, so those who want it can have it without any actual children involved.
Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
#269Earlier quoted context omitted.
Companies don't have to be ethical, they just have to be legal.
This is the sort of reasoning that got us into all this crap in the first place, and it certainly won't get us out of it.
> This is the sort of reasoning that got us into all this crap in the first place
I don’t consider us in “crap”. I welcome Apple’s decision.
Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features
#270Earlier quoted context omitted.
Android ROMs like GrapheneOS do not spy on you, verifiably.
A good first step, but that the public won't take. We've seen it with linux on the desktop already.
Moving good sense (good sense, not "good" conclusions - abilities, not partytaking) to the median is the massive endavour.
What is to be preserved as core is to have the alternatives. Note: in some areas they are already fading...
(I have this flash of Mr. Pink first trying a "We are professionals, right?", than shielding himself behind concrete.)