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In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

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Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

#321

Post by GordonS »

fragileone wrote: post #216
baq wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no viable option if you want a quality smartphone. Androids spy on you already. Apple will be spying on you. The dark side of economies of scale.

Android ROMs like GrapheneOS do not spy on you, verifiably.

It's non-trivial to unlock, root, and install a custom ROM - unless you are technical, very few people are going to be able to do this.

Also, it's been several years since I used a custom ROM, but I thought rooted devices were not permitted to use the official Google Play Store? (happy to be corrected if I've got this point wrong!)

Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

#322

Post by Perstone »

Someone1234 wrote: post #38

Apple'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…

They don't believe that people misunderstand how it works. This is marketing and PR speak for "We are going to do this and we are going to push enough tech jargon out there that most people won't understand nor care about the difference".

Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

#323

Post by hef19898 »

BiteCode_dev wrote: post #200
baq wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no viable option if you want a quality smartphone. Androids spy on you already. Apple will be spying on you. The dark side of economies of scale.

We are not here by accident. Those are symptoms of a public that doesn't care. We have been explaining the consequences of each choice for techs during the last 20 years. I've had the talk with my friends and familly many times. Very patiently. Very nicely. Nobody cares. It's just an annoyance for them. And it requires an enormous more amounr of energy to live your live this way than not caring. Even more if you gott…

Yes, as a society we are giving up privacy for convenience.

Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

#324

Post by LocalH »

midev wrote: post #156
Osiris wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think asking ourselves if this is a slippery slope is a valid part of discussing what's actually happening right now.

Appealing to the slippery slope is itself a fallacy. "While this image may be insightful for understanding the character of the fallacy, it represents a misunderstanding of the nature of the causal relations between events. Every causal claim requires a separate argument. Hence, any "slipping" to be found is only in the clumsy thinking of the arguer, who has failed to provide sufficient evidence that one causally exp…

>You need to argue things that are actually happening.

No. You don't get to control the narrative by saying that. You have to discuss things that could happen when discussing things this invasive.

Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

#325

Post by hef19898 »

kgarten wrote: post #164

Wondering If this implementation is related to the chat control effort in the EU: https://www.patrick-breyer.de/en/posts/message-screening/?la... Just installing graheneos on a pixel, writing this from my Librem 14 (got it after the M1, the phoning home of apple apps, the new lockdown of kernel extensions). Goodbye Apple.

Now that I think about it, is there any good, viable alternative for Windows 10 on a new ThinkPad? One that ideally is able to run MS Office (or at least Excel...)? Any recommendations regarding decent, and ideally user friendly, Linux versions?

Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

#326

Post by ziml77 »

Thorrez wrote: post #108
dotBen wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Respectfully you've missed what this is. This has nothing to do with data sent up to iCloud - at that point not only can those photos be checked via hash they can be further reviewed if there is a positive/high degree match The issue is that this mechanism applies to photos (/data) on the local device that wouldn't otherwise make its way up to iCloud.

Do you have a source that this is being used on all photos on the device? The EFF posts says it applies to 2 cases: photos being uploaded to iCloud, and photos through iMessage if the account holder is a child and the feature hasn't been disabled. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/apples-plan-think-diff... You're right that only scanning photos uploaded to iCloud is currently pointless. But maybe Apple plans to d…

I believe it's inaccurate to lump the iMessage and iCloud scanning together. The iMessage scanning tries to classify images as sexually explicit. The iCloud scanning tries to identify images that exist in the CSAM database, accounting for recompression and cropping.

Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

#327

Post by JohnJamesRambo »

almostdigital wrote: post #10

A system on my phone where it has a list of bad files and a threshold on how many of those files are allowed. If the threshold is reached Apple can read them. Both the bad files list and threshold is controlled by Apple and is explicitly designed to be un-auditable... Honestly I would have been fine with Apple scanning my all photos after they are uploaded to iCloud but this is deeply disturbing

This is how I feel as well. I don’t use iCloud photos but if I did, sure scan them for CP, I don’t care. Maybe you will catch some bad guys that willingly gave you their photos. But scanning everyone’s phones is beyond creepy and feels like exactly what the fourth amendment is about. It’s British soldiers suddenly having the ability to search EVERY home in colonial America as often as they want.

> Amendment 4. The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

I have moved away from Apple ecosystem, already purchased another phone yesterday. The Constitution is holy to me, it’s all we have protecting us from technological dystopia.

Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

#328

Post by ziml77 »

aoetalks wrote: post #21
modeless wrote: post #13

I don't understand the claim that this system improves their ability to detect anything. If it's really true that the system only works on data uploaded to icloud then apple could have easily just done all the scanning in the cloud, because icloud is not end-to-end encrypted. In that case, all this feature does is move the computational cost of scanning from Apple's datacenters to Apple's users, saving Apple money an…

I must have the same misunderstanding. I don’t know why this has to be device side for iCloud photos..

Maybe because they plan on enabling E2EE for iCloud. Of course that's not necessarily useful given that the set of images yours are being checked against is completely opaque.

Re: In internal memo, Apple addresses concerns around new Photo scanning features

#330

Post by speleding »

ziml77 wrote: post #313
speleding wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A cryptographic hash + file size combo is unlikely to have a false positive within our lifetime The chance of a "technical" false positive is tiny, but they need to look all false positives: If some joker sends you a lewd picture through WhatsApp, WhatsApp by default saves every picture to your photo library, then you are now on the naughty list. Good luck trying to explain yourself out of that one.

WhatsApp saves all received images to your library? That seems hard to believe. I can't imagine that anyone would appreciate having their personal photo collection cluttered with other peoples photos and all of the meme images that people share.

It's a setting, called "Save to camera roll". Default is on.
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