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After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

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Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#201

Post by nabakin »

aussieguy1234 wrote: post #158

Since hearing about this whole affair, one potential scenario popped up in my mind... Currently, bad actors are randomly sharing illegal content in an unsolicited way to people who did not ask for it (1). Let's imagine this happens to you. Suddenly, you have illegal content on your device you didn't ask for. Maybe you are busy when the message with the content is received and you don't even know about it, or you thin…

Well, to be factually accurate, in this case with Apple, nothing will happen. Apple only reports when it matches 30 instances of this content. They have said they plan to reduce it from 30 as they improve their algorithm.

Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#202

Post by lsh123 »

goodells wrote: post #65
heavyset_go wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This problem is the capability, not what it's used for. Any such capability will be abused by new use cases be it terrorism, drug trafficking, human trafficking or whatever. Plus there will inevitably be unauthorized access. Apple even says it themselves[1]: > This program is ambitious, and protecting children is an important responsibility. These efforts will evolve and expand over time. [1] https://www.apple.com/…

I can't wait until /child-safety 404s or redirects to /safety and there's a wall of marketing blurb (possibly only in Chinese at first) that explains how 'national security' concerns are reported to the CCP. This has totally pushed me over the edge, though I'll admit I was oblivious to begin with. My plan is to replace the MacBooks with a Thinkpad P15 gen 2 running Ubuntu and replace the iPhone with something running…

There is another option - don’t put anything sensitive on your phone and basically treat it as an adversary already has root access. This pretty much what I do for a long time. All the sensitive information (e.g. banking) is on Linux desktop and there are no logins or apps on iPhone or work laptop (hn is not sensitive ;) ).

Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#203

Post by pcurve »

Jxl180 wrote: post #135
pembrook wrote: post #72

This is by far the biggest misstep of Tim Cook’s tenure at Apple thus far. If they don’t kill this program soon, it’s going to overshadow the entire upcoming iPhone event, and will follow Apple around like a dark cloud for years. I can see the headlines now: “New iPhone launches amid massive new privacy concerns.” Anytime someone praises Apple for privacy, anywhere on the internet, there will be a tidal wave of peopl…

If they kill the program, headlines will read: “Apple refuses to protect sexually abused children” or “Apple sides with protecting child pornographers.” I anecdotally see no backlash outside of HN and the tech/libertarian-focused parts of Reddit. To the casual iPhone buyer making up their billions in revenue, turning back on the program wouldn’t be good optics. Obviously my statement is purely conjecture, I’ll admit…

I don't think they have to compromise on the CP protection.

They can just go along with what other cloud storage providers have been doing all along... that is, "we won't snoop into your phone, because that's yours. but if you upload photos to iCloud, onto OUR servers, then we reserve the right to scan for images in CP database.."

And I think most people will be perfectly fine with that idea.

Just like you sign away some rights and accept risk when you decide to store items in physical storage facility, same thing will happen when you use iCloud.

Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#204

Post by newsbinator »

userbinator wrote: post #188
pembrook wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just wait until the September event. Apple’s media attention quadruples during that time. “Apple creates authoritarian government wet dream” will be the main narrative coming out of the iPhone event. Not the new phone. And investors will not be happy.

Unfortunately, it seems the majority of the population are assuredly already rather authoritarian-leaning.

I wouldn't necessarily say authoritarian-leaning. More like "just this once"-leaning, without realizing there's no such thing.

Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#205

Post by zepto »

willis936 wrote: post #189
zepto wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume their goal is to turn on E2E for what gets stored on their servers. Right now, they have to hand over anyone’s photo library if they are ordered to do so. If they turn on E2E that will no longer be possible, and this will be strictly better and harder to abuse. That doesn’t mean this mechanism isn’t offensive. It just is better from a privacy point of view for them to do this and enable E2E.

Notice how they haven't done that though. It would be trivial to do. Just change all of the private keys to ones supplied by the clients. But they haven't done that. Why would you expect them to do that when they are taking steps away from individual privacy? Leaving a hypothetical option on the table that costs them nothing to do means they actively do not want to do it. So why would they do it?

They haven’t shipped this yet.

Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#206

Post by bigiain »

cyanydeez wrote: post #182
heavyset_go wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This problem is the capability, not what it's used for. Any such capability will be abused by new use cases be it terrorism, drug trafficking, human trafficking or whatever. Plus there will inevitably be unauthorized access. Apple even says it themselves[1]: > This program is ambitious, and protecting children is an important responsibility. These efforts will evolve and expand over time. [1] https://www.apple.com/…

from ptrotecting children to global ip dmca takedowns. we all know this is gonna be dmca 2.0

Yep.

And you know who that gun is aimed at first?

Apple employees.

Even if you trust Apple and NCMEC to not add out of scope hashes that some government or law enforcement or intelligence agency “asks” them to, does anybody who’s ever worked for Apple have any doubt at all they they’d use this to check employee’s personal devices for Apple IP? Especially if a big spectacular leak hits the media? Apple’s IP enforcement goons are legendary. And not in a good way in most people’s opinion. Particularly Gizmodos…

Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#207

Post by zepto »

katbyte wrote: post #191
zepto wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt that. I mentioned it to a non-tech person today. They hadn’t seen the news, and their first instinct was to empathize with the Apple executives having to confront that their products are enabling pedophiles.

hearin the number of CSAM reports apple made (265) vs facebook (10 million) changed my perspective. i don't like it but they are going to have to start scanning icloud photos sometime

Yeah - I can hear Tim Cook quoting those numbers as he explains this on stage.

Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#208

Post by tiahura »

merpnderp wrote: post #82
goodells wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't wait until /child-safety 404s or redirects to /safety and there's a wall of marketing blurb (possibly only in Chinese at first) that explains how 'national security' concerns are reported to the CCP. This has totally pushed me over the edge, though I'll admit I was oblivious to begin with. My plan is to replace the MacBooks with a Thinkpad P15 gen 2 running Ubuntu and replace the iPhone with something running…

That’s a smart plan. Apple didn’t misunderstand the criticism, they just have ulterior motives. It’s the only rational explanation.

“It’s the only rational explanation.”

Or, perhaps they feel really strongly about child exploitation?

Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#209

Post by pcurve »

jollybean wrote: post #128
pembrook wrote: post #72

This is by far the biggest misstep of Tim Cook’s tenure at Apple thus far. If they don’t kill this program soon, it’s going to overshadow the entire upcoming iPhone event, and will follow Apple around like a dark cloud for years. I can see the headlines now: “New iPhone launches amid massive new privacy concerns.” Anytime someone praises Apple for privacy, anywhere on the internet, there will be a tidal wave of peopl…

This I think is a bit of HN myopia. I've talked around and nobody I know is even aware of this, when I brought it up, they didn't care about the issue. It's not news in the commons, it's not on CNN, Fox or MSNBC right now as a headline. It's one of those tertiary concerns that frustrates some groups, but most people are not aware and would only marginally maligned, and a good 2/3 of people really don't care. I suspec…

This is a potentially sensitive and conflicting topic. I don't think people can take strong view on this in real life for multiple reasons, one of them being pedophilia is a disorder that is not super uncommon.

The fact that WSJ did a story on this with and a lengthy interview with Apple SVP means this is already a mainstream story.

Re: After criticism, Apple to only seek abuse images flagged in multiple nations

#210

Post by patmcc »

bnj wrote: post #192
patmcc wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>I just have to wonder who green-lit this idea to begin with. I suspect, with no inside knowledge, that there's someone high up in Apple who feels very, very passionately about child abuse/these sorts of images due to some personal connection, and they are championing the idea internally. And tbh not the worst bugbear to have, but obviously this isn't the way to address it. As for why the big players aren't jumping…

Having read the coverage and the documents that Apple has been putting out to manage the … what, crisis? Backlash? … I’ve been thinking about the design of the system and how I would want CSAM to be detected, if different than this. Honestly, I’m pretty impressed by what this approach accomplishes. Your comment says this obviously isn’t the way to do it— what’s better than this? In a legal context where detecting CSA…

>>>In a legal context where detecting CSAM is a strong requirement, what’s preferable to this approach?

It's not a strong requirement though? Only if the company sees it (unencrypted) do they need to report it, detecting it on-device is wholly different. It would honestly be better if they adjusted their TOS and started scanning the files on upload (on server side). They have the encryption keys already.

Apple is planning to install on all (recent) iPhones software that will let them scan for any image similar (using perceptual hashing) to some set of images. Right now, that's CSAM, and only on upload to iCloud. But what do you want to bet China is salivating at the idea of including images of Tank Man and other "seditious" content? And maybe checking images anytime they're added to the phone, or sent to someone else, not just up to iCloud?

It completely ruins the idea that Apple has your privacy/security in mind.

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