I'm sure device manufacturers are looking at energy-harvesting technologies for true "always on" capability.
Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
221–230 of 267 posts
Re: Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
#222The article is wrong about AOP being on while the phone is off. AOP is on while the phone is in standby. It powers down when you shut down the phone. Its job is to save battery by doing things like the Hey Siri and sensors processing without powering up the main cores at all. It does not stay on when the system is shut down.
The part about the Bluetooth chipset staying on is correct. Think about it, why would they need the AOP when the Bluetooth chipset can run that applet autonomously and send the beacons?
Nothing is listening to your mics while the phone is off. The stuff that runs while the phone is off is rather limited. Mostly things related to the NFC chipset, to support payment and transport applications while the battery is dead (which is a requirement of some of those systems) and, as we just saw, Bluetooth LE features.
Re: Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
#223Very interesting read. This seems to be implemented as a Bluetooth LE app running on the ultra-low power “always on processor” used for a variety of features, like “wake-up on motion.” Much like an Tile or AirTag is implemented. No comment on what this is capable in the future.. but for now this shows power usage / signal strength / proximity of other “actually on” devices are a limitations of this feature. What’s im…
The chances of you being directly spied on are low. The chances of someone being spied on who could influence the world around you is much higher. So a journalist could be spied on right before they break a big story, potentially leading to a cover up. That’s the problem with stuff like this. Even if you have “nothing to hide” you might rely on someone who legitimately does.
You could be spied on if governments are allowed to deploy dragnets that spy on everyone. Like how if your phone is on, your broad location is tracked whether you are a suspect or not.
Re: Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
#224Very interesting read. This seems to be implemented as a Bluetooth LE app running on the ultra-low power “always on processor” used for a variety of features, like “wake-up on motion.” Much like an Tile or AirTag is implemented. No comment on what this is capable in the future.. but for now this shows power usage / signal strength / proximity of other “actually on” devices are a limitations of this feature. What’s im…
> I’ll be pretty shocked if I’m “spied on” with this style of device. A few days ago I was trying to figure out what an AirTag is , so I read the Apple website. They claim that ordinary people don't need to worry about being tracked, because users who are travelling with an AirTag that is not theirs will have an alert sent their iPhone. This raises three questions which were conveniently elided on Apple's website: 1.…
Why are you so worried about expensive AirTags being used to track people? There’s a market full of cheap tracking devices to slip in someone’s pocket and they come with no privacy protection at all.
Re: Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
#225Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I’ll be pretty shocked if I’m “spied on” with this style of device. A few days ago I was trying to figure out what an AirTag is , so I read the Apple website. They claim that ordinary people don't need to worry about being tracked, because users who are travelling with an AirTag that is not theirs will have an alert sent their iPhone. This raises three questions which were conveniently elided on Apple's website: 1.…
>1. What prevents people from using AirTags to track Android users? AirTags are BLE beacons, that Android phones will simply not pick up and not send their signal to the mothership. A background noise.
You're missing the point.
If an Android user is travelling with an AirTag other people (e.g. a colleague) with iPhones will "send the signal to the motherships" but they won't get the alert as they most likely won't be in proximity of the AirTag long enough to trigger it.
Re: Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
#226Earlier quoted context omitted.
They do yearly updates, the 2022 doc will very likely have more information. Regardless, the 2021 doc has some key foundations of the technology that are worth knowing. The contract tracing docs _should_ be almost the same technology, and knowing how that works _should_ be a good start. At least, from my eyeing the OP's article as a lay person.
"They do yearly updates, the 2022 doc will very likely have more information." Sure you document such stuff before releasing it?
>Sure you document such stuff before releasing it?
These are all likely documented internally - the process of cleaning it up is probably something they only care to do once a year. Very little of this affects most developers, and the stuff that does is available in the dev docs.
Re: Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
#227The weirdest thing is that Apple can do this and not use it to make wake up alarms go off after the device is shut down lol
I remembered that some old functional phone has such compatibility. Their alarm will ring no matter your phone is off or on. Being totally independent to the phone function.
I had a Sony (Android 4?) that could do that. Such a useful feature.
Re: Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
#228Earlier quoted context omitted.
"who hates HN" This site, and this community, is great in my opinion. But it's not without valid criticism, especially considering the impact it can and has made in the industry and tech society. "naively uninformed tantrum" I'm unable to find the posts you're talking about.
Sorry if my distaste for these "I'm so cool look at me go" Twitter rants is seeping out here. If you go to his profile and scroll back a few days of posts you'll find them. Anyway it looks like he's humbled and corrected himself after seeing this writeup. Maybe I'll give him another chance.
> scroll back a few days
I did and I'm not sure what I'm looking for. Could you do it and post here so that I can verify what you're talking about?
Re: Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
#229Very interesting read. This seems to be implemented as a Bluetooth LE app running on the ultra-low power “always on processor” used for a variety of features, like “wake-up on motion.” Much like an Tile or AirTag is implemented. No comment on what this is capable in the future.. but for now this shows power usage / signal strength / proximity of other “actually on” devices are a limitations of this feature. What’s im…
> I’ll be pretty shocked if I’m “spied on” with this style of device. A few days ago I was trying to figure out what an AirTag is , so I read the Apple website. They claim that ordinary people don't need to worry about being tracked, because users who are travelling with an AirTag that is not theirs will have an alert sent their iPhone. This raises three questions which were conveniently elided on Apple's website: 1.…
1. Apple announced that they will release an App for Android that detects when an AirTag travels with you. I don't think it has been released yet, so currently, nothing prevents you from tracking Android users.
2. The iPhone can detect the distance to the AirTag quite precisely. I think this type of false positive is going to be rare enough for notification fatigue not being a problem. In your bus example, reporting the false positive would be fine imo. (It would also allow you to return the air tag to the owner).
3. The notifications don't go through Apple's servers, so Apple would need a backdoor in the OS to disable the feature. They might have added something like this, but it might not matter much - if someone plants a tracking device on you, they'll use one without silly privacy features.
Re: Always-on Processor magic: How Find My works while iPhone is powered off
#230Earlier quoted context omitted.
Without disagreeing with anything you've said there, even if you /think/ you have nothing to hide now and happen to be correct in practice, it's a terrible assumption to think that you can count on that being true forever. Imagine you witness a murder in a restaurant, cold blooded and it's dirty cops working for a three letter institution that did it. You want to give evidence like a law abiding, upstanding citizen w…
You don't even have to get that radical with "nothing to hide". Next time someone says that ask if they use blinds in their house/apt, if you could setup a webcam in their living room, or if you could just read some texts between them and a significant other. Or ask for their passwords, date of birth, SSN, credit card numbers, pets' names, and parents' names. Simple things like this are why I talk to people via Signa…
People don't care when they are just a statistical datapoint, like sure they can see "now a million people are having sex", but nobody will act on that since it isn't interesting. Which is why people would be more fine with having a camera in every bedroom than having a camera in their bedroom specifically.
So arguing "what if I spy on YOU?" wont convince anyone. They see that as a completely different thing.