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Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

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Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#681

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has nothing to do with a lack of spirit. It's a 800lbs of reality crashing down. There's nothing wrong with trying to hack the Gibson. However, this wasn't just a hack, but a severe threat to Apple's walled garden. As long as they are allowed to have it, they will protect it at all costs. Thinking any differently is just naive. So of course this is the ultimate result.

It’s identical to a jailbreak which gets patched ASAP so not sure what is has to do with walled garden as much. I’ve played with the same idea of making an Android client but I would never build a product on that because I know the limitations on my side. As a company you are 100% allowed to break 3rd party client when they don’t have an agreement with you. It’s your product after all. Heck even with an agreement API…

> It’s identical to a jailbreak which gets patched ASAP so not sure what is has to do with walled garden as much

Why do you think they don't want you to run a jailbreak? It's to protect the walled garden. If you can install apps other than their store, that's lost revenue. They claim security blah blah, but it's removing mouths from the teet. So, it has everything to do with the walled garden. How does that not make sense to you?

Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#682

Where is the hacker spirit here? The number of Apple apologists that have crawled out to say "see? I told you so!!" is saddening. It is a bit dicey when you're charging for it, but since Mini was entirely client-side it would be feasible for a free version to exist. Apple claims iMessage is E2EE, do we have proof they aren't siphoning the messages from the client once it's been decrypted? The level of trust we have t…

I like/love Apple, but it's not really about hacker spirit. I think Steve and Steve were at the start, for sure. But then, it's like Steve figured out how to "evolve" hacker spirit into a business model. And not just any business model: but a totalitarian vertically integrated model. I mean, fabulously successful and don't let the negative political connotations of totalitarian offend you here, it's but a minor jab, because there are downsides to this model in the Apple-verse, for sure: the lack of "hackability" of their devices.

But it's perhaps a momentary cultural variation in a sea of changing priorities for Apple. They have embraced right to repair: perhaps in future, "hacker spirit" evolves further to become, a "right" for all citizenry of the Apple-verse, backed by their tremendous business model. In the same way that you can conceptualize (again, without judgement or making regard as to truth or not), that "human rights" emerge not out of a vacuum, but out of what the infrastructure of state can conceive and provide.

In other words, today's action may be but the anachronistic kneejerk of some poobah in the Apple bureaucracy. A vestige of the old guard, perhaps soon dying out.

If that makes sense? :)

Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#683

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except they charge a thousand dollars to enter and then let everyone else in for free but they have to wear a badge and the pictures they get from the roller coaster photo booth are 240p.

> Except they charge a thousand dollars A Lamborghini Urus costs $230k so I guess it's morally acceptable to break into a dealership and steal it.

Kind of, yeah. Once something is expensive enough it's no longer common theft, it's a heist.

Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#684
post #631

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His first sentence about privacy and security is nonsense, but his second sentence hits the nail on the head. If the richest company in the world wanted their chat app to run on Android, it would by now. It's strange Apple doesn't sell an iMessage Android app, but I'm sure they've had somebody do the math and found out that it's more money for Apple in the long run if they don't.

Completely agreed about the nonsensical first claim. We have many third-party clients for other messaging platforms where privacy and security are a primary feature. It's completely tenable, especially for a player like Apple. Or put another way: If the privacy and security of imessage is compromised by someone building another client, I'd argue that you never had either to begin with.

> Completely agreed about the nonsensical first claim. We have many third-party clients for other messaging platforms where privacy and security are a primary feature.

I can't think of an any with independent implementations.

For instance, have a few third party Signal clients, which work by using the official libSignal . These are not third party clients, but third party GUIs. Use of libSignal on the official Signal network is also not supported or recommended.

Likewise, all the third-party Telegram clients I know of are forks using Telegram source.

This makes sense, because neither of these are stable systems. A third party has to stay up-to-date with features and changes made to the official servers and clients.

Do you know of a security and privacy focused messaging platform which is both:

1. documented

2. has multiple independent implementations of the networking and security protocols?

Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#685

Where is the hacker spirit here? The number of Apple apologists that have crawled out to say "see? I told you so!!" is saddening. It is a bit dicey when you're charging for it, but since Mini was entirely client-side it would be feasible for a free version to exist. Apple claims iMessage is E2EE, do we have proof they aren't siphoning the messages from the client once it's been decrypted? The level of trust we have t…

> Obviously Mini was using the encryption properly else it wouldn't have worked to begin with. Just want to point out this isn’t inherently true. For example an insecurely generated session key would work fine but not be secure. > Of course, it's very unlikely Apple is doing that. Just putting the thought out there. Apple is doing what? Not using encryption properly? What reason do you have to believe that?

> Not using encryption properly?

They didn't mean that, they meant siphoning off data client side, for reasons, like CSAM.

The point, which I agree with, is having to trust a single closed source implementation of a client is not so different to trusting the servers of a non E2E service.

Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#686

Where is the hacker spirit here? The number of Apple apologists that have crawled out to say "see? I told you so!!" is saddening. It is a bit dicey when you're charging for it, but since Mini was entirely client-side it would be feasible for a free version to exist. Apple claims iMessage is E2EE, do we have proof they aren't siphoning the messages from the client once it's been decrypted? The level of trust we have t…

I like/love Apple, but it's not really about hacker spirit. I think Steve and Steve were at the start, for sure. But then, it's like Steve figured out how to "evolve" hacker spirit into a business model. And not just any business model: but a totalitarian vertically integrated model. I mean, fabulously successful and don't let the negative political connotations of totalitarian offend you here, it's but a minor jab,…

I love my iPhone but apple is a publicly traded corp lol. The only reason they're embracing right to repair is because of huge efforts of people outside the company to get bills passed that make them embrace it.

Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#687

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple claims iMessage is E2EE, do we have proof they aren't siphoning the messages from the client once it's been decrypted? Actually it is documented by Apple themselves that they receive the encrypted messages and the key to decrypt them when iCloud backup is used (unless you and the person you are messaging have specifically enabled their "advanced data protection" feature). They have decrypted messages in respo…

You left off the point that that only true if you had iCloud backup of iMessages enabled. If you didn't have iCloud backup enabled then they've always been E2EE.

No, I mentioned that.

> If you didn't have iCloud backup enabled then they've always been E2EE.

Correction: if you and the person you're messaging both didn't have iCloud backup enabled. And also it's worth noting that Apple forbids you from using any cloud backup system other than theirs.

Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#688

One thing which is really confusing is why are Android users obsessed with iMessage? Android users can send text messages to iPhones, the can call iPhone users, and they can use third party messaging apps to communicate with iPhone users. It really isn’t clear to me why so many people are so angry they cannot use iMessage on Android.

Because Apple deliberately screws with messages to non Apple users. Every video my family sends to me is low res heavily pixelated trash, to the point that you can't even recognise faces.

Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#689
What’s between the lines is that iMessage is critical as a way to lock in users to iOS. People care about security somewhat but they care way more about being ostracized for having green bubbles. I bet few common users could tell you the security properties of major messaging apps. This app, if allowed, would have shaved off a parentage points off iPhone market share.

Re: Apple cuts off Beeper Mini's access

#690
post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The iPhone user experience for messaging with Android users (especially MMS) is awful and the Android users in the group chat get blamed for it. Having blue text bubbles show up when someone texts you can be seen in some circles as a status symbol.

Let’s be clear here: Apple not yet implementing RCS aside, the experience is horrible because SMS/MMS are horrible.

I can send the same mms from Android to Android and Apple recipients and they receive the same media. Yet sending from Apple to both the Apple users get good quality and Android Apple deliberately sends pixelated rubbish.
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