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Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

lapcatsoftware.com

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Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#491

Post by doublebind »

mikae1 wrote: post #462
jchw wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely! The important bit is that users have no choice in the matter. They're pushed into agreeing to whatever ToS and updating to whatever software version. The backlash against Microsoft's Windows Recall should serve as a good indicator of just how deeply people have grown to distrust tech companies. But Microsoft can keep turning the screws, and don't you know it, a couple years from now everyone will be runni…

If you accept Android as an option, then GrapheneOS probably check a lot of your boxes on an OS level. GrapheneOS developers sit between you and Google and make sure that shit like this isn't introduced without the user's knowledge. They actively strip out crap that goes against users interests and add features that empower us. I find that the popular apps for basic operation from F-Droid do a very good job of not sc…

That's great... for the HN reader.

However, how is that supposed to work for your significant other, or your mother, or your indifferent-to-technology friend?

Don't get me wrong, I also strive to keep my device's information private but, at the same time, I realize this has no practical use for most users.

Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#492

Post by chikere232 »

Gigachad wrote: post #480
latexr wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your second paragraph is exactly the point made in the article as the reason why it should be an informed choice and not something on by default.

If you don’t trust Apple to do what they say they do, you should throw your phone in the bin because it has total control here and could still be sending your data even if you opt out.

Oh yeah, the well known "blind trust" model of security. Never verify any claims of any vendor! If you don't trust them, why did you buy from them?!

Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#493

Post by dwaite »

kittikitti wrote: post #310

Here's a direct link to the paper that describes this as mentioned in the post, https://machinelearning.apple.com/research/homomorphic-encry... The homomorphic code is available in Swift https://www.swift.org/blog/announcing-swift-homomorphic-encr... I have concerns about how women would be affected by law enforcement who might use the location data to target abortions.

> I have concerns about how women would be affected by law enforcement who might use the location data to target abortions.

I believe this risk already exists in the form of LE request with court order to see the contents of an iCloud account, such as conversations and photo metadata. Advanced Data Protection exists to eliminate this particular vector - Apple no longer has account recovery information like private keys escrowed, so there's no way they can provide it if requested.

This would not increase such a risk since the network traffic is effectively VPN'd for anonymization, clients send false data periodically to break profiling or behavioral analysis, and the requests and corresponding results are not comprehensible to Apple's server due to the HE.

Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#494

Post by fragmede »

amatecha wrote: post #420
Thorrez wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But wouldn't the homomorphic encryption prevent Apple's servers from knowing if there was a match or not?

The server must know what it's matching at some point, to be able to generate a response: > The server identifies the relevant shard based on the index in the client query and uses HE to compute the embedding similarity in this encrypted space. The encrypted scores and set of corresponding metadata (such as landmark names) for candidate landmarks are then returned to the client. Even with the server supposedly not kn…

> The server must know what it's matching at some point, to be able to generate a response

The entire point of homomorphic encryption is that it doesn't.

The homomorphic encrypted Wikipedia lookup example is pretty neat.

https://spiralwiki.com/

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31668814

Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#495

Post by mort96 »

mikae1 wrote: post #462
jchw wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely! The important bit is that users have no choice in the matter. They're pushed into agreeing to whatever ToS and updating to whatever software version. The backlash against Microsoft's Windows Recall should serve as a good indicator of just how deeply people have grown to distrust tech companies. But Microsoft can keep turning the screws, and don't you know it, a couple years from now everyone will be runni…

If you accept Android as an option, then GrapheneOS probably check a lot of your boxes on an OS level. GrapheneOS developers sit between you and Google and make sure that shit like this isn't introduced without the user's knowledge. They actively strip out crap that goes against users interests and add features that empower us. I find that the popular apps for basic operation from F-Droid do a very good job of not sc…

Running a custom ROM locks you out of almost all decent phone hardware on the market since most have locked bootloaders, and it locks you out of a ton of apps people rely on such as banking and money transfer apps. You must recognise that it's not a practical solution for most people.

Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#496

Post by [deleted] »

ryandrake wrote: post #119
Gabriel54 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In response your second question, opt in would look exactly like this: don't have the box checked by default, with an option to enable it: "use this to improve local search, we will create an encrypted index of your data to send securely to our servers, etc..." A PhD is not necessary to understand the distinction between storing data locally on a machine vs. on the internet.

Exactly. It's the height of arrogance to insist that normal users just can't understand such complex words and math, and therefore the company should not have to obtain consent from the user. As a normal lay user, I don't want anything to leave my device or computer without my consent. Period. That includes personal information, user data, metadata, private vectors, homomorphic this or locally differential that. I do…

[deleted]

Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#497

Post by oneeyedpigeon »

ryandrake wrote: post #143
simondotau wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The average smartphone is probably doing a hundred things you didn’t knowingly consent to every second. Should Apple insist that every end user consents to the user agent string sent on every HTTP request?

> The average smartphone is probably doing a hundred things you didn’t knowingly consent to every second. You've succinctly identified a (maybe the ) huge problem in the computing world today. Computers should not do anything without the user's command/consent. This seems like a hopeless and unachievable ideal only because of how far we've already strayed from the light. Even Linux, supposedly the last bastion of use…

> I do expect it to obtain my consent before generally accessing the network and sending bytes over the network.

How would that make any difference in this case? Presumably, you'll have long-ago checked the "allow general access to the network" setting, so you've given consent to the "send my photo data" action. Heck, surely connecting to the internet in the first place is implicit consent that you want to send stuff over the network?

Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#498

Post by mormegil »

jchw wrote: post #417
raincole wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Trust in software will continue to erode > there is an increasing discontent growing towards opt-out telemetry Really? That's news to me. What I observed is people giving up more and more privacy every year (or "delegating" their privacy to tech giants).

Absolutely! The important bit is that users have no choice in the matter. They're pushed into agreeing to whatever ToS and updating to whatever software version. The backlash against Microsoft's Windows Recall should serve as a good indicator of just how deeply people have grown to distrust tech companies. But Microsoft can keep turning the screws, and don't you know it, a couple years from now everyone will be runni…

Completely agree, just one minor point:

> I think banking apps requiring SafetyNet passing is the dumbest thing on planet earth. You guys know I can just sign into the website with my mobile browser anyways, right?

No, you're not. For logging in, you need a mobile app used as an authentication token. Do not pass go, do not collect $200... (The current state of affairs in Czechia, at least; you still _do_ have the option of not using the app _for now_ in most banks, using password + SMS OTP, but you need to pay for each SMS and there is significant pressure to migrate you from it. The option is probably going to be removed completely in future.)

Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#499

Post by amatecha »

fragmede wrote: post #494
amatecha wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The server must know what it's matching at some point, to be able to generate a response: > The server identifies the relevant shard based on the index in the client query and uses HE to compute the embedding similarity in this encrypted space. The encrypted scores and set of corresponding metadata (such as landmark names) for candidate landmarks are then returned to the client. Even with the server supposedly not kn…

> The server must know what it's matching at some point, to be able to generate a response The entire point of homomorphic encryption is that it doesn't. The homomorphic encrypted Wikipedia lookup example is pretty neat. https://spiralwiki.com/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31668814

Oh, if that's the case, they really could have explained that better. The language used in Apple's article doesn't explain that the server cannot know the query or result (it implies as such, but doesn't make this clear, nor explain how/why)

Re: Apple Photos phones home on iOS 18 and macOS 15

#500

Post by Nullabillity »

simondotau wrote: post #444
Nullabillity wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is just "might makes right" bullshit with slightly prettier framing.

This has absolutely nothing to do with "might makes right". If a fast food store decides to offer a Vietnamese Peanut Burger and Sugar Cane Juice combo, nut allergy suffers are not "morally entitled" to a nut-free option and diabetics are not "morally entitled" to a sugar-free juice option. This applies whether the fast food store is a small family run business, or McDonalds. To suggest that customers are "morally en…

> If a fast food store decides to offer a Vietnamese Peanut Burger and Sugar Cane Juice combo, nut allergy suffers are not "morally entitled" to a nut-free option and diabetics are not "morally entitled" to a sugar-free juice option.

Why not? What gives McD the right to make such a decision unilaterally, other than might?

In fact, this is how disability legislation (for example) already tends to work. You don't get to tell disabled people to just go somewhere else, you have to make reasonable accomodations for them.

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