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An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

appleprivacyletter.com

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Re: An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

#181

Post by robertlagrant »

defaultname wrote: post #134
syshum wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are massively under estimating what this change means if you think it is "pretty tame change" Clearly you do not understand the full ramification of what is happening here.

What are the ramifications that I "do not understand"? I will repeat: It is a very tame change. Were you frantic and delirious when a neural network first identified a dog in your photos? Isn't that the slippery slope to it reporting you to the authorities for something bong shaped? Speaking of which, every bit of fear mongering relies upon a slippery slope fallacy. What is clearly a PR move is somehow actually the m…

> What is clearly a PR move

I don't know what I think about the move, but I know this: intentions don't matter. Capabilities matter. If the current intention is benign, that means little.

Re: An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

#182

Post by hughrr »

sathackr wrote: post #42

US Government: We suspect the person in this photo of committing a crime. Here is your subpoena, Apple. You are directed to scan all iPhone and iCloud storage for any pictures matching this NeuralHash and report to us where you find them. Chinese Government: Here is the NeuralHash for Tienanmen square. Delete all photos you find matching this or we will bar you from China. Apple has at this point already admitted thi…

Yeah as I mentioned down the thread, once you act against the users, you're dead. I'm done. They are going from my life.

Good job it's ebay 80% off fees this weekend here in the UK.

Re: An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

#183

Post by birdyrooster »

sandworm101 wrote: post #17
toxik wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is a very deep and troublesome philosophical issue here. Ceci n'est pas une pipe. A picture of child abuse /is not/ child abuse. Let me ask you a counter-question. If I am able to draw child pornography so realistically that you couldn't easily tell, am I committing a crime by drawing?

Yes. People have been convicted for possession of hand-drawn and computer-generated images. Editing a child's image to make it pornographic is also illegal. So some "deepfake" videos using faces from young celebs are in all likelihood very illegal in many jurisdictions. Images can be illegal if all people are of age, but are portrayed as underage. Many historical dramas take legal advice about this when they have adu…

Maybe in Saudi Arabia? That’s not the case in the US.

Re: An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

#184

Post by daemoon »

roenxi wrote: post #87
defaultname wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone who engaged in such a discussion with a non-technical person is going to defacto seem like an advocate for child pornography, similar to how advocating for encryption can easily be twisted to being pro-crime. Having said that, there is an enormous amount of misinformation and fear-mongering about a pretty tame change. This seems like so much ado about very close to nothing. a) They optionally scan messaged pho…

"They're going to scan your phone and probably have someone review any photos with a lot of human flesh in them" would be enough to get a lot of non-technical users to take notice. That would get a lot of people nervous. Let alone anyone smart who thinks through the implications here of how far the line is being pushed on how public your phone is.

Simply turning off iCloud Photos will ensure that photos on your iPhone are never scanned. Why are you trying to make this thing about photos stored on-device? Photos in iCloud have always been available to Apple through iCloud backups. If you are concerned about privacy, turn it off.

"And it does so while providing significant privacy benefits over existing techniques since Apple only learns about users’ photos if they have a collection of known CSAM in their iCloud Photos account."

Re: An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

#185

Post by syshum »

defaultname wrote: post #134
syshum wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are massively under estimating what this change means if you think it is "pretty tame change" Clearly you do not understand the full ramification of what is happening here.

What are the ramifications that I "do not understand"? I will repeat: It is a very tame change. Were you frantic and delirious when a neural network first identified a dog in your photos? Isn't that the slippery slope to it reporting you to the authorities for something bong shaped? Speaking of which, every bit of fear mongering relies upon a slippery slope fallacy. What is clearly a PR move is somehow actually the m…

That’s not a slippery slope; that’s a fully built system just waiting for external pressure to make the slightest change.

Apple’s changes would enable such screening, takedown, and reporting in its end-to-end messaging. The abuse cases are easy to imagine: governments that outlaw homosexuality might require the classifier to be trained to restrict apparent LGBTQ+ content, or an authoritarian regime might demand the classifier be able to spot popular satirical images or protest flyers.

[1] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/apples-plan-think-diff...

Re: An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

#186

Post by voakbasda »

post_break wrote: post #136

If Apple doesn't change on this my next phone will not be an iPhone. I will dump my iPad, and Apple watch as well. This is complete bullshit. I'm angry. I never thought I'd see "privacy" Apple come out and say we're going to scan your photos on your device, scan you imessages, etc. This is insane.

I gave up on Macs almost 20 years ago, but I have an iPhone 7 that I need to upgrade. This whole shitshow has put that purchase on hold indefinitely.

Re: An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

#187

Post by defaultname »

noasaservice wrote: post #167
defaultname wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone who engaged in such a discussion with a non-technical person is going to defacto seem like an advocate for child pornography, similar to how advocating for encryption can easily be twisted to being pro-crime. Having said that, there is an enormous amount of misinformation and fear-mongering about a pretty tame change. This seems like so much ado about very close to nothing. a) They optionally scan messaged pho…

This on-device scanning is even worse. They cant even tell what was violating, or what hash, or what image. Just that the computer said you are violating. We have no idea about the hash collisions. When talking about whole world, 2^256 isn't a big enough space.... even if they're using 256 bits. And how dare anybody criticize this - criticism is tantamount to being for child porn. (Then again, that's why it was chose…

There is a shared (among all of the major tech companies and presumably law enforcement) hash database of child abuse material. Going from a photo to the hash is deterministic: How it gets to a hash on your phone is surely the same way it gets to a hash running the exact same algorithm on the cloud, whether iCloud, Amazon Photos, etc.

Such a collision would generate a human validation.

This applies to cloud-shared files. It actually has applied to cloud shared photos for years. It applies to literally every major cloud photo service.

Re: An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

#188

Post by [deleted] »

wintermutestwin wrote: post #174
toxik wrote: post #3

Please talk to non-tech people around you about this. This overreach simply cannot stand, and from a company that sees success from touting itself as a privacy-centric alternative? These really are some dark times. I imagine that if the world had Stasi fresher in its mind, this would never have happened.

>touting itself as a privacy-centric alternative There is a difference between selling your data to the highest bidder through a stalker capitalism ecosystem and giving governments carte blanche access. I am not at all advocating for the latter, but if you are fighting that battle, CP is not the hill to die on.

[deleted]

Re: An Open Letter Against Apple's Privacy-Invasive Content Scanning Technology

#189

Post by webmobdev »

XorNot wrote: post #50

Fixed: Chinese Government: Here is the NeuralHash for some child abuse imagery, please scan this user's phone and tell us if it's found. Apple: Sure we found it. Chinese Government: this user has unpermitted winnie the pooh memes. Send them to an internment camp.

Fixed:

Modi's Indian Government: This opposition leader is criticising us too much. Send him a child abuse imagery and ask Apple / Google to scan for it on his phone.

Apple / Google: We found it!

Modi's Indian Government: Let the defamation begin!

Context:

- Evidence found on a second Indian activist’s computer was planted, report says - https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/07/06/bhima-korega... ]

- Pegasus Snoopgate - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ppt3FIV2itQ

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