Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

501–510 of 1001 posts

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#501

Post by RIMR »

mihaaly wrote: post #492
IceHegel wrote: post #430

I'm sympathetic to the J.D. Vance angle, which is that European governments are increasingly scared of their own people. This is not doing a lot to change my mind.

Very wrong conclusions. They are not scared of people, but of working, doing their job, especially when it is difficult (catching criminals). They expect the job to be done for them by others, on the expense of everyone, while they collecting all the praise. On sympathetic to Vance I did not really found a presentable reaction, would not find on any other accidentally agreeable sentence leaving his mouth (very low ch…

Well put. It's pretty much impossible to sympathize with Vance saying this when the administration he is a part of is scaremongering about "the enemy within".

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#502

Post by pb7 »

4ndrewl wrote: post #460
15155 wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Folks in the United States aren't routinely arrested for Facebook posts.

They're not arrested for posting on Facebook. They're arrested for _what_ they're posting on Facebook.

Yes, people in the US don't get arrested for that.

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#503

Post by JBSay »

4ndrewl wrote: post #460
15155 wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Folks in the United States aren't routinely arrested for Facebook posts.

They're not arrested for posting on Facebook. They're arrested for _what_ they're posting on Facebook.

Just like any other authoritarian state

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#504

Post by bilbo0s »

Cornbilly wrote: post #466
IceHegel wrote: post #430

I'm sympathetic to the J.D. Vance angle, which is that European governments are increasingly scared of their own people. This is not doing a lot to change my mind.

The unspoken part of that is Vance likely thinks that the people should fear their government.

True.

It's a very unwise position Vance takes.

The world would clearly be better run if all governments feared their people, than it would if all people fear their governments.

The UK can pull this kind of stuff precisely because they do not fear any consequences from their people.

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#505

Post by JumpCrisscross »

bArray wrote: post #106

Too right, it was far more problematic than they ever made out. > The UK government's demand came through a "technical capability notice" under the Investigatory Powers Act (IPA), requiring Apple to create a backdoor that would allow British security officials to access encrypted user data globally. The order would have compromised Apple's Advanced Data Protection feature, which provides end-to-end encryption for iCl…

> One scenario would be somebody in an airport and security officials are searching your device

No Heathrow connection necessary. “The law has extraterritorial powers, meaning UK law enforcement would have been able to access the encrypted iCloud data of Apple customers anywhere in the world, including in the US” [1].

[1] https://www.ft.com/content/bc20274f-f352-457c-8f86-32c6d4df8...

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#506

Post by anoncow » 

    >Online privacy expert Caro Robson said she believed it was "unprecedented" for a company "simply to withdraw a product rather than cooperate with a government.
That is such a self serving comment. If Apple provides UK a backdoor, it weakens all users globally. With this they are following the local law and the country deserves what the rulers of the country want. These experts are a bit much. In the next paragraph they say something ominous.

    >"It would be a very, very worrying precedent if other communications operators felt they simply could withdraw products and not be held accountable by governments," she told the BBC.

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#507

Post by nickburns »

mox1 wrote: post #397
mtrovo wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Doesn't the US have access to all the data of non US citizens whose data is stored in the US without any oversight? Totally agree. Having this discussion so US centred just makes us miss the forest for the trees. Apart from data owned by US citizens, my impression is that data stored in the US is fair game for three letter agencies, and I really doubt most companies would spend more than five minutes agreeing with…

International users that have Advanced Protection enabled would in theory be safe from all of the 3-letter agencies (like safe from those agencies getting the data from Apple...not safe generally). Realistically we are talking about FISA here, so in theory if the FBI gets a FISA court order to gather "All of the Apple account data" for a non-us person, Apple would either hand over the encrypted data OR just omit that…

> its reasonable to assume they would do the same in the US (disable the feature if USG asked for a backdoor or attempted to compel them to decrypt)

I think it's more likely that Apple would challenge it in US courts and prevail. Certainly a legal battle worth waging, unlike in the UK.

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#508

Post by stavros »

yubblegum wrote: post #481
ljm wrote: post #358

Fundamentally, I think the issue is more about technical literacy amongst the political establishment who consistently rely on the fallacy that having nothing to hide means you have nothing to fear. Especially in the UK which operates as a paternalistic state and enjoys authoritarian support across all parties. On the authoritarianism: these laws are always worded in such a way that they can be applied or targeted va…

> technical literacy amongst the political establishment who consistently rely on the fallacy that having nothing to hide means you have nothing to fear. That's an awfully generous assessment on your part. Kindly explain just what "technical literacy" has to do with the formulation you note. From here it reads like you are misdirecting and clouding the -intent- by the powerful here. Also does ERIC SCHMIDT an accompli…

I feel like the comment was clear, technical illiteracy leads politicians to believe that they'll be the only ones with access to this backdoor, which isn't true.

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#509

Post by pplante »

Arubis wrote: post #353
pplante wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Life is imitating too many dystopian books, movies, etc these days. I think we need to put an end to all creative works before the timeline becomes irrecoverably destroyed.

I suspect you’re being flippant, but destruction of and restrictions on creative works as an _antidote_ to dystopia is a take I haven’t seen before.

Yes, I am being very flippant. Sometimes we need to jest in order to digest reality.

Re: Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row

#510

Post by bunderbunder »

yubblegum wrote: post #481
ljm wrote: post #358

Fundamentally, I think the issue is more about technical literacy amongst the political establishment who consistently rely on the fallacy that having nothing to hide means you have nothing to fear. Especially in the UK which operates as a paternalistic state and enjoys authoritarian support across all parties. On the authoritarianism: these laws are always worded in such a way that they can be applied or targeted va…

> technical literacy amongst the political establishment who consistently rely on the fallacy that having nothing to hide means you have nothing to fear. That's an awfully generous assessment on your part. Kindly explain just what "technical literacy" has to do with the formulation you note. From here it reads like you are misdirecting and clouding the -intent- by the powerful here. Also does ERIC SCHMIDT an accompli…

Let me offer a possible example that might be more in line with the HN commenting guideline about interpreting people's comments as charitably as reasonably possible:

My password manager vault isn't exactly something to hide in the political sense, but it's definitely something I would fear is exposed to heightened risk of compromise if there were a backdoor, even one for government surveillance purposes. And it's a reasonable concern that I think a lot of people aren't taking seriously enough due, in part, to a lack of technical literacy. Both in terms of not realizing how it materially impacts everyday people regardless of whether they're up to no good, and in terms of not realizing just how juicy a target this would be for agents up to and including state-level adversaries.

As for Eric Schmidt, he's something of a peculiar case. I don't doubt his technical literacy, but the dude is still the head of one of the world's largest surveillance capitalist enterprises, and, as the saying goes, "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it."

Post reply on HN