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Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

security.apple.com

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Re: Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

#61

Post by azinman2 »

transpute wrote: post #27
loteck wrote: post #23

Some good comments on this from cryptographer Matt Green here: https://x.com/matthew_d_green/status/1800291897245835616?t=C... (I wonder if Matt realizes nobody can read his tweets without a X account? Use BlueSky or Masto man) Edit: here's his thread combined https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1800291897245835616.html?...

Thanks for the link. > As best I can tell, Apple does not have explicit plans to announce when your data is going off-device for to Private Compute. You won't opt into this, you won't necessarily even be told it's happening. It will just happen. Magically. Presumably it will be possible to opt out of AI features entirely, i.e. both on-device and off-device? Why would a device vendor not have an option for on-device A…

You would have to activate a clearly LLM-powered software feature and have internet access. I don't know if settings will appear to disable this, but you could imagine it would be the case. This isn't just siphoning off all your data at random.

Re: Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

#63

Post by [deleted] »

zer00eyz wrote: post #31

I have a big question here. Who is this for? Dont get me wrong I think it's a great effort. This is some A+ nerd stuff right here. It's speaking my languge. But Im just going to figure out how to turn off "calls home". Cause I dont want it doing this at all. Is this speaking to me so I tell others "apple is the most secure option"? I don't want to tell others "linux" because I don't want to do tech support for that.…

[deleted]

Re: Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

#64

Post by transpute »

azinman2 wrote: post #61
transpute wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the link. > As best I can tell, Apple does not have explicit plans to announce when your data is going off-device for to Private Compute. You won't opt into this, you won't necessarily even be told it's happening. It will just happen. Magically. Presumably it will be possible to opt out of AI features entirely, i.e. both on-device and off-device? Why would a device vendor not have an option for on-device A…

You would have to activate a clearly LLM-powered software feature and have internet access. I don't know if settings will appear to disable this, but you could imagine it would be the case. This isn't just siphoning off all your data at random.

Would Spotlight be considered a "clearly LLM-powered software feature"? Will there be an option for "non-AI Spotlight"? Disabling dozens of software features, or identifying all apps which might use LLM services, is a daunting proposition. It would be good to have a PCC kill switch, which makes opt-in usage meaningful, rather than forced.

Re: Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

#65

Post by wmf »

transpute wrote: post #58
wmf wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're one of the richest companies in history you can "simply" invest 15 years into developing your own chips instead of buying Nvidia GPUs.

> simply invest 15 years into developing your own chips instead of buying Nvidia GPUs https://www.notebookcheck.net/Apple-and-Imagination-strike-G... Following the loss of Apple, easily its biggest client, Imagination was bought out by a Chinese-based investment group. Apple subsequently released its first in-house designed mobile GPU as part of the A11 Bionic SoC that powered the iPhone X.. The new “multi-year licen…

That probably has nothing to do with the Neural Engine though.

Re: Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

#66

Post by wyes »

cherioo wrote: post #25

Can some ELI5 how remote attestation is supposed to work? It feels like asking a remote endpoint “are you who you say you are”. What’s stopping remote endpoint always responding “yes”

They rely on Trusted Execution Environments and the fact that hash functions are one-way functions.

Verifier -> requests a Prover to attest its software state

Prover -> goes into RoT, verifies authenticity of Verifier (and request), computes hash of attested memory region, sends hash digest

Verifier -> receives digest and compares to known hash

> What’s stopping remote endpoint always responding “yes” The attestation code is inside of a RoT, so a bad actor shouldn't be able to call this code, only callable by receiving a request from a Verifier

Re: Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

#67

Post by transpute »

Timber-6539 wrote: post #59
piccirello wrote: post #50

> The Secure Enclave randomizes the data volume’s encryption keys on every reboot and does not persist these random keys, ensuring that data written to the data volume cannot be retained across reboot. In other words, there is an enforceable guarantee that the data volume is cryptographically erased every time the PCC node’s Secure Enclave Processor reboots.

Feels like an uptime screenshot would be appropriate here

PCC node execution should be per-transaction, i.e. relatively short lived.

Re: Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

#68

Post by wmf »

transpute wrote: post #52
wmf wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if you can't turn it off and this extreme security is the justification for why?

If user data disclosure is forced, would user data be limited to PCC nodes located within the same legal jurisdiction, e.g. EU, UK, US, China, etc?

PCC is as government-proof as the iPhone itself so jurisdiction may not matter much.

Re: Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

#69

Post by solarkraft »

I was sceptical of the announcement, but this actually sounds really well thought out.

One key part though will be the remote attestation that the servers are actually running what they say they're running. Without any access to the servers, how do we do that? Am I correctly expecting that that part remains a "trust me bro" situation?

Re: Private Cloud Compute: A new frontier for AI privacy in the cloud

#70

Post by al_borland »

zer00eyz wrote: post #31

I have a big question here. Who is this for? Dont get me wrong I think it's a great effort. This is some A+ nerd stuff right here. It's speaking my languge. But Im just going to figure out how to turn off "calls home". Cause I dont want it doing this at all. Is this speaking to me so I tell others "apple is the most secure option"? I don't want to tell others "linux" because I don't want to do tech support for that.…

Apple needs to differentiate itself, and they have chosen privacy as a way to do that, which I'm all for. The headlines around Microsoft's AI efforts have largely been a nightmare, with a ton of bad press. If the press around Apple's AI is all about how over the top they went with security and privacy, that will likely make people feel a little better about using it.

I'm not a big user of OpenAI's stuff, but if I was going to use any of it, I'd rather use it through Apple's anonymizing layer than going directly to OpenAI.

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