I don’t understand why UK wants to force Apple to change the method to leak user data, USA just sends an email and Apple, without checking anything else, sends all the data to the government. So why they can’t do the same?
Because that data is encrypted and law enforcement is used to get data unencrypted from its citizens. If a judge issues a warrant, they can wiretap your phone, unencrypted data directly from the pipe. If a judge issues a warrant, they can just enter your property, potentially by force, taking whatever they please. They are used to being able to just take what they need for whatever they can get a judge to sign off on.
For years law enforcement agencies around the world have been complaining that encrypted data makes their life a little harder because while they can still take it, they don’t know what it is or how valuable it is. They can’t use it. So now they push on politicians, they say stuff like “well listen those people who died, we probably had data, messages, that could have prevented that, but they were encrypted.” Ignoring the fact that these agencies have far too many messages currently to sort through.
Overall it doesn’t make sense to give them encryption backdoors. It’s far too dangerous and insane to think that protecting your data requires someone else to have a key. It’d be equal to requiring every physical lock to have a button that says “Only the law enforcement agents can press this” and it unlocks without a key. If it happens, you’ll see the UK lose a lot of server business and potentially internet traffic. It’s like the UK is intentionally trying to shoot itself in the leg.
Good, as a UK resident I hope Apple, Signal, even WhatsApp stick to their guns over this issue. It's the only way it will gain any traction with the public.
it will not make changes that it characterises as “a serious and direct threat to data security and information privacy” for users around the globe
That’s the thing right there. If Apple makes a back door for the UK, they would have difficulties keeping only UK citizens affected. Communications are global. Even if they restricted the back door to conversations involving UK residents, every private group chat that resident user enters becomes snoopable just by that user being there and the history could be made available from before the user entered. It would be like a privacy virus with UK residents as the spreaders.
I get concerned when companies like Apple uses the “We won’t break our application for demands of one country” argument as Australia, France, the USA and possibly other countries are either planning or already have similar legislation.
The right argument to have is the one that says “this is just plain wrong!”. That is a much tougher needle to thread though.
Careful there, expressing an honest take about an Apple decision instead of trying to spin it like it’s evil is a good way to piss a bunch of people off.
Considering Apple has no problem bending over backwards for dictatorships like China. Do you think they'll do anything other than to server their finances?
People regurgitating company PR bullshit is fucking cringe.
this "careful, you might…" cliché makes you seem like you spend too much time online. Add something constructive to the discussion, rather than virtue signaling.
No company is looking after your best interests, except when it aligns with their financial interests. You take that out, they'll sell you out to the highest bidder.
My brother in Christ, I don’t know who it was that hurt you but it wasn’t me. Being this emotionally invested in disliking a company is definitely not good for your mental health. Nobody here is even remotely suggesting that any company cares for anything other that maximizing profits. That doesn’t mean that there are no companies that maximize their profits by having a reputation for privacy and security.
If you don’t think my comment was valuable, downvote it and move on. Nobody wants to hear someone cry about how mean the big bad computer company is.
Hi, @jemorgan and @unpopular, this thread is getting pretty tense, I think it is time to disengage from the discussion. Further responses like these (personal attacks, insults) will be removed. When interacting with other users on this instance in the future, please keep in mind Beehaw’s one rule: Be(e) Nice
I rarely think Apple has done the right thing, but in this case they seem to be putting the privacy of their users above demands made by third parties, which is good.
Apple has a long history of being unwilling to bend the knee to govt requests.
I’m glad to see them taking a firm stance on this. I’m curious to see what the shareholders think if this happens, as one side of the coin is detrimental to their UK growth, but the other would result in their name being tarnished.
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