> Still stuck in Chrome though, just because there doesn't seem to be anything better.

I think Firefox is better. It cannot be trusted to sync one's passwords between devices, but then neither can Chrome. Other than that, I think Firefox is by far the better browser. It's fast enough, standards-compliant and made by people who love web browsers.

Firefox leaks ram horribly though. Not that Chrome is a ton better, but it's a little better.

Firefox has never used anywhere close the memory that Chrome does for me.

Not sure why you're getting downvoted; the point around these services being opt in seems valid.

Android is a global monopoly.

You have a choice what phone to use, but OEMs and app developers have no choice but to use Google.

But Apple is about as bad and invasive in its data practices. You prefer their controlled integrated system, but that doesn't make Apple any better wrt data snarfing.

Wow. No.

Apple makes it a point to do as much data processing as practical on the phone. They don't override your preference to not have your location tracked. They are developing new ground in differential privacy so when they do collect data, it's both useful and not personally identifiable. They don't do underhanded tricks with cookies to circumvent your browser privacy settings. And they're not in the business of selling you to advertisers based on your private data.

In short, there's no comparison between Google and Apple.

Does Google not have any interest in differential privacy practices?

That would run counter to their business model. They want to know exactly who you are.

They have used it to help anonymize data when collaborating.

I think they'd have a lot more trust if they explicitly gave information on their data retention periods.

Google was first to ship differential privacy in Chrome.

It seems I stand corrected (although none of us has posted references). I'm disappointed about being downvoted for being potentially wrong, though, as that's not what it's for. I'm OK to update my thoughts, athough I have reservations. I looked for what made me think this and it's Apple's pretty dire history of security holes and secret data tracking. For example, from reputable sources: http://www.wired.co.uk/article/apple-spies-on-yosemite-searc... https://pando.com/2014/07/28/apple-hit-with-class-action-sui... https://www.wired.com/2015/11/how-to-get-rid-of-the-iphone-m... http://arstechnica.com/apple/2011/04/how-apple-tracks-your-l... http://www.cultofmac.com/132610/it-took-apple-3-years-to-fix...

I appreciate your follow-up, although you're still conflating data tracking under your control vs data tracking under Apple's control.

* https://www.wired.com/2015/11/how-to-get-rid-of-the-iphone-m...

Wired is pointing out that the phone keeps a history of locations. Not Apple. Again, very different from Google's practices.

* http://www.wired.co.uk/article/apple-spies-on-yosemite-searc...

This one was disappointing, and as the comments indicate, contrary to Apple's customary sensitivity around privacy. Also trivially disabled, again, unlike the location tracking the Register is describing here which cannot be turned off.

* https://pando.com/2014/07/28/apple-hit-with-class-action-sui...

Sounds more like a lawsuit driving by misinformation. Show me facts, please.

* http://arstechnica.com/apple/2011/04/how-apple-tracks-your-l...

Again, purely data stored on the phone.

* http://www.cultofmac.com/132610/it-took-apple-3-years-to-fix...

Embarrassing, undoubtedly. Again, not Apple data collection.

> Also trivially disabled, again, unlike the location tracking the Register is describing here which cannot be turned off.

The tracking absolutely can be turned off. The register's original article is somewhat confused on this.

(disclaimer: googler)

Interesting. Important and good to know, thanks.

Regardless of specific events, you need look no further than their business models to see the difference:

Apple produces and sells premium devices (arguably fashion pieces) at a premium price. They make their money at the point of sale.

Google produces and contracts with manufacturers to produce devices, and provides services. They make their money with ads.

These are both widely known and accepted things, and these mean that Apple has a vested interest to NOT scrape your data, where Google has a vested interest to scrape as much of your data as they can.

Citation needed. I can at least turn off or opt out of Apples data collection. How do I opt out of google reading[1] my email when I communicate to someone who had a Gmail account?

Edit: [1] and by reading I mean: reading the contents of my email and forming a profile about me even if I don't use Google services.

The same way you opt-out of Apple or Yahoo! reading your email when you communicate to someone that has iCloud or Yahoo! mail.

You're confused. Google reads all incoming emails to enhance its ad targeting, Apple doesn't [1]. I don't have to opt out of Apple reading my mail because it doesn't read it by default.

Still waiting for some facts instead of rhetoric about how "everyone's doing it".

[1] https://www.apple.com/privacy/

"iAd sticks to the same privacy policy that applies to every other Apple product. It doesn’t get data from Health and HomeKit, Maps, Siri, iMessage, your call history, or any iCloud service like Contacts or Mail, and you can always just opt out altogether."

Apple,Yahoo!, Google and every mail sever READ all the emails.

They are read for anti virus purposes, categorization and for full text search.

You're conflating reading email for the purposes of providing an online email service with reading email for the purposes of building a profile of a user to help target advertising.

These are very different. In the former case, if I delete an email, its metadata is gone too (indexing, antivirus, etc.). In the latter case the email provider is literally building a dossier of my personality, preferences, and contacts that persists regardless of how much email I delete (or even if I delete my whole account).

To put it another way, Apple reads my email in the trivial sense - so the email itself can be stored, displayed, and searched. Google reads my email in the intimate sense - so it can learn more about me and augment my ad profile. These are not at all the same thing, and confusing the two is dangerous because it lets privacy invasion off the hook as just "providing a service".

https://www.google.com/settings/u/0/ads/authenticated "Ads based on your interest". Notice no where in there does it say that these interests are based on your emails.

Gmail does a lot of stuff that requires email parsing: * Spam filtering * Search indexing * Applying rule based filters * Priority Inbox * Picking up automated emails corresponding to receipts, flights, or calendar appointments and making them available to search or see in Google Now. * To train the Smart Reply feature

One primary reason Apple doesn't do this is that Apple doesn't have a cloud based email service. They are forced to do everything on device. I have about 10Gb of email in my work account and 16Gb of email in my personal account. Do I want to sync 26Gb of email to my phone, tablet, and desktop, all so that they can do purely local indexing, filtering, and other smart AI based features? If I'm a user in a developing country on a 2G or 3G network, do I want this to all happen locally, or in the cloud?

There are tradeoffs in all scenarios, and the theorized nasty things from all of the speculated profiling going on don't seem to be very apparent. And if all of these profiling is going on, then why is what Google thinks I'm interested in so often wrong? Perhaps there's a disconnect between what people imagine Google "could be doing" and what they're actually doing.

Apple has iCloud email service

Wow, you're right. It's so under the radar, I don't know a single person who has ever used it, or mobileme before it. The point still stands though, in the sense that Mail.app is written with the assumption of IMAP/Exchange as the primary use case, and so they have to assume local processing unless they implement proprietary protocols/IMAP extensions. I don't think you get credit for starting with a legacy POP/IMAP client, and then say "this was architected for local processing for your privacy", in the sense that, it already existed that way because most Mail clients prior to Gmail had to treat the MTA as a relatively commodity store. (you're claiming credit for doing something that was always that way by default) If they launch a rewrite-from-scratch end-to-end client for a proprietary email service protocol, and offer features on parity with gmail, but all with offline processing, then it's worth talking about.

Apple is in the same position as Microsoft with the PC. Microsoft wanted the PC to be the center of the universe, the center of the home, and all processing to take place on it, because that meant MS Software would be in control. Cloud based processing commodifies your platform, as the Web helped commodify Windows and paved the way for the iPhone and Mac to be viable and usable (since most of the apps people wanted to run were now web apps)

Apple wants the iPhone to be the new central hub of everything, because that drives sales of hardware and drives lock-in to their proprietary walled garden. By coincidence, this aligns with enhanced privacy, but Apple is beholden to Wall Street just like Google is, and if there was a new product which threatened to tank their stock, and they had to compromise "principles", you'd start to see a weaseling away.

When Apple reaches saturation with their primary business, the iPhone, and they need to drive huge growth, they'll diversify into other areas. If they are driven into services, they will inevitably run up again the issue of having to process inherently personal data in the cloud.

I think you're assuming more from Apple's privacy statement than they say.

"We don’t build a profile based on your email content or web browsing habits to sell to advertisers."

How do you get from a phrase like that to "... if I delete an email, its metadata is gone too (indexing, antivirus, etc.).?" In particular, the antivirus and indexing data---particularly any manual signal you provided to Apple on whether you thought that email was spam---is likely retained to improve the quality of their service for you and other customers.

They said they're not building a profile on you to sell to advertisers. It'd be really surprising if they aren't building a profile on you to improve things like, say, Siri's understanding of your interests, or Maps' understanding of your area, etc. So is the third-party advertising where we draw the line?

You original

> How do I opt out of google reading my email when I communicate to someone who had a Gmail account?

Perhaps the one confusing and using wrong terms is not me.

You're right I should have clarified that I meant I don't want Google to read the contents of my email and form a profile about me even if I don't use Google services instead of just saying "read".

Edit: I still haven't heard any justification from you for why it's ok for Google to do this nor any evidence that Apple does the same thing.

I didn't said that Apple makes a profile, I have said that Apple/Microsoft/every mail server reads ALL the emails.