Network filtering isn't going to protect your privacy from anyone. If Apple (or Google) were really serious, they'd require app developers to have a privacy policy and have them post a bond in case they violate the policy. (They'd also need to audit every application backend to ensure that it's not sending data back to China.)
Nobody would write apps with this sort of policy in place... so here we are. If you really think the Chinese government is out to get you, which is a very real concern, I would not use any apps on your phone. The app developers do not care about your safety, and neither does Apple.
http://fortune.com/2018/09/01/apple-app-store-privacy-policy...
And having developers post a bond is logistically impossible to implement. Far better just to have Apple kick them off the store entirely. Which is what they do already.
It's quite amazing that Apple has not added this simple requirement to their app store until now.
Or if you're big enough like Uber, just get a firm warning and be told to stop doing whatever it is that's wrong.
A year and a half after their more privacy-conscious competition but good progress: https://www.iubenda.com/blog/privacy-policy-for-android-app/...
> And having developers post a bond is logistically impossible to implement.
Require a credit card at publisher signup. Explain it will be charged for violations.
I don't want to assume you're trolling, but this is literally the first time I've heard anyone ever say Google is more privacy conscious than Apple.
When you think of a toxic hellstew of vulnerabilities, you probably don't think of Apple either, even though its App Store infected more users with malware than all its competitors combined. https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/09/malware-...
The malware you’re referring to—XcodeGhost—was produced by compromised non-Apple copies of Xcode installers downloaded by (mostly) Chinese developers from non-Apple (Baidu) servers, who then produced iOS apps with the non-Apple Xcode. The modified copies of Xcode would inject malware into iOS app builds. The link you provided says nothing about actual numbers of end users with malware infections, much less that there were more users infected than all Apple’s competitors combined. It merely suggests potential number of users who could be affected if they installed known compromised versions of apps built with the non-Apple Xcode—and it provides no methodology for what these estimates of total potentially affected users is based on.
Privacy policies do nothing to actually protect user privacy. Facebook’s requiring of privacy policies hasn’t protected users or the company from multiple privacy fiascos.
What GPS data collection are you referring to here? Apple-collected data stays on user devices. Third-party apps are granted permission (or not) to use location services however they see fit. Location services can be disabled entirely. What third parties do with your location data is between you and them, not Apple.
iMessage being replaceable by Signal or any other app as a default messaging app says nothing about Apple’s commitment to user privacy. You are free to use Signal.
The best outside estimates show XCodeGhost infected at least 400 million users. That estimate is from knowing which apps were infected and using publicly available estimates for their users. Apple didn't say how many exactly (or even warn its users about the malware) because Apple only pays lip service to security for marketing purposes.
> Privacy policies do nothing to actually protect user privacy.
You disagree with Apple on this then.
> What GPS data collection are you referring to here?
I told you exactly what data collection I was referring to there. Apple (not third parties) collects GPS data from user's phones to run its AGPS service. Unlike Android, which has an opt-in for this, Apple doesn't even let you opt out.
> You are free to use Signal.
But not as your default SMS app. Instead, you have to use Apple's closed source and unverified app.
Don't need Chinese companies for that. When GDPR came into effect I received privacy policy msgs from adware (Foursquare) inside my standard Samsung Image Gallery. Not only Google, but Samsung as well is a horrible privacy nightmare.
Yep. I bought a cheap tablet off of Amazon with the only use for it needing to be able to read digital textbooks at close to their equivalent physical size. This was back when tablets larger than 7" were crazy expensive. This one wasn't.
It has so many ads injected into and between apps (full-screen popups on app change) that it's unusable for anything other than reading static content (which is luckily what I bought it for). Response time is on par with a 1st-gen Kindle.
I thought I'd be cute and implement DNS adblocking at the router level but that just causes crashes and hangs since they didn't see a need to implement a graceful failure mode for the ad callbacks.
With the more recent changes in Firefox, I find the UX acceptable and may go through switching back... I've got a few things on google but may migrate out.
It would be more accurate to say that Google Play sucks.
[0]: https://f-droid.org/
Cubot is a good example[1]:
"However, it was discovered that Cubot had removed the malware from the System UI package and hidden it under a new package, com.android.telephone, disguised as the phone dialer. On further digging, it was discovered that the new package does not have any real function and it manages to evade any detection by antivirus apps such as NetGuard, that would detect the malware under System UI previously."
The only thing they have is low prices.
The nice thing is they still give you drivers even to Windows 7.
When I get new Lenovo laptop, I immediately throw away their drive, put a bigger one and install Windows 7 from scratch.
At least for some time, this was not good enough. The shipped crap/spyware in the firmware and exploited Windows Platform Binary Table to inject their spyware into freshly installed Windows. So, even a clean disk and an official Windows CD didn't evade the spyware:
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/08/12/lenovo_firmware_nas...
Luckily, desktop Linux/BSD is probably too obscure to be on their radar.
[1] https://forum.xda-developers.com/xposed/modules/xprivacylua6...
With XPrivacy you're able (or used to be able - I'm not sure if it works on recent Android versions) control things like how apps can use WebViews (e.g. what URLs they are allowed to open there), or whenever app is allowed to read or write (all separately) clipboard data. Etc etc.
https://github.com/M66B/XPrivacy/blob/master/README.md
Most of these permissions either require individual consent after you run the app (and can be revoked in settings) or aren’t allowed under any circumstances.
The exceptions I see are:
Clipboard
Internet access (you can block cellular internet access on iOS and 3rd party keyboards can be blocked from allowing any network access)
Prevent links from opening in a view - depending on which type of web view that an app uses, the native content blocking framework that third party ad blockers use for Safari also work in the WebView. For instance, the ad blocker I have installed works with Feedly - my RSS reader.
The only sensor I think that can be blocked is the GPS.
PrivacyGuard in LineageOS is about blocking.
My phone number is 000 000 000 and my email is [email protected]
and they work fine then
Also, have you really audited the code of xposed and xprivacy to see that there isn't any single security flaw that expose your whole phone?
So, Android devices sucks with privacy and cheap space to farming to other companies. Heard some Chinese companies sell phones with ad injections in default apps.