Wait what? You’re 180 degrees wrong.
But rather in the context of those in America that largely only deal with American government officials and those outcomes.
And to my knowledge. China isnt abducting people or conduction renditions on american soil.
As I said - I agree that China's government is worse. In fact my previous employer had a policy that company devices just didn't cross that border, even when traveling for work. But it's still not a factor in which devices I purchase myself.
But that's not what the original comment said.
China, on the other hand, does not seem to give a single f* about foreigners, only about their own citizens. Most people are not so are not really endangered even if chinese spyers do know what they handle on their phones. So in battle between US spyers/China spyers I'd better give my data to Chinese, if I don't have a choice not to share my data at all.
China, as well, don't try to make extraterritorial laws (like financial regulations), so it's harder to even be targeted by CCP if your are a foreigner.
https://www.dw.com/en/china-sentences-swedish-publisher-to-1...
The Chinese secret police don’t present a threat to me, whereas the NSA has the means, motive (at the leadership level) and opportunity to violate my natural rights.
However, after this backlash you can bet other manufacturers will continue to hide what their actually doing.
However, the perception was very different.
Picking a Chinese phone based on financial circumstances, however, is understandable IMO.
However, as one who's moved from an iPhone to a Nokia 8110 with KaiOS, which I in no way argue is as secure as iOS:
It has less on it. It has far less on it. It has my phone calls, a handful of text messages, and while it has email access right now, I'm experimenting with if I actually need that, or can remove it (leaning towards removing it). And my calendar.
The camera is horrible, so I just carry a pocket digital camera with me now if I care to take photos, which don't end up on the phone.
If I don't give it wifi privileges (which it currently has, but I've been running with wifi off and cell data off to see how that works, and the answer so far is "quite well"), there's simply not much it can really do to my accounts or network.
I believe there are some Google Authenticator apps for KaiOS, just not in the main app store, and I've not gone through the process of working out sideloading yet.
I'd love to go feature phone, but would be missing two essentials for work purposes:
- A 2FA application (eg Google Authenticator, Authy)
- A password manager (eg BitWarden, KeePass, etc)
I can do without emails etc but not those two, yet whenever feature phones try and be more feature-some they do the same old emails, FB, WhatsApp etc instead.
Google Authenticator is sort of a crap option for doing TOTP, all things considered.
I have a KDE edition Pinephone that I intend to use more overtime but primarily an Android user.
Also I get super annoyed when Android bundles stuff on your phone. I realize you can get rid of it/the cheap phone has to get paid somehow... but like having notifications that you can't slide away... things like that. Want more control over I realize Linux phones are lacking in software, pretty bad... Plasma looked really nice, Phosh not so nice (home screen) but it works out of the box though particularly detecting external screens. Anyway I'm looking forward to it improving over time, a cheap Samsung Dex-like experience is my desire.
The Pinephone modem is partially open already:
https://linuxsmartphones.com/hackers-develop-open-source-fir...
Edit: another thing to my parent comment, ads in your voicemail... the visual voicemail app in Android. Omg that annoys me so much, thankfully I have not been getting many voicemails anymore.
Of all the things in the world to get worked up over, this is ridiculous.
I get it, the mechanism they're using has apparent flaws, and maybe some whacko could somehow get access to your phone and start uploading things that trick the algorithm into thinking you have CP.
But, that alone is such a ridiculous phobia, if someone has that level of access to your phone, they could upload real CP and maybe even upload it to your Facebook for good measure.
There is no technical reason why this needs to exist. If they want to scan iCloud photos for something, they can do that on their servers. iCloud is not end-to-end encrypted. Law enforcement can do whatever they want with the data you send there. Since they chose the client-side route, they have to be up to something, and it all smells very fishy. Today, they say it's for CSAM. Tomorrow, it will be for any discontent against whatever government wants to oppress its people this week -- and as time goes forward, that is not just third-world countries where you don't live, it could be your own.
Do you really want to explain to the police at your door at 3:30 in the morning why you read a website called Hacker News? This is the first step towards that reality.
Imagine I wrote a program that contained the phone numbers of people I don't like. The database is encrypted, and the only way to see if you're on that list is to install the app on your phone. The app does two things -- nothing if you're not on my list, or it sends me your location (at your expense!) if you are. Would you install that app? Absolutely not, that would be crazy. But that is basically what is bundled into iOS now.
I really like my iPhone and iPad Pro. I like how Apple handles privacy in general. But I can't accept this. It's a step too far. You don't have to draw the line there, but I draw the line there.
Okay.
> We have no idea what hashes they're checking images against; we can't see the raw data, and we can't see the hashes, and we can't see what they're sending to their servers.
Apple is getting the entire image regardless, this happens as part of the iCloud upload process.
> There is no technical reason why this needs to exist. If they want to scan iCloud photos for something, they can do that on their servers. iCloud is not end-to-end encrypted. Law enforcement can do whatever they want with the data you send there. Since they chose the client-side route, they have to be up to something, and it all smells very fishy.
It's a hell of a lot cheaper to distribute the load onto the device than to do it on GCP. However, this whole line of thinking is ridiculous, iOS is your operating system, it can send what it likes where it likes without you knowing about it. Why does this particular thing cause concern?
> Tomorrow, it will be for any discontent against whatever government wants to oppress its people this week -- and as time goes forward, that is not just third-world countries where you don't live, it could be your own.
> Do you really want to explain to the police at your door at 3:30 in the morning why you read a website called Hacker News? This is the first step towards that reality.
https://www.txstate.edu/philosophy/resources/fallacy-definit...
> Imagine I wrote a program that contained the phone numbers of people I don't like. The database is encrypted, and the only way to see if you're on that list is to install the app on your phone. The app does two things -- nothing if you're not on my list, or it sends me your location (at your expense!) if you are. Would you install that app? Absolutely not, that would be crazy. But that is basically what is bundled into iOS now.
Again, your overlooking the fact that this app is already coming from Apple the company that made iOS. They already control your phone, why would they need some additional app?
Then I guess it's not my operating system after all.
Umm... that happened.
I also get the slippery slope thing since you don't really have any control over what your device does but that's been true since forever. Running some scan() method and posting matches to a URL is something that literally could have been done in the last 10 years. It's not like this tech is magically enabling something that wasn't possible before.
And I do get the using your resources argument but iPhones have had integrated DRM since forever.
The thing I don't get is why now? Surely you should have left ages ago?
So turn off iCloud photos?
This service exists so Apple can E2EE your data while still placating DOJ.
It's a cop in your phone.
What they actually do is what is important. And what they actually do is publicly disclosed so you can make your choice appropriately.
Edit: The point here is that even if Apple tries very hard to make this be only about photos about to be uploaded to the cloud, if the percentage of phones that turns off iCloud storage increases as a response to this new "snitch-on-me" feature that will be a very good argument for law enforcement to ask for a list of IMEIs that are not using iCloud, and it will also tempt them to demand that Apple start scanning all files.
It's very simple. You want to upload images to iCloud? Then let your phone scan it and upload it. You don't want your images scanned? Don't upload them to iCloud.
Yet. Have you considered that this might be a necessary precursor to making iCloud e2e?
Sure. All the statements about why it’s not ok are also just speculation.
> why not release both features at the same time
That’s not how Apple typically works. They release a feature, try to make sure it works as expected and only then release the features that depend on it.
It’s as if USPS invented a new type of envelope that is physically impossible to open for anyone whose name is not written on the outside of it. Just one caveat: before they’ll give you any of these envelopes, you must allow them to read the letters being put inside.
If your concern is someone intercepting your mail before it gets to its intended recipient, this is great news. If your threat model involves federal agencies reading your mail, you’re no better off than you would be without these fancy new envelopes.
Yes, but this isn’t snooping.
This is what you were arguing. It is false.
It was clearly a technical statement not a privacy statement, so only superficial reading might lead one to believe it meant something that it did not.
That is why I replied that the person who replied to my comment, where I said I had argued something different, but that what he wrote was an excellent point.
So, what on earth are you so invested in that you feel the need to argue minutiae that don't apply?
That doesn’t change anything. It may be a pre-requisite from the perspective of their business. You replied to me and I didn’t constrain my point to just technicalities.
> So, what on earth are you so invested in that you feel the need to argue minutiae that don't apply?
It does apply. I’m simply pointing out that what you said is not correct.
You know, I could respect your opinion that this is where you draw the line, but you ignore all of Apple's history if you think this is the first step. This isn't the first step, this isn't the first chapter, this is at best the middle of the book where the plot twist happens.
No, this is clearly no the first step. This is the first step you chose to see the reality of the situation. You'll look back and you'll see how everything was paved with good intentions and how people sounding the alarm were ignored.
This isn't the first step.
Despite this having been a possibility for almost a decade... there's a suspicious lack of headlines of this attack occurring.
No, only the ones designated for upload to iCloud.
> [...] it’s about governments forcing Apple to do things with this new weapon
Governments can already force Apple to do any kind of scanning, "weapon" being built already or not.
> No, only the ones designated for upload to iCloud.
How do you verify that?
If Apple really is trying to sneak in a CSAM database on your phone with iCloud disabled, someone WILL catch it and raise so much hell we'll all hear it.
If that is what is supposed to happen, then it makes no sense for any new code to run on the device!
> Of all the things in the world to get worked up over, this is ridiculous.
Well, it is not crazy to get worked up over Apple saying they will check uploads to iCloud by checking what's on your phone - instead of simply adding code to iCloud. That seems obvious not ridiculous.
The new code calculates the hash as part of the upload process. The comparison of the hash against known CP hashes happen on the server.
> Well, it is not crazy to get worked up over Apple saying they will check uploads to iCloud by checking what's on your phone - instead of simply adding code to iCloud.
They're still doing the checks in iCloud, but the hash is being computed on the client.
Mystery solved?
I work in data engineering and I can tell you what I'd rather do. Having Apple's servers check hashes rather than the entire image means you can segregate the original images from the CP-checker data processing pipelines. That's a much simpler and more secure security scenario.
Maybe include children so that on first glance the reviewer will just forward to the authorities.
You get these images, store it, then you get flagged.
Now what? What’s your recourse when the FBI insists that you’re guilty, and your reputation is ruined?
There absolutely is a problem of pedophiles, but the process that Apple is using seems ripe for abuse.
Whatsapp by default adds all received images into Photos. So all it takes is to send you few dozens of pictures while you're sleeping.
So apart from every Apple user being treated like a proven-until-innocent owner of CP, at all times, this will (yes, a matter of time) be used for political purposes, to find and silence activists, journalists, to discredit opposition leaders, to prosecute Uyugur/Muslims/women/palestinians etc.
Do we really believe that CP owners store their collections in iCloud / google cloud / Dropbox and view them on their phones? And that this is an issue on a massive scale?
Please.
These are the most expensive phones on the market, with an incredible profit margin for Apple. The part of these devices that we actually own is a shrinking territory.
Why not have the mics on all the time in case “someone says something related to a CP ring?”
Many messengers, including Whatsapp, save all the incoming pics into camera roll by default.
The actual problem is that they've created a great surveillance tool which will inevitably get broader capabilities and they are normalising client-side data scanning (we need to eradicate terrorism, now we need to eradicate human trafficking, and now we need to eradicate tax evasion, oh, we forgot about gay russians, hmm, what about Winnie memes?).
One random article of many: https://money.cnn.com/2016/02/25/technology/apple-fbi-respon...
Edit: but through regulations they could probably say 'you're not allowed to sell phones without x backdoor' but maybe the government didn't want to spell out specifically what capabilities are required.
Many of the arguments/fears about CSAM is that it can be widened to be a generic backdoor, but as you point out in the arguments Apple has already argued in court Apple doesn't seem to think a generic backdoor is a good idea and have strongly fought against it and CSAM seems to be entirely designed to not be capable as backdoor, and especially not a generic backdoor.
I absolutely understand the fears of false positives and whatever processes the FBI and other TLAs choose to do with the results from CSAM (though many of those concerns apply to everything the TLAs do regardless of what technical tools they have at their disposal), but I'm not sure that I understand all the fears that CSAM is a generic backdoor (in the making) given what Apple have revealed about how it is built and what Apple's quite explicit reasons seem to be to build it to entirely avoid building a generic backdoor and that everything about it seems a "thumb your nose at the FBI by doing what they ask explicitly for but not what they really want to build" by entirely building something that can't be used as a generic backdoor and is very specifically built to only a tiny explicit use case the FBI has asked for. At least from what I've seen so far.
The biggest complaint here is clearly this is not where it'll end, and it's not a unique hash, so there will be false positives. And since it's publicly announced, this is very unlikely to catch any producers of CP, and would only catch the dumbest consumers. So it's an invasion of privacy with very little chance of having a noticeable impact.
I don't think it computes a hash of the image, it's a tad more involved than that.
Simple hashing is easily evaded. They must be computing an identifier from the contents of the images in the CSAM database. This requires computational analysis on the handset or computer. If that's all that were happening that would be no problem, but of course there are management interfaces to the classifer/analyzer, catalog, backend, &c
The contents of the identifiers are purposefully opaque to prevent spoofing of the identifier database. I don't know what is included in the images; what if I take a picture at Disneyland with a trafficked person in the frame? Will that make it into the qualifier database? What is added to the CSAM signature database and why? What is the pipeline of hashesfrom NCMEC and other child-safety organizations->Apple's CSAM image classifer alarm?
>I get it, the mechanism they're using has apparent flaws, and maybe some whacko could somehow get access to your phone and start uploading things that trick the algorithm into thinking you have CP.
The CSAM analyzer could be subverted in any number of ways. I question how the CSAM identifiers are monitored for QA (I actually shudder thinking there are already humans doing this :( how unpleasant.) and the potential for harmful adversaries to repurpose this tool for other means. One contrived counterfactual: Locating pictures of Jamal Kashoggi in people's computer systems by 0-day malware. Another: Locating images of Edward Snowden. A more easily conceived notion: Locating amber alert subjects in people's phones, geofenced or not.
To my eyes, it appears we will soon have increased analysis challenges. Self analysis of device activity and functions for image scanning malware (for example) is slightly harder, we have added a blessed one with unknown characteristics running on the systems. Does this pose a challenge to system profiling? How/does this interact with battery management? Is only iCloud scanning, or is everything scanned and then only checked before being sent to iCloud? (this appears to be the case[X])
There should be user notification too. If some sicko sends me something crazy somehow, I would surely want to know so I can call the cops!!
All in all this makes me feel bad. There is not a lot of silver lining from my perspective. While the epidemic of unconscionable child abuse continues, I question the effectiveness of this approach.
I would not consider jailbreaking my iPhone but for this kind of stuff. I would like to install network and permissions monitoring software on my iPhone such as Bouncer[0], Little Snitch[1], although these are helpfully not available for iOS.
I feel grateful that I am unlikely to be affected by this image scanning software, I'm planning to continue my personal policy of never storing any pictures of any people whatsoever. I don't even store family photos this way. My Life is not units in a data warehouse.
[0] - https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.samruston....
[1] - https://www.obdev.at/products/littlesnitch/index.html
[X] - Apple's Whitepaper: https://www.apple.com/child-safety/pdf/CSAM_Detection_Techni...
They aren't, but the blame is misguided. This isn't a problem with Apple. What is Apple going to do if they do detect something identified as CSAM on your device? Refuse to sell you another? Oh well. The real worry is what other parties will do if they get ahold of the information. That is what needs to be fixed. Apple is exposing the underlying problem, not causing the problem themselves.
If a pedophile uploads CP to the internet and the host finds CP they call the police.
Both seem like reasonable responses to me.
This will violate my IT device usage policy! Apple is not my IT department!! We have a ZERO TOLERANCE IT device usage policy. By not calling the local police department after one violation, we violate the policy. There is also a form which must be signed before HR (Girlfriend) so they can be present on the call to LE or else be subject to disciplinary action up to and including termination.
The general sentiment does appear to be that the laws are misguided. That does not necessarily mean repeal is necessary. Augmentation may also provide a solution that satisfies their concerns. However, that is moving well beyond the topic at hand. There is no indication I can find that some kind of change is controversial. There is clear worry about the status quo based on the potential outcome of what information Apple may glean.
What remains is that Apple isn't anyone's real concern. An inanimate corporation can't do much to you. Apple is simply bringing attention to what actually concerns people, which is something that was already there all along.
That said, if I had to chose between a Google Android phone and an Apple phone, I'd still pick the Apple one. Luckily there are more choices these days.
That's the nice part of Apple's ecosystem - its pretty simple and requires minimum intervention.
I purchased my first iPhone since the 3G this year, and it is currently for sale on swappa. I am willing to compromise on a slightly less polished UI and subpar camera to get the UX of android back; at least for me, iOS was lacking many features I could consider essential.
For similar reasons, I don't self-host important services like email despite having my own domain. If shit goes wrong, I want the company I'm paying to have their people take care of it. I don't want to have to rush to fix it myself.
* The Clock app doesn't let you set a snooze length? Seriously?!
* Not having a notification LED or some other indicator really sucks. I might set my phone on the counter while I'm doing other things, and with Android, it was nice to be able to look up and see if I've gotten something without walking up to the phone and checking. (I know Apple will likely never implement this because it's a great pitch for their watch.)
* Face ID is slow and inconsistent compared to a fingerprint reader (especially during COVID), and I'm bummed that Apple ditched the latter. It works well about 80% of the time, and the other 20% I'm that crazy-looking person that's making faces at his phone trying to get it to unlock.
* If you had any sort of media app open previously and then connect some Bluetooth headphones, the media controls for that app open up and take up most of the lock screen, and there is no way to swipe them away; you have to kill the app to get them to disappear.
* I miss the inline notification controls. On Android, apps can give their notifications extra buttons, so you can do things like delete an email right from the notifications bar without having to open the app.
* My friend and I regularly send each other voice memos. First of all, the built-in voice memo feature in iMessage is atrocious (no seek and you have to restart from the beginning if you leave the screen), so we use the Voice Memos app to send each other audio files. Except, when you play an audio file inline through either iMessage or Mail, the screen will still turn off and lock, which pauses the file. You have to save it to Files, then open it via the Files app to ensure that it continues playing in the background. How are you supposed to know this?!
* If your iCloud storage is close to full, Apple will continually notify you every few days via your phone and email, and there is no way to disable these notifications.
* Needing a special charger sucks. Everything else I own is either USB-C or microUSB at this point, but my iPhone needs its own charging cable that nothing else uses.
* All of the special treatment that only Apple's apps get is frustrating. For instance, why does only Apple's Clock app get a special timer UX on the lock screen, and everyone else's has to use a notification? Why does only Safari support ad blockers? And why is the camera button on the lock screen limited to the built-in Camera app? They really push their own apps with these artificial benefits, which detracts from the plethora of apps in the App Store.
* Syncing files (in both directions) without iCloud is a pain, and I'm not going to pay for an iCloud subscription. There are lots of different ways to achieve this, but none of them are as easy as simply using SyncThing on Android.
Even though Android is lacking in certain areas, I find the UX to be a lot more consistent than that of iOS, and I would take the consistency and flexibility of Android over all of Apple's corner cases and attempts to predict how I will use my device. But again, that's my personal preference, and to each their own.
(Sorry, this turned out to be much longer than I expected. I guess I'm more frustrated by iOS than I realized!)
Also, as an iPhone user, contrary to the recent Hacker News fight, I actually view this CSAM scanning with a sign of hope, because this hints that we could get end-to-end encryption on iCloud Storage. The CSAM scanning is rumored to be just a prerequisite to get the government to shut up with their biggest critique of E2E, so that Apple can then turn it on.
If I can get E2E storage from iCloud but accept CSAM scanning on my device to satisfy the law... I'm OK with that choice. You might not, in which case, Android (and I'll probably buy a backup Android phone "just in case").
What good is E2E encryption when they can scan your client with a backdoor? All Apple is doing with this hashing is giving themselves plausible deniability when this access gets abused down the road. "Oh we didn't know they would use those hashes to arrest those protesters, we couldn't have foreseen this"
Also you are aware Google Photos, Facebook, etc. do scanning anyway and have for almost a decade?
For me it boils down to ecosystem and integration. I can have a fragmented set of devices and tools, or I can deal with CSAM having literally zero impact on me.
I also have an M1 laptop, it's insane that this little MacBook Air with 16GB ram is walking all over a 16'inch Macbook Pro with 64GB ram.
To make AOSP "usable" for my life, I need to install the Play Store. At which point I've already lost and would prefer an iPhone for my privacy.
To be fair you don't need to, I use Aurora Store, they have a guest mode where you don't need to register any account.
On iOS and iPadOS, they will implement the iCloud Photos CSAM scanning, but Apple left out macOS as having that for now. Rumoredly according to GitHub reverse-engineers of the system, it's due to the mathematical precision of the NeuralHash algorithm being processor-dependent on ARM and not Intel.
> These features are coming later this year in updates to iOS 15, iPadOS 15, watchOS 8, and macOS Monterey.
For now, the security experts looking at this say that the nudity detection model is on all platforms, but the database matching in iCloud Photos is only on iOS and iPadOS and it's unclear whether it will come to macOS.
"Next, iOS and iPadOS will use new applications of cryptography to help limit the spread of CSAM online, while designing for user privacy."
That implies macOS isn't getting the CSAM scanning stuff (yet?).
> iOS and iPadOS will use new applications of cryptography to help limit the spread of CSAM online
If true, it's highly probable that Apple can just port it to macOS and have it work especially for the Apple Silicon line up rather than Intel.
But only Apple knows. But so far, it seems like ignoring the M1 hype was the smart thing do.
I don't any hardware or software developer... I don't really care if the US is reading my emails, images, chats and whatnot. I choose not to worry about those sort of things.
My product choices are more related to functionality and basic ROI.
That's a false dichotomy. There are competitors offering various levels of maturity and functionality. Jolla exists, PinePhone, Xiaomi, Librem 5, dumb phones, POTS landline, no phone...
And yes, Linux on the desktop is also a valid choice. It most likely won't track you either.
I don't think you know what you are talking about when you mentioned Xiaomi as an option. That would be among the dumbest options you could possibly choose.
Linux on the desktop is a valid choice, but as I said above, don't tell me to switch to it, it's just not practical in my life. I've tried over a dozen distributions since 2011 and probably over fifty releases of them, and Linux isn't there.
Tried that yesterday on CalyxOs with anonymous MicroG account and my banking app works fine. No problem with contactless nfc payments.
Also you can't use any paid apps with this method.
Regarding the second point - that's true. I've heard there are some plans to add payments to the Aurora store/F-Droid (which are alternative app stores) but right now you can't use paid apps.
I consider this to be a plus though - gives me a chance to switch to open-source / self-hosted apps.
You don't get to dismiss others' concerns by saying "it's a choice", and at the same time dismiss choices others present...
For Desktop, if I have to choose between macOS CSAM spyware of paying users or the Linux ecosystem and its tiny userbase of unpaid users I would go for using and targeting the paid users since they are the ones paying the bills and thats where the money is.
For smartphone alternatives, the phones themselves are still immature as well as the Linux phone software ecosystem which is again still light years behind. If they can't even run the same Android apps on modern Android devices, then it is close to no chance.
If they don't hurry up, Google Fuchsia will steam-roll them silently.
> I've tried over a dozen distributions since 2011 and probably over fifty releases of them, and Linux isn't there.
Likewise, with the GUI software I'm writing, 'Defining Linux support' is something that is not worth doing given that there are tons of distros out there and by selecting one or two distro's there will always be an endless amount of people asking to support X distro or Y distro.
There was a major game developer (sadly forgetting the name) who decided to support Linux as a test around 2018ish. The Linux users were only a few percent of their users but ~20% of the support tickets. They said never again.
watch words are simple to listen for, generalised transcription is far harder.
Now, it's only logical that you may share certain interests, so why not show ads for things they bought/googled for to their contacts?
macOS does _something_ related to this system. It's unclear what though.
I agree with how impressive the M1 is. I've replaced my 16" fully specced i9 with a 13" M1 Air. The only thing I sometimes miss is the larger screen but not by much.
Respectfully, it is there. You are not. Which is fine - I prefer a Mac for general purpose computer use, word processing, web browsing, that sort of thing. But Linux can do these things just as well, it just requires you to configure them, which is strictly a "you" constraint and not a failure of the system.
Linux is not necessary a bad system, but usability (degree of effort, burden of knowledge, misuse risk) are absolutely a core determination on where or not a piece of technology is "there yet"
I don't understand what you mean. My non-technical relatives use Linux just fine. There is no "burden of knowledge".
You're financially supporting the creation of an Orwellian dystopia.
The whole premise is that Google and Facebook and everyone else are just doing this on the unencrypted photos you upload, in their cloud, with their own (presumably, but correct me if I'm wrong) undocumented algorithms and datasets.
Now here comes Apple, documenting almost everything except the dataset itself, and everyone is freaking out because it's happening on your own device. But then it's encrypting the whole thing and uploading it to Apple where they presumably do no additional scanning.
What is the actual difference if it's being looked for on-device vs. by the provider? Supposedly in preparation for a bigger push of encryption of the photos themselves, if they are not already encrypted in the cloud.
Am I missing something more than "but it's happening on-device!"?
Also, it's actually pretty easy to mess with Android and get it un-googled. Google don't make most Android phones, so there's less hardware-level enforcement of rules, and more independent alternatives. This is less so for Apple devices. If Apple decides to do something you don't like to your phone, you are SOL; you can only accept it or ditch Apple and switch to Android/something else.
Well, technically this is still true. Files you are putting to iCloud by yourself voluntarily are not staying in your iPhone in the first hand. Everything which is against this, is only speculation currently.
If you don't trust that, that is another story. System is full black box.
Am I missing something more than "but it's happening on-device!"?
Your answer is "no".
It's not whether it happens on-device, off-device, in the cloud, in the tubes, or anywhere.
It's that Apple said that they would not do this, and now they're doing this. You can make technical quibbles that what they promised was slightly different to what they're doing, but they're irrelevant. The core promise of "what happens on your iPhone stays on your iPhone" is being broken. It's that breaking of the promise that people are angry about. Does that make sense?
People think that this kind of capability was not there already, while it was. The simplest example case is normal iCloud sync. It scans your files and gets metadata, finally comparing to cloud to know which files to sync.
Other concern is, that this can be easily expanded to other kind of content, or whole device (outside of iCloud files). While, this sounds like valid concern, government who can force this change, could have forced it already. "Technology does not exist" is not valid excuse, never was. There are pretty expensive consults used by politics to prove these excuses otherwise.
Linux is incredible... and still unusable for many everyday apps and workflows, and simply not an option for many people including myself. I've tried Linux distributions since 2011, they aren't there yet.
I have actually totally dumped Windows recently (I have tried it past 5 years), because now Linux is getting very close for everything I need, and this same applies for many people. Can you give some examples which aren't there yet?
Support the continued freedom you enjoyed in your youth for future generations.
What simplifies in my life if I'm moving away from any ecosystem that tracks me to the OSS way, do I have to compile my own Chromium over the night? "oh, my Linux segfaulted, let's reinstall the OS"
time. Saving time on these operations is worth more than some X-company sniffing my network traffic. Yes, I care about privacy, I always decline the cookie pop-ups, always ask for GDPR contract before handing over my phone no./email to recruiters et. al. I'm doing my best without breaking usability & affecting time spent on these operations.
I believe that, for example, anticorruption activists and gay people in Russia who may be subjected to state-imposed surveillance won't agree with you. Apple won't leave even the russian market in case the government demands to expand capabilities of the system. And they will never leave chinese market.
> macOS doesn't scan
I'm afraid I have some bad news for you:
"Features to detect child abuse material stored on iCloud coming in updates to US users iOS 15, iPadOS 15, watchOS 8, and macOS Monterey."
Who will? Google? Microsoft? HP? Dell? Huawei or Xiaomi or Lenovo (lol jk)? Which computer or phone manufacturers or service providers refuse to do business in Russia and China?
Fortunately for now you have some escape hatches.
I believe that it would be a smart move for everyone to stop paying for nooses for their own gallows and start investing into privacy. There are some realistic ways to do it, just buy a damn Fairphone for a no-brainer start.
I know they did briefly after some attacks, but I also know that they had very little market share to lose at the time and have subsequently worked to get back in. Do you have a good summary of their current position there?
It's a choice. You might wholly disagree, but recent events aren't enough to get me to switch yet, because I think the competition has too many tradeoffs.
I can get my photos scanned against a CSAM database... or I can have Google tracking my location constantly regardless of what they say (as they've been proven to be misleading in the past)... or I can use a Linux phone and say goodbye to battery life and useful apps I need. I'll pick CSAM Scanning over my Location data being in the hands of Google, sorry.
And as for my laptop, macOS doesn't scan, and the M1 is too impressive and has me spoiled. And I have too many horror stories with both Linux and Windows and can't stand either of them. (Don't tell me switch to Linux - I've tried over a dozen distributions over the last decade. It's just not there yet.)