The article is referring to the Private Relay connection itself (the "VPN" connection. In quotes because it's not a real VPN) bypassing the firewall, which is not typical. Apple took some heat for doing this to their other apps when Big Sur was first released [1].

Mullvad is installing a rule to essentially disallow any non-VPN'd traffic to prevent leaks. But iCloud Private Relay is not being stopped by that rule.

[1] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/11/apple-lets-some-big-...

That's fair, but as a mullvad customer, I'm happy they let me know about it.

Especially rich coming from a VPN vendor, whose business happens to be threatened by Apple's relay.

Seems like a valid complaint to me. Apple is giving themselves privileges to end-around potential competitors on their platforms. Although this is not new.

This isn't something Apple has sneakily reserved for itself. Any process the user authorizes can access PF_NDRV sockets which bypass firewall rules. It's a documented feature of Darwin.

I fail to see the difference. apple authorized themselves to bypass firewall rules without the users input

Personally I trust Mullvad a million times more than Apple. Mullvad is one of the few vendors which have earned my trust. Meanwhile, Apple caved into pressure from the FBI to keep iCloud message backups unencrypted.