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0 pointsgjsman-10004y ago0 comments

By that logic though, Google Drive, OneDrive, AmazonS3, they are all privacy nightmares. And you might agree, but Apple is hardly alone.

And like the article says, they didn’t want to poke the bear anymore. Of course the FBI has congressional friends. It is possible that Apple saw the risk of it backfiring and making things worse as too great.

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modeless4y ago

Google does end-to-end encryption of Android backups. And Apple knows how to do it too, but they intentionally restricted their implementation to only cover backups of Keychain passwords and a few other things, apparently because they don't have the courage to stand up to the FBI, according to Reuters. Strange considering their public stance against the FBI in the San Bernardino case and on privacy issues in general. Especially since iCloud backup totally defeats the highly touted end-to-end encryption in iMessage.

gjsman-1000OP4y ago

Yes, backups, and Apple should get on that. However, your photos in Google Photos, your location data, your uploads in Google Drive (equivalent to iCloud Drive OP is talking about), not end to end encrypted and no option for it.

I think market share is another sign. Does anyone use actual Android Backup, or do they use the unencrypted “backups” in G Photos and elsewhere? For that reason should the FBI care? Maybe I’m wrong but I believe actual Android Backup is much less used than iCloud and confusingly named alternative “backups” within Google apps.

headmelted4y ago

Let's be really frank about it - no large company is going to offer end-to-end encryption of photos because of what kind of photos might end up on their infrastructure if they do. And honestly I don't blame them at all.

I'd just like to see Apple be more transparent with this one particular issue because it undermines so much of what they're advertising to the consumer.

A transparency label for iCloud backup showing what is and is not E2E before enabling would do. Most people (myself included) would be quite happy with photos being encrypted by an Apple-held key (I'm not worried about the police seeing my boring lunch pics, I just don't want photos of my kids being readily accessible to everyone else).

It should be made clear if they're offering E2E for some features that other settings will render it pointless is all I'm saying.

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modeless4y ago

Look at the Reuters article they linked. iCloud backup is the issue. Usage of iCloud backup and Android backup are probably very similar (in percentage terms), why would you expect that Android backup is used less? They are pretty much equivalent features, except that one is end-to-end encrypted and the other is not. In both cases, photos are handled separately.

encryptluks24y ago

There are encryption options, just not with the software provided by the storage providers.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

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modeless4y ago

gjsman-1000OP4y ago

headmelted4y ago

I'd just like to see Apple be more transparent with this one particular issue because it undermines so much of what they're advertising to the consumer.

It should be made clear if they're offering E2E for some features that other settings will render it pointless is all I'm saying.

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modeless4y ago

encryptluks24y ago

There are encryption options, just not with the software provided by the storage providers.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse