<story><title>An open letter against Apple&apos;s new privacy-invasive client-side content scanning</title><url>https://github.com/nadimkobeissi/appleprivacyletter</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>hnlmorg</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s good that you&amp;#x27;re principled enough to do that but you guys will be rounding errors in Apple&amp;#x27;s revenue. Most people don&amp;#x27;t even know about this and those that do, most wont care. Even of those who do know and do care, most aren&amp;#x27;t motivated enough to change their habits beyond writing a few angry words on a forum Apple are never going to read anyway. Those that do change their buying habits, yourselves, are by far in the minority. And while you might have some influence over what tech your friends, family and significant other might buy, let&amp;#x27;s be completely honest, it&amp;#x27;s not going to be enough to sway them into using an unbranded phone over a feature that they themselves likely don&amp;#x27;t care much about but happily assume the role of outrage when around you because we are generally social animals.&lt;p&gt;This is companies consistently get away with pissing off their customers. It&amp;#x27;s the same reason politicians get away with pissing off their electorate. Even in a crowded space people seldom get outraged enough to change their buying habits. But in an industry where the options are already limited (Android or iOS) and where people only buy products, at most, once every two years...? Sorry but literally nobody outside your social circle will notice if you stopped buying Apple products.&lt;p&gt;I get this is a depressing response and I&amp;#x27;m not suggesting that you shouldn&amp;#x27;t follow through with your threat. But I hear this threat posted unironically a lot and it seems to me that people think they have the power to invoke change simply by moaning on a few message boards or buying a competitors products for a couple of years (then that competitor does something to earn our outrage and we&amp;#x27;re back to the first company again). But &lt;i&gt;real&lt;/i&gt; change takes effort. A lot of effort. More effort than most are willing to commit. Hence why the GP rightfully commented that in a months time people will have moved on to their next outrage.</text></item><item><author>brigandish</author><text>&amp;gt; I am currently planning the migration away from the Apple ecosystem&lt;p&gt;Me too. I told my wife today that I&amp;#x27;ll be looking at a feature phone as I&amp;#x27;m not sure I can be bothered with jumping through all the hoops required to de-Google an Android phone. I remember a time before mobile phones, I was just fine without one - smartphones aren&amp;#x27;t &lt;i&gt;that&lt;/i&gt; good, just convenient.</text></item><item><author>dijit</author><text>Can’t speak for everybody of course, but I am currently planning the migration away from the Apple ecosystem and I’m heavily invested (watch, phone, MacBook, Mac Pro, Apple TV).&lt;p&gt;I’ve also been recommending to friends and family to move to droids with microG.&lt;p&gt;The largest concern I have for them is that they’re stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea.&lt;p&gt;Most people aren’t going to run a droid without google, or Linux on the desktop.</text></item><item><author>sillysaurusx</author><text>&amp;gt; a non-insignificant amount of people in tech take this seriously&lt;p&gt;We&amp;#x27;re all here to make ourselves feel good saying we Took A Stand.&lt;p&gt;In reality, four weeks from now, do you think anybody will still be talking about it?&lt;p&gt;I made this same mistake. I was pretty convinced that people were taking Copilot seriously, and that there was possibly going to be ramifications for Microsoft. I wasn&amp;#x27;t particularly looking &lt;i&gt;forward&lt;/i&gt; to it, but I rated it as plausible.&lt;p&gt;One stonewall and a few weeks later, here we are. Hardly a word anymore about it.&lt;p&gt;I think if there&amp;#x27;s going to be any real, long-term change, we &lt;i&gt;have&lt;/i&gt; to find a way to combat the real threat: life goes on.&lt;p&gt;(Made me smile to phrase it like that, actually. That wasn&amp;#x27;t the combat I had in mind...)&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s true, though. Ask anyone in a month whether they take this seriously. They&amp;#x27;ll say yes. And what&amp;#x27;s it worth?&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s all we can do, of course. But that&amp;#x27;s just another way of saying we&amp;#x27;re powerless.&lt;p&gt;Like it or not, we aren&amp;#x27;t in control. And unless we can figure a way to get some measure of control, then what are we doing here, really?&lt;p&gt;Your three bullet points are wonderful, and I agree entirely with them. And it won&amp;#x27;t change a damn thing.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m not sure what to do about it.</text></item><item><author>bArray</author><text>Honestly I&amp;#x27;m glad to see a non-insignificant amount of people in tech take this seriously, especially when the goal Apple announces appears to be for the greater good. It can be hard to stand on the side that doesn&amp;#x27;t immediately appear to be correct. We have already lost so many freedoms for &amp;#x27;national security&amp;#x27; and other such blanket terminology.&lt;p&gt;Just be warned, there will be those that unfairly try to cast this as helping the distribution of CP. Expect a headline tomorrow: &amp;quot;Edward Snowden et al Supports Child Porn&amp;quot; - or some other hot take.&lt;p&gt;A few other things:&lt;p&gt;1. Vote with your feet - Put your money in the pockets of the people aligned to your values.&lt;p&gt;2. Actively support projects you align with - If you use some open source hardware&amp;#x2F;software, try to help out (financially or time).&lt;p&gt;3. Make others aware - Reach out to those around you and inform them, only then they can make an informed choice themselves.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>mdale</author><text>The best you can do is raise tech awareness, take apple interviews and cite this reason for not moving forward. Facebook faced constraint not just after a avalanche of bad press but also as the tech workers (employees and applicants) pushed back and worked to improve things. The biggest asset in information economy is the people; the employees can enact change. See many examples in how Google direction has been influenced in military contracts or what not.</text></comment>
<story><title>An open letter against Apple&apos;s new privacy-invasive client-side content scanning</title><url>https://github.com/nadimkobeissi/appleprivacyletter</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>hnlmorg</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s good that you&amp;#x27;re principled enough to do that but you guys will be rounding errors in Apple&amp;#x27;s revenue. Most people don&amp;#x27;t even know about this and those that do, most wont care. Even of those who do know and do care, most aren&amp;#x27;t motivated enough to change their habits beyond writing a few angry words on a forum Apple are never going to read anyway. Those that do change their buying habits, yourselves, are by far in the minority. And while you might have some influence over what tech your friends, family and significant other might buy, let&amp;#x27;s be completely honest, it&amp;#x27;s not going to be enough to sway them into using an unbranded phone over a feature that they themselves likely don&amp;#x27;t care much about but happily assume the role of outrage when around you because we are generally social animals.&lt;p&gt;This is companies consistently get away with pissing off their customers. It&amp;#x27;s the same reason politicians get away with pissing off their electorate. Even in a crowded space people seldom get outraged enough to change their buying habits. But in an industry where the options are already limited (Android or iOS) and where people only buy products, at most, once every two years...? Sorry but literally nobody outside your social circle will notice if you stopped buying Apple products.&lt;p&gt;I get this is a depressing response and I&amp;#x27;m not suggesting that you shouldn&amp;#x27;t follow through with your threat. But I hear this threat posted unironically a lot and it seems to me that people think they have the power to invoke change simply by moaning on a few message boards or buying a competitors products for a couple of years (then that competitor does something to earn our outrage and we&amp;#x27;re back to the first company again). But &lt;i&gt;real&lt;/i&gt; change takes effort. A lot of effort. More effort than most are willing to commit. Hence why the GP rightfully commented that in a months time people will have moved on to their next outrage.</text></item><item><author>brigandish</author><text>&amp;gt; I am currently planning the migration away from the Apple ecosystem&lt;p&gt;Me too. I told my wife today that I&amp;#x27;ll be looking at a feature phone as I&amp;#x27;m not sure I can be bothered with jumping through all the hoops required to de-Google an Android phone. I remember a time before mobile phones, I was just fine without one - smartphones aren&amp;#x27;t &lt;i&gt;that&lt;/i&gt; good, just convenient.</text></item><item><author>dijit</author><text>Can’t speak for everybody of course, but I am currently planning the migration away from the Apple ecosystem and I’m heavily invested (watch, phone, MacBook, Mac Pro, Apple TV).&lt;p&gt;I’ve also been recommending to friends and family to move to droids with microG.&lt;p&gt;The largest concern I have for them is that they’re stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea.&lt;p&gt;Most people aren’t going to run a droid without google, or Linux on the desktop.</text></item><item><author>sillysaurusx</author><text>&amp;gt; a non-insignificant amount of people in tech take this seriously&lt;p&gt;We&amp;#x27;re all here to make ourselves feel good saying we Took A Stand.&lt;p&gt;In reality, four weeks from now, do you think anybody will still be talking about it?&lt;p&gt;I made this same mistake. I was pretty convinced that people were taking Copilot seriously, and that there was possibly going to be ramifications for Microsoft. I wasn&amp;#x27;t particularly looking &lt;i&gt;forward&lt;/i&gt; to it, but I rated it as plausible.&lt;p&gt;One stonewall and a few weeks later, here we are. Hardly a word anymore about it.&lt;p&gt;I think if there&amp;#x27;s going to be any real, long-term change, we &lt;i&gt;have&lt;/i&gt; to find a way to combat the real threat: life goes on.&lt;p&gt;(Made me smile to phrase it like that, actually. That wasn&amp;#x27;t the combat I had in mind...)&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s true, though. Ask anyone in a month whether they take this seriously. They&amp;#x27;ll say yes. And what&amp;#x27;s it worth?&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s all we can do, of course. But that&amp;#x27;s just another way of saying we&amp;#x27;re powerless.&lt;p&gt;Like it or not, we aren&amp;#x27;t in control. And unless we can figure a way to get some measure of control, then what are we doing here, really?&lt;p&gt;Your three bullet points are wonderful, and I agree entirely with them. And it won&amp;#x27;t change a damn thing.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m not sure what to do about it.</text></item><item><author>bArray</author><text>Honestly I&amp;#x27;m glad to see a non-insignificant amount of people in tech take this seriously, especially when the goal Apple announces appears to be for the greater good. It can be hard to stand on the side that doesn&amp;#x27;t immediately appear to be correct. We have already lost so many freedoms for &amp;#x27;national security&amp;#x27; and other such blanket terminology.&lt;p&gt;Just be warned, there will be those that unfairly try to cast this as helping the distribution of CP. Expect a headline tomorrow: &amp;quot;Edward Snowden et al Supports Child Porn&amp;quot; - or some other hot take.&lt;p&gt;A few other things:&lt;p&gt;1. Vote with your feet - Put your money in the pockets of the people aligned to your values.&lt;p&gt;2. Actively support projects you align with - If you use some open source hardware&amp;#x2F;software, try to help out (financially or time).&lt;p&gt;3. Make others aware - Reach out to those around you and inform them, only then they can make an informed choice themselves.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>cinquemb</author><text>What you are saying isn&amp;#x27;t that depressing, I think it makes a lot of sense. But perceived abuses do take time for people to eventually take action that can actually effect companies&amp;#x2F;states bottom lines.&lt;p&gt;I can imagine at some point a 0day targeting iOS devices that when they connect to a public wifi network with a compromised router, it distributes CP malware&amp;#x2F;botnet on to their device and then everyone else that connects to that device in the future (muddying the waters).&lt;p&gt;Similar actions could also be taken against other companies and state entities systems.&lt;p&gt;And these actions don&amp;#x27;t need to rely on most of the population to take them.&lt;p&gt;The more these &amp;quot;kill chain&amp;quot; like systems become automated and cheap to deploy, the more incentive individuals will have to pursue these types of attacks.</text></comment>