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Comment by Zelphyr | Hacker News Reader

I don’t know why this is getting downvoted. I feel the same way. Amazon and Google have yet to demonstrate to me that they value my privacy enough to take necessary steps to protect it. They, like Facebook, know most people foolishly don’t care enough to hold these companies feet to the fire on it.

At the risk of stating the obvious; Facebook has more than demonstrated the opposite.

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The only company I've seen take demonstrable action to protect their customer's privacy is Apple.

Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon have never given me a single reason to trust that they have my privacy concerns on their mind.

>The only company I've seen take demonstrable action to protect their customer's privacy is Apple.

The same Apple that gave the Chinese government access to all their Chinese user's iCloud data?

https://techcrunch.com/2018/07/17/apples-icloud-user-data-in...

Is there anything Apple could have done to protect the privacy of its Chinese users better (whilst still having some)? You could say they shouldn't have Chinese users, but that's a different argument, I believe.

This is false. iCloud data doesn't contain phone call contents or iMessage data contents. Yes they gave access to metadata, but this is China where privacy basically doesn't exist, not a western country.

Wrong - Apple moved all iCloud data, which includes text messages, email and other data stored in iCloud (according to Reuters) as well as the access keys. Apple even forced users to sign the updated TOS or drop service.

The Chinese government access is _not_ limited to metadata.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-apple-icloud-insigh...

Text messages are not stored in iCloud...

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202303

>iCloud data doesn't contain phone call contents or iMessage data contents.

Literally the first paragraph of both of bduerst's links suggest otherwise.

Also, I don't know if you've used iCloud on multiple devices before, but it very much contains iMessage data contents.

But with Apple's entire ecosystem being closed and intentionally locking you in, is Apple really a better choice. All it takes is one decision from the board that it would be more profitable to start violating privacy.

The board's legal mandate is to make as much money as possible. As soon as privacy is no longer a fad that makes more money and growth than the opportunity cost to not violating it, Apple will flip a switch. That's their duty as a for profit company.

> The board's legal mandate is to make as much money as possible.

Why do people keep repeating this falsehood?

https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/04/16/what-are-co...

Per SCOTUS in US v. Hobby Lobby:

> While it is certainly true that a central objective of for-profit corporations is to make money, modern corporate law does not require for-profit corporations to pursue profit at the expense of everything else, and many do not do so. For-profit corporations, with ownership approval, support a wide variety of charitable causes, and it is not at all uncommon for such corporations to further humanitarian and other altruistic objectives. Many examples come readily to mind. So long as its owners agree, a for-profit corporation may take costly pollution-control and energy-conservation measures that go beyond what the law requires. A for-profit corporation that operates facilities in other countries may exceed the requirements of local law regarding working conditions and benefits. If for-profit corporations may pursue such worthy objectives, there is no apparent reason why they may not further religious objectives as well.

The key there being 'so long as it's owners agree'

That's a different issue entirely.

Can Apple opt to do bad or short-sighted things? Yes.

Are they legally required to do them to maximize profits? No.

What evidence or steps would be sufficient for you?

Not parent, but I'll answer.

1) The implementation of the wake word recognition is implemented in hardware that cannot be updated remotely.

2) The device is unable to transmit information without lighting up a TX light. Implemented in unmodifiable hardware.

3) Voice recordings are processed and then deleted within one month.

4) The device is run by a company that doesn't make money through marketing or data analysis.

Love your list & know I'm late, but I'd add one item to your list: Make your update mechanism resistant against sending "personalized" update versions to specific clients. A client querying a central server can be overcome with a single NSL, while a peer to peer solution would need to hijack your connection as well.

1 means it's impossible to offer better voice recognition accuracy or change the wake word, meaning they get pilloried by reviewers for offering a device that's strictly worse than the current gen, and they get pilloried by HN for contributing to tech waste.

1&2 get the company pilloried by HN the moment a vulnerability comes out.

3 is a requirement that doesn't actually solve any problems and ruins a legitimate need of ML - comparing performance against a known baseline.

4 is overbroad - most software companies make their money through data analysis of one form or another.

Be honest, even if the manufacturer tells you #1 is true you're not going to believe them.

You're setting up an impossible set of demands that no manufacturer is going to meet and no consumer really cares about (other than perhaps yourself and a few tinfoil hat wearing crypto-anarchists).

The iPhone hardware meets my standards. The secure enclave for touchID is detailed in it's description and security. The Apple business model is not data collection, and the legal fights they have put up give me a reasonable belief that they take my security and privacy seriously enough for me. They are also printing money so it seems to be workable as part of a business model. I think you are wrong on all accounts.

I think you misread my comment. I'm actually a huge fan of the secure enclave and the way that Apple protects customer privacy. What I was commenting on was the distrust a lot of people have, combined with a lack of knowledge about how the hardware works. For example, Amazon's echo devices have a physical circuit that disconnects the microphone when you mute it. They could have done it in software, but wanted to break the physical circuit so that there was no question in customers minds whether the device was still listening or not when it was muted.

I trust Amazon as much as I do Apple to protect customer privacy.

Can't you set up Alexa on a raspberry pi? I guess you could then have your own trigger word "hello pi" or whatever that you've programmed it to listen for, and only then activate Alexa maybe?

Pain in the ass but you could open source it for the rest of the world.

Yeah, I think you are correct here. I think I would also be happy if someone else was selling me the hardware and I controlled it more, and it just was a hardware pipe to the voice service provider.

Hotword recognition does already exist and works on fairly modest hardware (I've never tested it on a pi, so I don't know specifically how well that would work - or more accurately how fast). The trouble is that it's an enormous hassle to set up and while it is open source, it involves some company or other having it's grubby paws all over the recognition networks. Which may or may not rub you the wrong way.

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