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Comment by _bxg1 | Hacker News Reader

Apple in 2020 is such a weird thing. Some of the things they produce - mostly in the software realm, I guess - have really careless and egregious bugs and design problems. But then they still come out and make amazing little features like this one that nobody thought to ask for, and don't get highly publicized, but really speak to that classic detail-oriented Apple mindset.

It's like there's a huge cultural schism running through the middle of the company, or something.

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> they still come out and make amazing little features like this one that nobody thought to ask for

Privacy/security-conscious computer users have been asking for user-controlled hardware switches on such peripherals from the moment they were shipped integrated into the device.

> Privacy/security-conscious computer users

So, in the grand scheme of things, "nobody" is an accurate description. Most people don't care about a hardware disconnect for their microphone, even if they should.

Right, and Apple isn't a niche hyper-secure laptop company, they just (sometimes) put good features in their mainstream products that their customers may not even know they want.

Is it too much to ask for a small LED next to each camera indicating if the sensor is powered? Should be standard on every phone.

Ditto. Or even an old-school LED that indicates data transmission like the HDD LED in old computer cases. Make it in hardware so that if any data is sent through the wire, it lights up.

HDD LED in old computer cases

Old? I'll admit I haven't changed my case in a couple years, but mine currently has one, and I can't remember the last time I've used a desktop computer that didn't have one.

old, adj: Having lived or existed for a relatively long time;

https://www.thefreedictionary.com/old

Old doesn't have to mean extinct :)

Unfortunately those were immediately susceptible to tempest attacks, at least at old hard drive speeds.

I think you are confusing this with data tx/rx lights for exfil[0]? I've never heard of a tempest attack (that is, revealing the data written via a side channel) on a hard drive light.

[0] Guri et al, LED-it-GO

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1702.06715.pdf

I think it’s this paper I remember that describes it as an “optical tempest” and talks about storage mechanism leakage: http://applied-math.org/acm_optical_tempest.pdf

Yeah it's type II in the Loughry schema. Still unfortunate if you're operating a high security air gapped network, but not squirting out secrets without being compromised first.

It seems almost quaint to worry about this when so much software has web spyware baked into it -- but maybe we need a virtual spyware led that lights up every time something talks to Facebook/Google/etc tracking. The light would be blinking non-stop for many people.

It would just never go out.

People already complain about the price and battery life of current phones. I can’t imagine either of those things making either situation better.

You can get SMD 0603 LEDs that use ~1mA of power for a few pennies in bulk. Peanuts compared to the power usage and price of the rest of the phone.

yeah that LED cost is going to drive my 1400 phone price up through the roof

Or maybe an icon in the status bar indicating the camera being in use.

Having it in the status bar would defeat the purpose as ill behaving actors could possibly circumvent this, having it in the hardware as a led would make this if not impossible most likely infeasible. I’ve only heard one instance where someone were able to go around the led and if I recall correctly that was on the old PowerBook and required physical access to flash the firmware on the camera hardware module with custom malicious firmware.

You can get that functionality with Microsnitch. It works for the microphone too.

I use MicroSnitch on my mac and love it. I just need it for the iPhone. It doesn't exist, does it?

No but it sounds like a good idea. I suspect it would require a jailbreak though.

I never understood how an expensive device like a camera was added to literally every laptop in existence without any option to remove (save for a few). I can only think manufacturers were pressured.

Supply chain/production complexity. It's more expensive for them to make the option customizable than it is to ship it for everyone. If there was an appreciable market for consumer-level camera-less machines the math to justify it might look different but there isn't. The vast VAST majority of the demand for hardware without cameras comes from the NatSec type people, and they're all doing bulk orders so they get more leverage to have niche production runs done for them. And even then they don't always get devices without the cameras. They end up having to do awkward things like physically disabling the hardware after the fact or locking out the functionality with custom firmware.

Before laptop makers started adding them en masse, there very much was an appreciable market for camera-less machines.

I find that pretty far fetched. I'd need to see some actual data on that that isn't explained by the commodity parts getting cheaper to be convinced.

Because before laptops included cameras we used to buy Logitech USB cameras to attach to our laptops.

I still have mine, and sadly it only produces 640x480 images, and everything looks too dark compared to the camera that is now included in the laptop.

It's a company with multiple people making multiple decisions each day. It shouldn't be surprising that there's variation in quality, just like at any other company.

But what I see is a gargantuan drop-off. A much wider range of variation than you'd normally expect, and mostly partitioned to different segments of the business.

Painting with broad strokes, Microsoft's products are fairly consistently "fine". Lately perhaps they've skewed towards "pretty good". But generally you know what you're going to get. Whereas Apple's products can be anywhere from unparalleled to embarrassing.

I've always attributed that user-tradition as a Jobs byproduct; he was a unifying force for the user experience and that role hasn't been filled since his passing. There are lots of hands involved with many projects, but it feels there's no point-person or champion on this for many years.

From going back to dongle hell of the 90's via USB-C, to the conflicting marketization of the macOS products, the connectors proliferating on the iOS standards(now lightning and USB C!), the conflating of iOS apps into macOS space, dropping magsafe; it doesn't feel very user friendly when you start getting into the details.

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