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Comment by gjsman-1000 | Hacker News Reader

I would think Apple has some leverage to force it if they really wanted.

If Apple really wanted to force the issue, they could tell T-Mobile no more iPhone contracts unless you do it. Apple can survive and thrive on fewer networks - the iPhone was AT&T exclusive for a long time at the beginning.

If that happened, there would be no way for T-Mobile to get a supply of iPhones. People would need to buy iPhones from Apple and then replace the SIM cards themselves. It would make T-Mobile bend pretty quickly unless they managed to get Verizon and AT&T to join them on the issue.

But then Apple has a second card to play, and that's the court of public opinion. If Apple wanted to make a public ad lambasting the carriers for undermining people's privacy, the damage would also force them to bend.

Finally, of course, there's the fact that carriers need Apple just as much as Apple needs carriers. However, between the carriers and Apple, who has $200 billion in the bank to do things themselves if they wanted?

Edit: Heck, T-Mobile has a market value of $130 billion. AT&T has a market cap of $188B, and Verizon $223 billion. If Verizon and AT&T joined T-Mobile in protest, Apple could theoretically attempt (or at least threaten) a hostile takeover of any of them. That would cause a lot of discussion among the carriers and send a strong message very quickly.

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Apple could simply reimplement APN and iCloud Files and etc over their own Private Relay connections, so that any carrier who blocks Private Relay ends up blocking all push notifications to all Apple devices. They have not yet done so, but if they do, either all US carriers will have to collude to block it — which could reasonably be considered anti-competitive behavior and would attract immediate governmental review — or they'd all have to allow Private Relay, as otherwise they'd bleed millions of customers due to being hostile to iPhone.

It seems safe to assume that Apple doesn't like user APN traffic being tracked any more than the rest of their traffic, and so I would imagine this is essentially the roadmap for all Apple Services provided to their users over the next few years.

It's also possible the Beta is just to see what happens when they make the traffic visible and possible to block, and having seen the carriers tending towards "block anything that inhibits tracking", they might simply target Private Relay 2.0 as "HTTP3 over 443/udp to http3.apple.com" and have that be an N-way reflector point for all customer-provided Apple services, including Private Relay and the rest as different channels over that multipath HTTP3 layer. They chose to implement Private Relay in a way that could be detected, and are measuring how neutrality-hating carriers respond. Assuming it's their final answer is not a bet I'd take.

It seems like any kind of forceful action would trigger government review. The safest option to me seems to be just having a modal pop up saying "T-Mobile blocks private relay from being used".

It isn't a forceful use of power by Apple and it clearly informs just the simple truth that the users carrier is hostile and maybe they want to switch.

I expect my iPhone to work the same on any carrier.

That has never been the case. Carriers have been tampering with web traffic for a while now. If T-Mobile is specifically tampering with the network, the problem is external and out of the control of Apple.

In the US, big Carrier A implements the full array of iPhone capabilities for carriers under Settings > Cellular; big Carrier B does not. Most people aren’t aware of what they’re missing, but for example, when implemented by the carrier properly, the cellular data usage heading is “this billing cycle” instead of “however long it’s been since you last clicked Reset Statistics manually”; and Settings > Phone > Call Forwarding has an iOS native UI rather than forcing you to dial 1980s-style *#12##0112636382* modem strings into the dialer.

Does your carrier implement this? If not, will you switch carriers? It’s unclear what degree of importance you assign to your expectation, as it could be anything from “for the tasks I care about” to “in every possibly way without exception”. (For me: It’s not important eniugh to switch carriers on its own, though it’s certainly a factor if I have greater reasons.)

I was always wondering why statistics never correctly showed information for my billing cycle. Admittedly, I wasn't the account holder until recently, but I never understood that it was a carrier settings. Are there other carrier-specific features that you know about?

By the way, your parent comment hypothesizing about http/3 and Apple services likely being routed via Private Relay was also very insightful. The http/3 part seems quite speculative, but I could easily see the Apple services being routed over Private Relay as part of any standard "dogfooding" roadmap.

There is not a lot of difference between http3 and a VPN protocol that can bundle and transport multiple bidirectional channels asynchronously, especially when considering the restriction “only uses http protocols and none other” — a quality that many Apple services share with Private Relay.

It’s absolutely speculative to consider http3 a viable replacement for ”a VPN”, as many consider Private Relay to be^, but that’s not due to any technical limitation. We could benchmark Squid-over-http3 versus Wireguard VPN in various latency and packet loss scenarios today (if implemented), and get productive and interesting results. We could do the same with varnish / nginx versus openvpn / pptpd. Whether or not it supports CONNECT is worth noting, but is no obstacle for “let’s assume that everything is HTTP”, as appears widely applicable to both Apple’s services to their customers, and a significant majority of consumer VPN traffic, today.

Have those benchmarks been performed yet? Are we all doing it wrong by using wireguard et al. to Mullvad et al. for 99% HTTP traffic and we just don’t realize it yet? I look forward someday to finding out the answer :)

ps. iOS carrier APIs and functionality are NDA’d so I don’t have any other information or useful examples to offer, as my experience with carriers as their customer is very limited. Perhaps others will know; apologies.

^ I haven’t seen an FP yet titled “If it can’t carry SSH traffic, it’s not a VPN”, but certainly there’ll be one someday. I can’t predict when, though, anymore than I can guess when someone else will realize to seriously ask, supported by benchmarks and encapsulation overhead charts, “Should tcp be deprecated in favor of http?”. (I have no opinion on what the correct answers are at this time.)

Better verbiage would be "T-Mobile requires the ability to report your browsing activity to third-parties."

Legally much more risk since you are now assuming motives rather than stating plain facts. Even if those motives seem certainly correct.

It is a plain fact that they will have that ability.

ps. Everyone who’s reading this story and discussion, go read the report that T-Mobile only forces Private Relay off for customers who are enrolled in their content-filtering product:

https://tmo.report/2022/01/t-mobile-blocking-icloud-private-...

There’s been an update to the article addressing this:

> However, many of the users we’ve heard from, and tested ourselves, do not have any such content filtering enabled. We’ve followed up with T-Mobile for additional clarification, but have not yet heard back.

I don't know why these products are still around. They are already basically useless; from T-Mobile's site:

> Visiting secured web sites (https) because encryption prevents Web Guard from seeing the content of those websites

I guess T-Mobile should start downgrading HTTPS to HTTP /s

Some carriers would if they could. That's why HSTS was implemented.

And their confirmation of that is out today, with an iOS 15.2 bug reported to Apple as well.

https://www.theverge.com/22878885/verizon-att-t-mobile-apple...

> If Apple wanted to make a public ad lambasting the carriers for undermining people's privacy, the damage would also force them to bend.

That ad would be candy to the Apple PR team trying to push the “Apple is secure and respects your privacy” campaign. I bet we’ll see Apple use the court of public opinion here, and win with it.

If Apple escalates this into a dirt-flinging war, I don't think any domestic carriers would take offense at reminding the public that Apple is the only one among them that still does business with China. But neither one will escalate things, because both Apple and every US cell carrier have so many skeletons in their closet that trying to call one another out wouldn't just be hypocritical, it would be mutually assured destruction.

Nah - that wouldn't work. Apple would just point out that they use networking gear made in China. Brilliant.

My point is that carriers and manufacturers have so much dirt on each other that trying to escalate things would just hurt them both. The reason why Apple (and mobile carriers, for that matter) don't take swings at each other is because they both need the other to look as pristine as possible to sell units. They have a mutual interest in looking good together, and neither Apple nor the carriers have any vested interest in breaking that relationship.

I don't think the American public would particularly care – and some would probably even support – that Apple does business with China. If that's the best the carriers can throw at Apple, versus Apple cutting them off from the single device doing the heaviest lifting to keep them relevant, then yikes.

Oh, that's certainly not the worst they'd grab for, but more of an example where they can call their bluff. Cell carriers and hardware manufacturers alike get bent over backwards for compliance in the United States, trying to assert that you're "the private one" is just going to get you called on every other front. It's not even a question that these companies do shady things, the real question is more about the lengths they'd go to diminish their competition.

Again though, rupturing this conversation is mutually assured destruction. The reason why Apple won't call T-Mobile's bluff is because it's better for them to look like a symbiotic company than an adversarial one, and T-Mobile can get away with this because data protection in the US is a moot-point anyways. It's about as unremarkable as news gets.

Hell, Apple was even nice enough to give T-Mobile a special error message when you try to use Private Relay:

> "Your cellular plan doesn’t support iCloud Private Relay. With Private Relay turned off, this network can monitor your internet activity, and your IP address is not hidden from known trackers or websites."

I wouldn't call it security theater if I couldn't see the curtains on the left and right.

It's strange that you think Americans would equate "people in China are suffering" and "X is spying on me".

Your suggested response doesn't change my mind at all, it seems quite desperate and pathetic. And I want to see a stronger moral stance on trade with China.

I don't think that would be effective, everyone already knows that Apple builds their phones in China, it says on the back. The fact that your cell carrier wants so badly to spy on you that they are willing to go to go to bat with Apple will, however, surprise some people.

I'm trying to think of a case in which Apple has used public opinion in this way. The closest I can come up with is Adobe Flash, but Apple was the one blocking a product on its platform then.

>What's a computer?

Apple trys to manipulate public opinion constantly.

A computer is a device where you can work on, unlike a tablet, unless you are in a band or paint digitally.

> Apple could theoretically attempt (or at least threaten) a hostile takeover of any of them.

If I were any of the carriers, I wouldn't worry about this in the slightest.

Apple attempting to gain ownership of a mobile carrier in order to impose it's will on the market would be met with incredibly harsh regulatory scrutiny.

Beyond that, there's a strategic reason Apple hasn't launched their own mobile offering. The minute Apple owns a particular mobile carrier, they would be pretty well cut off from the other mobile carriers, or they would have to negotiate deals that would probably be argued to be collusive trade practices.

The real solution is that the United States needs real data security and privacy laws that prevent network operators from reselling your usage history, location tracking, and other personal details. It's a national security issue at this point.

I was thinking the same, then I remembered that Google has its own phones, it owns Android, and it managed to start its own cellular network without a whisper. So, no reason why Apple can't do the same.

google's wireless offering is an MVNO, they're paying to ride on other networks.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Fi

Google is in slightly more of a "home-grown" situation, but more importantly Lina Khan was not in her current chair back when all that stuff happened. In marked contrast to previous officeholders, she won't be deferring to the "monopoly is good" FCC.

Launching an MVNO that pays out to network providers isn’t the same thing as a hostile takeover of a single carrier, for either case.

Also, as a carrier, I’m not worried about Google’s MVNO for one simple reason: Google hates humans.

For all that the carriers are bad to their customers, they at least have a footprint in meatspace. Google’s DNA finds physical footprint and real human interaction anathema.

I would gladly take Google in a customer foot race any day.

They contract it out, but Google Fiber had door to door sales people attempting to get people to switch to Google Fiber a few months ago. Several of my neighbors switched from these people reaching out.

There's a difference between temporary sales presence contracted out and a permanent retail presence, though, you're right.

I always felt like Fiber was a warning shot to all of the ISPs trying to constrain what/how/where customers could do while extracting as much money as possible.

In other words, if they keep this behavior up, Google will begin to compete as well as advocate (fight for the regulation, laws, etc) for other, smaller, new ISPs to enter the market. Or fight harder on the net-neutrality front. Or potentially worst of all for the incumbent/monopolistic ISPs, fight to make them dumb-pipes.

Then again, maybe it's just another google product/service destined from conception for the graveyard...

Right, but I think there's some incorrect conclusions being drawn.

The article asserts that an error in the settings menu appears: "Your cellular plan doesn’t support iCloud Private Relay. With Private Relay turned off, this network can monitor your internet activity, and your IP address is not hidden from known trackers or websites."

This doesn't appear to just be a situation where T-Mobile started blocking it at the network level; it appears to be one where Apple submitted.

While there's a lot of theories in this comment about how Apple will respond; I don't see that happening (in a public way, of course). Apple's leadership in 2022 doesn't have the same convictions their leadership has had in the past. They're capable of being a positive force for change, in fair weather; but when the weather gets rough, or when forces assert power over their expression of values, they fold.

What, so now displaying an error message means you're responsible for the error? See some of the other threads about why Apple might not like playing dirty to go behind T-Mobile's back--each one needs the other for its good reputation.

Its reasonable to assert that they wrote the error, and they phrased the error message intentionally, in a way which clearly says that they expected carriers to block the service. The settings app is owned by Apple; not T-Mobile; T-Mobile would certainly NEVER admit so plainly that they monitor network activity (even though they do).

Alternate phrasing which betrays different expectations: "We could not connect to the iCloud Private Relay servers. This may indicate an issue with your network provider, blah blah blah."

No VPNs is mostly standard-operating-procedure in, say, China. That being said: I'd assume that feature, let alone the settings page to configure it, is hidden in versions of the software distributed in countries like that. This error message is likely for countries where the service is available; just not on your carrier.

But putting that aside and even considering their stance of submission to the CCP; they betray every spoken value their American executives verbalize. That is standard operating procedure for 2022 Apple, and most other gigacorporations. That is the lens that every statement Tim makes, every word spoken at their keynotes, needs to be viewed through; that they're willing to invest their infinite money in whatever projects they believe aligns with their values, but they're wholly unwilling to stand up for those values when those projects are battle-tested in even such an absolutely inconsequential way as this.

Of course, they can prove me wrong by standing up to T-Mobile and using them as an example. I mean my god, you couldn't ask for a better example to make, T-Mobile/Sprint is a fourth-rate bargain bin cellular carrier, we're not talking about a nation state; this is a toddler mad at his parents because they won't let him eat candy for dinner. If they can't even resolve that, what hope do any of their values have?

Apple was the one who wrote that text out and put it in your iPhone. You can choose to interpret that any way you choose, but it's pretty clear that Apple either really loves and trusts T-Mobile or (more likely) their "Privacy is a Human Right" bit rides shotgun to their moneymaking shtick.

The wording "doesn't support" seems very cooperative; it's less likely to generate angry calls to the network's customer service than "sabotages", "blocks", or "interferes with" - all of which are arguably more accurate descriptions.

> Heck, T-Mobile has a market value of $130 billion. AT&T has a market cap of $188B, and Verizon $223 billion. If Verizon and AT&T joined T-Mobile in protest, Apple could theoretically attempt (or at least threaten) a hostile takeover of any of them.

OTOH, one way to become the most valuable company in history is to not go pulling stunts like that. Nothing the street loves more than predictability.

Of course, the odds of this are extremely small. It's just more to show that Apple has more leverage than the carriers in this situation.

Edit: Another, "smarter" tactic that Apple might use is by sending messages to the Board of Directors. If Apple can get the Board of Directors on their side (or at least convince them that management is fighting a war they can't win)... another way to freak out execs at the carriers.

The odds of any American company could start scooping up cell carriers without reproach is not just "small", but more along the lines of "complete impossibility". The SEC already gives Apple the stink-eye for gobbling up C-lister startup companies; if they tried acquiring anyone in the S&P 500, every trade commission in the world would be on them within seconds.

I also think it's silly to equate a company's power to the amount of money they have (at least in the first world) but your hypothetical does raise an interesting question: who's deeper in bed with the State, Big Telecom or FAANG? All of them answer to the government, even T-Mobile; but who's got the most favor? Understanding the heinous stuff the American government got away with when they had telecom under their thumb doesn't set a very optimistic baseline of expectations. It might even lead certain people to believe (surprise surprise) that Apple's dedication to privacy doesn't really mean much when there's money on the line. Arguing about how "Apple is better because they have more capital resources" has about as much pragmatic value as a child's crayon drawing.

Unless Apple has one-upped Room 641A, I think you're describing a power fantasy.

Sure, but on the other hand if there is one thing Apple (as well as Tesla, Facebook and Google) are known and loved by the stock markets for, it is vertical integration to an absolutely insane degree.

Apple would literally capture the entire value chain of the iDevice ecosystem with such a stunt, not to mention have yet another steady stream of income.

>the iPhone was AT&T exclusive for a long time at the beginning.

I think that was a very different time though. Smartphones were just becoming popular. A lot of other upcoming smartphones also had carrier exclusives at that time (Verizon with the Droid line). I don't know if that would be acceptable in today's world.

A joint move like that by the carriers would be subject to a lot of antitrust scrutiny, where as apple can move on it's own with a lot less scrutiny.

Not to mention AT&T paid through the nose for this exclusivity.

People would need to buy iPhones from Apple and then replace the SIM cards themselves.

I mean, why isn't this already a thing? This isn't difficult at all. I don't buy my phone from my carrier. When I get a new phone, I simply take the old sim out and put it in the new one. The last time I had to do more was when the phones changed from a standard SIM to a mini SIM - the old one wouldn't physically fit. That was some years ago, though.

I'd think the bigger issue might be with the US phone networks: Do they still force you to use your phone with the carrier even though this isn't necessary at all? And if so, why haven't folks protested since it is obviously a way to trap people into one carrier.

Also, since folks in non-US countries can just buy a phone and put a sim card in, Apple won't have any issues adjusting whatsoever.

It is already a thing, just not prevalent. Although I believe for the moment, you still have to choose your radio-specific variant as the transition to 4G and 5G isn't 100% complete yet; CDMA vs GSM. (I hope I'm wrong about this by now). Sometimes it's (or was) based on spectrum.

Another issue is probably the "incentives" provided through the network providers and their partners, especially when an iPhone is traded in. Often times it results in significant "savings" for the consumer. (I imagine Apple could implement something similar, if not superior if they wanted)

Finally it's physical presence. Apple has done a fantastic job of creating a physical place to serve your needs, and of course you can always buy online, but there are those that prefer or require going to a place to take care of their phone needs.

I also shudder to imagine what the Apple stores would look like if they had to deal with and resolve the kinds of network issues (not to mention some of the characters that need the help) I've seen the superabundance of network provider mall/strip-mall stores deal with.

Hopefully all of these are just remnants of a time we'd all like to put behind us.

> I mean, why isn't this already a thing? This isn't difficult at all. I don't buy my phone from my carrier.

There is no need to buy a phone from the mobile network in the US. People have been able to pop a SIM into a phone and call the mobile network and have them add the IMEI for many years.

What a strange world US is where phone sales and carriers aren't separate.

> People would need to buy iPhones from Apple and then replace the SIM cards themselves.

The horror! We've been doing this the entire time here in Russia. Carriers have always had exactly zero say on what phones can and can't do.

Of course you can buy the phone from Apple and put in a SIM card in the US. I’ve done it many times. You shouldn’t take fake internet outrage so seriously.

Or the other cellular networks could start running ads touting that they let iPhone users use all of the iPhone features.

"Does your cell phone company hold you back? With Cincinnati Bell, you can do things with your iPhone that T-Mobile won't let you."

Apple could even help pay for the ads. It's not like companies with aligned interests don't do ad cost-sharing all the time anyway.

Cincinnati Bell? I thought the US only had 3 mobile networks: T-Mobile, ATT, and Verizon?

Edit: Wikipedia says Cincinnati Bell sold its mobile network to Verizon in 2014:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Bell

So you want them act as monopolists which is something HN usually is very much against. Also the threat of trying to buy a carrier out is a completely empty one and the carriers would all know it. There is no way it would pass regulatory or court review for the market leader in cell phone sales to own a major carrier.

I agree with you that they probably wouldn't be allowed to buy a major US carrier. But they aren't a monopolist or the global market leader in cell phone sales. Even in the US where they are indeed the market leader, their percentage of sales hovers around half, well below monopoly levels.

Anti trust starts when abuse of a powerful position begins. There is no threshold requiring you to be a monopolist or even a dominant player. Just that you abuse your position.

I wouldn't be so certain of that. Antitrust review of mergers is mainly concerned with whether the merger will reduce competition in a market. Since Apple doesn't currently operate a mobile network and none of the carriers currently manufacture phones, it would be hard to argue a merger would lessen competition.

Now whether Apple shareholders want Apple operating a mobile network is a completely different question.

While I agree with your comment almost fully, I think it's a bit too early to judge Apple. They probably found out just a few days earlier than we did and are still weighing their options.

if i had to hypothesize why T-Mobile are doing this, its streaming media.

TMobile has numerous pay-for-play access contracts in place for companies like netflix and hulu. in return they get a QoS tier and guaranteed minimums for their subscribers.

conversely, as others have mentioned and the article itself, private relay is absolutely haram. it damages tmobiles ability to deliver edge content from their contractually obligated players like netflix (without a region netflix quality might suffer) and it completely sidesteps all of TMobiles lucrative user plans that include access to streaming media as a feature relative to the users data cap.

increasingly private "anything" on a cellphone is becoming a hostile proposition for carriers as their revenue is largely based on predatory surveillance capitalism. without metrics and metadata, theyre no different than the water company.

Having worked for a couple carriers, network operators, and the back end data processor for them, I agree that the carriers are fighting and losing the data wars. They did make a lot of money on surveillance, but it is dropping as more coms are encrypted. I don't quite understand why people feel comfortable with a $3T company holding all their data, but I guess it is just in fewer baskets. People like me who know too much only use VOIP and prepaid burner SIM's on phones that always run VPN and airplane mode 98% of the time. It is way cheaper and more secure.

I don't think Private Relay routes app traffic through Apple servers, just Safari traffic: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212614

Please correct me if I'm wrong. If that's the case, I believe most/all iPhone users watch Netflix/content sites via an app, so that traffic would not be routed via Private Relay.

This may affect Mac Safari traffic, though. I am curious if they have any exceptions on the backend for edge content providers.

Apple could theoretically attempt (or at least threaten) a hostile takeover of any of them

Yeah, that's not Apple's style. Besides, they don't want all of the legacy crap that comes with owning a cell phone carrier.

I suspect the issue is making its way up the corporate ladder through various directors and Vice Presidents.

And I'm sure Apple's got a business plan for running their own MVNO they could dust off if things get out of hand. But let's hope it doesn't come to that.

Theoretically they could buy it, replace the management, sign a contract to never do such things again, and spin it off. They wouldn't necessarily have to deal with it beyond that.

But this would be rewarding existing ownership with a buy-out.

Why would Apple need carriers and vice versa? 3GPP is a series of standards for a reason.

This blocking is a net neutrality issue. Hope it doesn't hold, at least in Europe.

Just because the tech is standardized doesn't mean Apple could just fly on their own. The carriers are entrenched via spectrum ownership. It would be impossible for Apple to build a network without the right spectrum.

Maybe I should have been more clear. I meant that as long as you uphold the standards you can connect to any network.

> People would need to buy iPhones from Apple and then replace the SIM cards themselves.

Changing sims is VERY easy, but a sim that doesn't match an approved phone is also easy to block?

There is no chance Apple would be allowed to buy or run a mobile network. The monopoly dogs would be at the door before the email went out.

The vertical integration of Amazon in the past 10 years or so makes me think those monopoly dogs can't hunt.

Regulators responsible for anti trust enforcement only give lip service to the laws they are meant to enforce. The rest of the time their lips are firmly pressed up against the asses of the people they are meant to regulate.

The message that would send is that EU anti-trust mechanisms would need to be engaged pronto.

> I would think Apple has some leverage to force it if they really wanted.

No, because then people will ask why they also don't use the leverage to enable this feature in China/Russia/...

I don't think anyone thinks America's third-largest cell carrier has the same power as the Russian or Chinese government. Certainly Apple can say "We cannot make China and Russia do what we want" because they don't have that much leverage.

Last I checked, T-Mobile has approximately 100% fewer nukes than Russia or China.

Apple has to abide by the law in each jurisdiction it operates in or cease operating there.

It doesn’t have the ability to give a middle finger to both those governments and still be able to sell devices to Russians and Chinese people to use Private Relay on.

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