At this point I’m carrying so many electronic devices with me or at home that I’ve give up on going out of my way to prevent getting tracked. My best effort is to trust Apple doesn’t sell me out.
As much as I hate the guy, Kissinger made a great point in an interview with Eric Schmidt paraphrased:
'We have lived a fairly peaceful period in the last century with a stable world order, we should not assume that this is guaranteed to continue forever.'
We usually don't like to think in centuries or decades. But a democratic state today can become autocratic 50 years from now.
Equally, today caring about my privacy is just adding a lot of friction to me daily live. 50 years from now, I have no guarantee that myself or someone in my family becomes 'a person of interest' for my government.
Careful there. Now you're sounding like you you don't want to obey the government/laws if you don't agree with what is created in the future. At least this has been the argument around many gun laws that create registries, quasi-registries, or release identity information publically, especially with the Overton window and rhetoric.
Edit: why disagree? Really, still no response? Isn't this the general play that is being mentioned in the prior comment - information gathered now can be used against them by the government in the future when the laws change or are ignored? Is this only an issue when it's applied to some people or topics but not others?
It can happen in years, nevermind decades.
Megacorporations aren't going to save you from this one. Actually creating regulation that will define where you're data is allowed to go (and stay) might.
1. The problem presented is not that parking apps exfiltrate data from your phone, it’s that anyone can throw your plate number into it and get notified of when you pass through specific areas.
2. Your solution would not address the problem. Problem is not one of data portability, but the fact that your license plate may be registered in a system without your consent or awareness. The convenience of the service is directly at odds with privacy/security, and the post is asserting that the gain in convenience achieved through the current implementation is not worth the perils of the unfettered tracking possible through it. It provides non-governmental solutions to ameliorate the issue.
This is how Apple comes into it.
Which means Apple has just about all the data about me over last ~3 years and so far they seem to be doing a good job of holding fort. Obviously if a state actor wants to screw me then well, all bets are off so I'm not going to guard myself against that as it's way too more inconvenient as you stated.
The best way to increase privacy in the Apple ecosystem is to not use iCloud at all. Most of it (including your photos and backups, which contain endpoint keys and chat history) is effectively unencrypted and Apple can read all of it at any time without your device. Apple intentionally preserves this encryption backdoor in iMessage/Photos/iCloud for the US federal government, who can then access this information without a search warrant or probable cause.
This means creating a burner phone number, using that to create a burner Apple ID that is used only for installing apps, using only free apps (because the moment you put your payment card information in, you're deanonymized) and only using devices bought for cash.
Then Apple has a fair amount of information about you, but it's not linked to your identity.
Apple turns over customer data to the US federal authorities without a warrant over 30,000 times per year per their own transparency report. This is in addition to the normal legal process stuff that involves subpoenas or probable cause-based search warrants.