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Comment by seanp2k2 | Hacker News Reader

All Apple needs to do is send a few scary C&D letters from their army of lawyers and this will be done. If they run the infrastructure for imessage, I'm sure there's something in a ToS somewhere that talks about spoofing device IDs and unauthorized use of their services blah blah Apple's sole discretion.

In theory I love it but in reality it'll be dead soon as Apple has too much to gain from the walled garden they've spent decades and billions building and defending.

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A $3T monopolist sending scary C&D letters tends to get the attention of the government.

What is your evidence for this assertion?

Since when? What country?

I'm sure they're quaking in their boots over the prospect of paying a $2m fine a decade from now.

That decade of lawyer fees is much more than $2m.

If it was obviously bogus (think SLAPP territory) then that would make sense, but I don't think it is as likely to get their attention if the offending behavior can reasonably be classified as a potential violation of the CFAA.

(Whether it is a violation or not, I certainly couldn't say, but my point being that there is a reasonable good faith interpretation of the behavior that would not raise eyebrows.)

what is SLAPP in this context?

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

Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation. In other words, "Sue somebody when they criticize you, hoping the legal expense will make them stop." This isn't exactly the same scenario, but would be similar (in the poster's hypothetical) in that it was a lawsuit meant to intimidate rather than to seek justice.

The problem is that Apple has valid case, because these guys are making money with the app, by using Apple’s private backend services without permission.

Eh, just being really big isn't going to be enough by itself. Apple has just a bit over half the market, they're definitely not a monopoly. The gov't won't get involved.

Beeper isn’t using Apple services (at least not in Beeper Mini, their new e2ee iMessage client), and thus is not subject to any Terms of Service from Apple.

They’re publishing client software, which is protected expression provided it’s original and doesn’t infringe any trademarks or copyrights.

The end users are the ones potentially violating the ToS by connecting to Apple APIs.

Apple has no basis to tell Beeper to cease and desist from the publication of software that it is legal to publish.

But as part of developing the application? Can they realistically do that without violating ToS?

Someone said they are embedding Apple binaries for crypto stuff. Clear copyright infringement if so.

They might argue that this is like the inclusion of the Gameboy logo to boot a Gameboy game.

Only in the open source example PoC, not in the proprietary/closed source Beeper Mini. (They are not the same.)

That would be a clear and avoidable error and would get them shut down instantly.

That sounds a lot like the P2P file sharing companies' argument that didn't hold up in court: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MGM_Studios,_Inc._v._Grokster,....

I believe that reverse engineering for the purpose of interop is different and has been found to be fair use by the courts.

They could take it the other way and start suspending accounts that use a spoofed device id. For me that's my main hesitation, I don't want to have my apple accounts suspended for violation of ToS.

I've been on the receiving end of this - as an individual maybe, but as a committed startup not necessarily. Rooting for them!

Apple doesn’t even need to do that. They can send the DOJ after Beeper.

Many people hear about a reverse entering exception in the DMCA and call it a day. But it’s not that simple.

Reverse engineering is allowed for a very narrow case, namely interoperability between two software programs (for which you have a license granting you legal permission to use), as defined in paragraph 4 of Section 103(f).

The DMCA decidedly does not permit you to use reverse engineering to package someone else's software or service and sell it.

Jurisprudence also established that EULAs that explicitly prohibit reverse engineering supersede the exception granted in the DMCA, see Bowers v. Baystate Technologies, 320 F.3d 1317 (Fed. Cir. 2003)[0]

Apple has explicitly forbidden reverse engineering in their macOS license agreement[1], the iOS license agreement[2], and the Apple Media Terms of Service[3].

Agreement with those terms is necessary to reach the parts that need reverse engineering.

There’s also the matter that the pypush repository seems to include Apple’s proprietary code, which wouldn’t fall under reverse engineering.

Worst of all, even if reverse engineering was allowed, it still doesn't allow you to connect to other people's servers. The Computer Fraud Abuse Act of 1986 explicitly prohibits unauthorized access to computer systems, and the DMCA exception doesn't supersede the CFAA.

A lot of states have criminal statutes that mirror the CFAA.

So, at this point, it wouldn’t be inconceivable for Apple to try and get the DOJ involved.

0: https://law.resource.org/pub/us/case/reporter/F3/320/320.F3d...

1: https://www.apple.com/legal/sla/docs/macOSSonoma.pdf

2: https://www.apple.com/legal/sla/docs/iOS16_iPadOS16.pdf

3: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/

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