OctoMonkey

crowley said:

tylersdad said:

bulk001 said:

lkrupp said:

tylersdad said:

This is monumentally bad for privacy. It's making me reconsider my investments in Apple products. My entire family belongs to the Apple ecosystem. We all have some version of the iPhone 12, iPads and Apple Watches. It starts with examining personal pictures ostensibly to prevent child exploitation, but where does it lead? Where does it end? 

If it makes the perverts switch to Android, so be it and good riddance. And I doubt you will leave the platform when you realize you’re still better off with iOS than Android. Google will be doing exactly the same thing shortly as it usually follows Apple in these matters. Who will you go to? Your statement is just a fart in a wind storm. Good luck with it making any difference.

Agree with your basic sentiment of supporting Apple in this. But, I think though that Google Drive and FB already do something along these lines and Apple is actually playing catch-up? Could be wrong. If so be sure to write me a rant on how Apple leads on everything! ߘ⦬t;br>

Apple shouldn’t be playing catch-up on this spyware. They should stand up for the privacy of their customers. Today it’s child pornography that’s being targeted. Maybe tomorrow it’s anti-vax memes? Regardless, this is a horrible idea that will almost certainly be abused. 

It won't be anti-vax memes tomorrow, or the next day.  I guarantee it.

Perhaps not...  but perhaps it will be photograph (hashes) of unidentified Jan 6th protesters / rioters...  and when the political winds shift perhaps BLM protestors / rioters...  or photographs of wanted fugitives...  or any number of other un-desirables du jour.

Mike Wuerthele said:

tylersdad said:

Mike Wuerthele said:

tylersdad said:

Wesley Hilliard said:

tylersdad said:

It starts with examining personal pictures ostensibly to prevent child exploitation, but where does it lead? Where does it end?

Apple isn't examining personal pictures. No one is examining anything. Your photo has a unique number based on how the pixels are laid out, that number is compared to a database of numbers representing images for an exact match. False positives are one in a trillion. This is overly-simplified, but that's the basic overview. There isn't some algorithm looking for nudity in images.

Where does it end? It already has ended. The tool exists, it took years to develop, it is rolling out this fall. There is no "next."

Um, how do they look at the pixels if they don't examine the image? Do you have any idea how this technology even works? It doesn't appear so. To look at the pixels compare them to pixels in reference images, they must open both images. If they are opening the image and reading the pixels, then they are examining personal pictures. Are you trying to be obtuse purposely? 

Your answer to "where it ends" is beyond ridiculous. There is always a next. There are always enhancements. It's the nature of technology. 

Wes is not the one that misunderstands. There is no pixel to pixel comparison.

The iCloud pictures are mathematically hashed. They are then compared to a hash database, provided to Apple, by the NCMEC. Apple does not have the source pictures, it has the database hash.

How exactly do you mathematically hash an image--or any file for that matter--without looking at the 1's and 0's in the file?

Because you're doing it one 0 and one 1 at a time. A single pixel is many 0s and many 1s, depending on the bit depth, and compression algo. There is no contextual evaluation or assessment of the file, or even a single pixel, beyond the generation of the hash.

There's no assessment of the image as a whole. You could feed a Word file into the hasher, and it would still generate a hash.

Ah!  But can I feed it corned beef?  If so, would it still generate a hash?

corebeliefs said:

Apple is an amazing company but has a long history of stonewalling users over computer defects. Everyone has their own story. I still recall in 2005, the white iBook I owned had a graphics driver issue that caused the screen to go crazy. Apple wouldn't acknowledge it for over six months and asked me to send back the machine multiple times. Later, it was admitted to be a widespread flaw. Maybe that's not the case here, I hope it's not, but it's hard to give them the benefit of the doubt. 

That is the exact reason I indicated "yet another lawsuit" in my first post.

For all the accolades people heap upon Apple, they do have a tendency to deny design (especially form over function) problems until a lawsuit is brought against them.

bradmacpro said:

As they did not change the bezels to something more slender on these models, if it's limited to the M1 models, one can't blame the construction. If I was buying a laptop, which has no latching mechanism, it seems it would make sense to use some sticker to the bezel or top case to introduce a tiny bit of extra space here to allow for a grain of sand to not crack the display.

Wellll...  There may be more to it.  It is possible they changed display suppliers (or added a supplier), they might have changed the manufacturing process, altered the display construction...  perhaps the torque on the tool for screwing in the display was set too high (assuming there is such a tool) at a single station for a shift or two...  There may have been a defect in the display itself, or a change at the display manufacturer.  Of course, there might have been no change at all.  We are not privy to the engineering and manufacturing details...  or at least, I am not.

That said, there are a great many possibilities including mishandling by the consumer.

Apple needs to step up or this will result in yet another lawsuit...  potentially class action.

I have worked on industrial designs where we had to take significant precautions to prevent cracking of a clear plastic lens.  While a notebook computer would not experience the same level of physical stress, incorporating clamped plastic in a design can be quite tricky.