elijahg

"Confusion" was not the issue. Apple of course would say it is because to do otherwise would be an admission that the feature was toxic and entirely contradictory to their public privacy stance. Privacy organisations and governments weren't "confused", they could foresee the potential privacy consequences. Apple knows full well the pushback was due to their public "what's happens on your phone stays on your phone" stance, the polar opposite to scanning phones for CSAM - and the potential for further encroachment on privacy.

F_Kent_D said:

How is that remotely relevant to the HP flop? Amazon sells all of their smart speakers for less than the HP mini. The initial justification used here for the price gap was privacy, but since Apple was caught sending voice clips to be reviewed by humans that argument somewhat evaporated, with no further excuses for the price.

You’re not telling the whole story here about people  listening to recordings. Recordings weren’t tied to specific accounts like Alexa’s are. The report says there’s no identifiable information regarding where the recordings came from. There’s a big difference in the way recordings are reviewed by actual people. 

Apparently that is not true and significant personal data was included:

"According to the British daily, “there have been countless instances of recordings featuring private discussions between doctors and patients, business deals, seemingly criminal dealings, sexual encounters and so on. These recordings are accompanied by user data showing location, contact details, and app data.”

and 

"the big issue is that these voice snippets end up being accessed by humans—contractors working for the company around the world—that should not have been authorized in the first place and could provide enough details to identify a user"

ITGUYINSD said:

elijahg said:

Not sure why anyone would pay such an absurd amount for this from what is a pretty poorly regarded networking company - when you could get a prosumer solution from a professional networking company like Cisco (Meraki) or Ubiquiti (Unifi) for 1/4 the price; companies with actual networking expertise who write their own network stack with excellent UIs, reliability, security and updates for 5 years+. Or you could get an overpriced Netgear box with a generic version of Linux underneath and a crap GUI that doesn't work properly ontop with 6 months of software support for $1500.

Because most people don't have the stack of networking certifications needed to properly install and configure Meraki and Unifi equipment.  They are NOT user-friendly and most of the advanced options are only accessible via command line.  No thanks.

I had Ubiquiti UAC-AC-PRO's (multiple) in my house for years.  Junk.  Nothing but trouble (slow, would stop passing traffic, poor range).  Replaced with TP-Link Deco and never looked back.  Deco (in the words of Apple) "just works".

Wow if you think you need a "stack of networking certifications" to use Meraki and Unifi equipment, you need to step back and get someone in who knows how to use a simple iOS app. Running the APs in standalone mode only needs the (excellent) Unifi app. It is as simple as setting up an Airport Basestation. And no, the advanced options are not "only accessible via command line". That's complete FUD.

I've installed many many UAP-AC-Pro's alongside nanoHDs, flexHDs, AC-Meshes, AC-IWs and AC-Lites, with associated switches and routers. Never a problem with them, apart from the odd FW update causing oddities. But I have come across situations where entirely clueless people have screwed up standalone installations by doing things like having a different SSID or different WPA key for each base station, that understandably doesn't work too well. Maybe you did that, since many people get on just fine with 1000+ clients in schools with AC-Pros, sometimes upwards of 50 clients per AP.

I have replaced many TP-link systems. They're in general trash, and there are botnets that use TP-Link routers. Terrible security, probably intentionally terrible so China can - as others have said - use them as they see fit.

I used to be a Netgear fan, then switched to the Apple Airports, but now I would highly recommend Ubiquiti. AmpliFi for the most simple configuration with multiple wireless mesh points (though as with any mesh tech, don't expect more than about 200mbps thorough a mesh node), and Unifi for more configurable and complex networks. Wired to each AP is the only way to reliably get 300mbps+ on 802.11ac, and wifi 6 is needed for 450mbps+ in general. But speed and range depends on so many factors. The number of antenna chains in the AP and station (phones tend to have less than tablets/laptops/desktops), supported channel width, wall thickness, uplink, number of devices etc. Ubiquiti gear supports 802.11k/r/v too which greatly helps when roaming between access points, helping to prevent dropped calls etc.

Not sure why anyone would pay such an absurd amount for this from what is a pretty poorly regarded networking company - when you could get a prosumer solution from a professional networking company like Cisco (Meraki) or Ubiquiti (Unifi) for 1/4 the price; companies with actual networking expertise who write their own network stack with excellent UIs, reliability, security and updates for 5 years+. Or you could get an overpriced Netgear box with a generic version of Linux underneath and a crap GUI that doesn't work properly ontop with 6 months of software support for $1500.