“Last week Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, once again reiterated the company’s belief that people have a right to privacy and security, and that the cost of free-as-in-paid-for-by-your-data services isn’t always clearly understood,” Rene Ritchie writes for iMore. “Those for who believe the conversation about privacy and security is the most important of our generation appreciated someone as powerful and influential as Cook giving it the spotlight it deserves. Those who believe the advancement of technology requires the relinquishing of previously held beliefs about privacy and security, however, reacted harshly. The problem is, many of them also reacted in a way that’s just plain wrong.”
“It’s vital to understand that privacy and security, while often mentioned together, are not one and the same,” Ritchie writes. “Privacy demands security, but security does not demand privacy. Historically, privacy has often been violated in the name of security.”
“Some people were recently irked that they’d have to buy new bridges or hubs for home automation, thanks to Apple’s requirement for end-to-end encryption in HomeKit. I was irked my bridges and hubs weren’t end-to-end encrypted from the start,” Ritchie writes. “Now, thanks to Apple’s stand on privacy and security, they will be. And I can’t help but hope that thanks to Apple’s stand on privacy and security in general, all services from all companies will be under immense pressure to be more private and secure as well. And that benefits everyone.”
Much more in the full article – very highly recommended – here.
MacDailyNews Take: Safeguard your privacy, don’t fritter it away mindlessly; it’s to valuable to give away.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
SEE ALSO:
Edward Snowden: Apple is a privacy pioneer – June 5, 2015
U.S. Senate blocks measures to extend so-called Patriot Act; NSA’s bulk collection of phone records in jeopardy – May 23, 2015
Rand Paul commandeers U.S. Senate to protest so-called Patriot Act, government intrusion on Americans’ privacy – May 20, 2015
Apple, others urge Obama to reject any proposal for smartphone backdoors – May 19, 2015
U.S. appeals court rules NSA bulk collection of phone data illegal – May 7, 2015
In open letter to Obama, Apple, Google, others urge Patriot Act not be renewed – March 26, 2015
Apple’s iOS encryption has ‘petrified’ the U.S. administration, governments around the world – March 19, 2015
Obama criticizes China’s demands for U.S. tech firms to hand over encryption keys, install backdoors – March 3, 2015
Apple CEO Tim Cook advocates privacy, says terrorists should be ‘eliminated’ – February 27, 2015
Apple’s Tim Cook warns of ‘dire consequences’ of sacrificing privacy for security – February 13, 2015
DOJ warns Apple: iPhone encryption will lead to a child dying – November 19, 2014
Apple CEO Tim Cook ups privacy to new level, takes direct swipe at Google – September 18, 2014
A message from Tim Cook about Apple’s commitment to your privacy – September 18, 2014
Apple will no longer unlock most iPhones, iPads for police, even with search warrants – September 18, 2014
Apple, Google, others call for government surveillance reform – December 9, 2013
Nice rhetoric. Some facts match the rhetoric and some facts are not. Some products are at the high end, such as Apple Pay. iCloud was not, to name one well known situation.
iCloud security was not at fault for the celebrity affair a year ago. It was poor passwords, easily discovered passwords etc that was the problem. If the celeb users had properly secured their online material it would not have happened.
It seems that even with all the intelligence gathering, that we only prevent further events after one already happened. Which leads me to believe that it is no different than before info gathering. Back then something happened, we investigated the perpetrator with court authorization. We have forced on ourselves, we demanded to air out the politicians and celebrities personal lives, so they have no incentive to keep our private.
In Apple in trust.
I hope the citizens of the free and civilized world enjoyed this nice article. I certainly do agree that the conversation about this topic is a very important one, but unfortunately it should not have to be.
The article alludes to a nebulous group of (american) marketeers, and rattles off some (american) names insinuating that this is engaged by commercial enterprises but it does not make it clear that the spearhead organization is their (american) government.
MDN recently posted a New York Times article by Snowden and proposed an idea: “The U.S. federal government should adhere to the U.S. Constitution.”
It’s pretty well clear that this federal so called (american) government, regardless of political party in control, is not adhering to their constitution, much less to any behavior would be considered ethical moral or civilized by todays’ standards. In other words this isn’t about a oops human error deviation of their (american) constitution by a few people. It’s a systemic quantum leap into a deep dark abyss.
So here’s an idea: If the U.S. federal government if indeed deviating from their constitution to that extent what does that make make it? Hero is not the word that comes to mind.
More importantly what is being done about it? There is to my understanding to a proviso in this constitution that there is a right to bear arms, in order to prevent this very thing from happening but from what we’ve seen there does not seem to be any action to put to country back on it’s constitutional path nor is there any action to bring these violators to justice. This is quite unfortunate because knowing the way that karma works there will be a lot of guns that will be pried from dead hands that will have not fired a single shot for justice.