“Russia has proposed that Apple Inc and SAP hand the government access to their source code to make sure their widely used products are not tools for spying on state institutions,” Maria Kiselyova reports for Reuters. “The suggestion that two of the world’s flagship technology companies disclose some of their most sensitive business secrets comes as the United States and Europe debate their most severe sanctions yet against Russia for its role in Ukraine. On Tuesday, the United States imposed a new round of sanctions, hitting three Russian banks, including the country’s second-biggest, VTB. The European Union reached agreement on Tuesday on its first broad economic sanctions, marking a new phase in the biggest confrontation between Moscow and the West since the Cold War.”
“The Russian proposal was voiced last week when Communications Minister Nikolai Nikiforov met Apple’s general manager in Russia, Peter Engrob Nielsen, and SAP’s Russian managing director, Vyacheslav Orekhov, the Communications Ministry said in a statement,” Kiselyova reports. “It said the proposal was designed to ensure the rights of consumers and corporate users to the privacy of their personal data, as well as for state security interests.”
“While couched in the language of protecting privacy, any Russian move to force these companies to divulge the inner workings of their software could pose a major threat to their viability if they were to lose control of the source code. ‘Edward Snowden’s revelations in 2013 and U.S. intelligence services’ public statements about the strengthening of surveillance of Russia in 2014 have raised a serious question of trust in foreign software and hardware,’ Nikiforov said in the statement released late on Tuesday,” Kiselyova reports. “He was referring to bombshell disclosures by the former U.S. National Security Agency contractor that revealed widespread NSA snooping through eavesdropping on popular technology products and services. Since then, experts have concluded that U.S. government-backed standards for software encryption have created backdoors for the NSA to spy on users.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Delusional.
Good luck with that…
BwwaaaaaHaaaaHaaaaHaaaaHaaa!!!! Yea, sure, here’s the keys to the Kingdom! Just lock up when you leave . . . .
Samsung, stop pretending to be Russia.
Why Samsung? Microsoft is in bed with all kinds of governments, including Russian. They gave the source code of Windows to Russia ever since 2003.
I suspect the intelligent Russian populace trusts Apple more than Putin
he’s rootin’-tootin’, jackboot scootin’, shirtless photo-op shootin’, KGB salutin’ BAD VLAD PUTIN!
darn tootin’.
Dammit, made me laugh again. 🙂
the iPhone source code emailed to President Putin this morning from the desk of Tim Cook:
10 PRINT “ESAD VLAD”
20 GOTO10
run.
Yes but what bigger case of industrial espionage could there be than that, no wonder the Russians are suspicious.
Which is why most windows viruses come from Russia.
And I want all of Apple’s money, today please….pfffffttttt…..
Yeah, sure Vladimir. Right after you send us your launch codes.
Yeah like that’s gonna happen.
Nice try, Vlad. Why don’t you go impale yourself.
What a brilliant idea! 😉
Give the Russians N O T H I N G. The same as they give everyone else!
It’s understandable that they feel the need to protect from a growing menace coming from the USA. Like it or not Apple Inc. is a company under the control of Washington and the increased sanctions against Russia means the POTUS will not be stopped by some executives in Cupertino if they need to spy on Russians using Apple products .
They can send an IT expert to Apple to verify the source code. After he issues his verdict, we’ll have to kill him.
Wow. That kind of request takes some serious balls. Why you’re at it, can we also have the schematics and location of your entire nuclear submarine fleet, you know, in case they’re spying on us too.
Anyone remember back to the MacWorld issue in the late 1980s of the “new” Soviet desktop computer? It looked almost exactly like the Mac Plus and the OS mimicked the early Mac. As the implementation wasn’t all that great, it sold extremely poorly even in the Soviet Union. But they did try to build and sell Mac clones. There was absolutely nothing Apple could do about it.
With the Mac being for the most part an atypical way of putting together commodity hardware (even Apple’s great A series chips are based upon ARM reference designs) once the Russian government has the source code to the Mac OS or iOS, what’s to keep them from setting up companies to create their own clones. And, good luck to Apple if it tries to sue such companies in Russia!
Russian government has nothing unique in the mind on the subject of OSes: they are doing open-source Unix-like system, they do not need code neither from Microsoft (already got that), nor from Apple (not likely to get that).
Go pound borsch
you beet me to it.
Ha, ha, ha…
Apple is more powerful than Russia.
Apple should just buy Russia.
Waste of money
Apple’s been going green. Is vodka a green fuel?
no, but what comes out of you the next morning is…kind of a Chernobyl green.
I happen to be sitting right here on the throne with my iPad mini! What a coincidence. Extreme LOL
They didn’t ask MS to give access to their source code as well?
Do they blindingly trust MS?
Doesn’t the Russian Government use windows (good for them)?
Since it was hosted on Windows Server they already had access to it…
How embarrassing to have to admit that your industrial spying efforts have been thwarted by Apple security personnel, policies and practices.
Serious question, is the right wing still in love with Putin?
Both left and right wings are in East Ukraine waiting for recovery…
I would consider punching you for that…I lost a relative
But this being the internet…I’ll put it down to over enthusiasm.
Are the Russians admitting they are incompetent, that they have been unable to reverse engineer and find keys to a back door under the mat? 😉
You want to know what’s REALLY delusional? The fact that Americans threw a fit when Russia invaded Crimea, when America did the EXACT same thing one-hundred years ago…they “annexed” Hawaii without a formal treaty. The hypocrisy here is astounding.
Well, not quite; Crimea has been a part of Ukraine for a little less than 23 years (it was part of Soviet Union before 1991, and part of Russian Empire before that). Before Hawai’i was annexed by the US, it was never a part of the US. At this point, there is not a single Hawai’ian alive who was born in independent Hawai’i (majority of Crimeans were born in the Soviet Union, though, and weren’t exactly thrilled when Ukraine’s independence tore them from their country of birth).
True, but there still wasn’t a formal treaty signed. According to the UN, Hawaii Statehood is not legit, and we are technically a non-governing territory of the United States. This needs to be settled soon.
Bzzzzzzt! This was settled, 55 years ago. In June 1959 the citizens of Hawaii voted 94.3% for statehood as opposed just 5.7% “against. The UN’s Special Committee on Decolonization later removed Hawaii from its list of Non-Self-Governing Territories.
Thank you! Someone that knows facts!
Heir to which throne, the donkey throne?
More importantly, Crimea was always contested territory since it was annexed from Russia to given to Ukraine illegally even under the laws of USSR. This is the reason why even UNO still does not have legal demarcated borders between Ukraine and Russia and why Crima voting to reunite with Russia has nothing to do with 1994′ memorandum, which was not, by the way, ratified even by Ukraine itself.
The problem with Crimea’s annexation was the process, not the result. It probably should be Russian territory (full disclosure my family is Russian), but it should not have been taken at gunpoint. Also Russian should have taken on the portion of the Ukrainian nation debt attributable to Crimea, it should have paid Ukraine for the lost territory, and it should stay the f**k out of eastern Ukraine.
While we may all in principle agree on that (the process), taking land back at gunpoint seems to be the most common way to do this throughout history, so Russia did what all others had done before; the only meaningful difference is that nobody had to die in the process, and Crimea was re-integrated without a bullet fired. Perhaps because the government in Kiev felt they had a weak case defending Crimea anyway…
As for Eastern Ukraine, that’s a whole other discussion.
A reasonable request in light of recent NSA behavior. It would need to be done by a third party agreed to by both sides.
It just won’t happen. The Russians recent annexation of Crimea without firing a single shot demonstrates just how anti-Amurdercan they are.
These Communist bastards just might have what it takes to take on a wannabe terrorist nation.
I’m taking no chances, I’m stocking up on popcorn and extra lawn chairs.
I agree…except for the fact that Russia is anti-Amurderican (I like that) They are just a ruthless empire, and like all empires, will eventually collapse. Just like America…hopefully…
I always enjoyed the story someone told me about the Greco-Roman empire, which involved the conquering of lands, establishing a common language and trade route as well as theological principles then crumbling via corruption and pollution (lead poisoning made a grand contribution to the decline of that Empire).
I see a lot of similarities with the Anglo-American empire and it would not surprise me to see the Russian empire expressing the same properties.
Now however, we are in the process of globalization, and these arguments of who took the land over from who I feel needs to be challenged. We all share the planet and this nationalism, which did serve useful purposes needs to make way for globalism.
I tend to follow it by the genetics of the matter. Certainly there was historically a lot of pure (an in) breeding. It was very common to marry locally within the same genetic stock, rape and pillaging expeditions of course did vary the genetic stock. Now a days we do see people that are 1/4, 1/8, 1/16 variations genetically and to me that bodes well for humanity, one planet, one people kind of idea.
I don’t think we have talked before but let me thank you for your posts on the Hawaiian situation, I’ve been reading a bit about that history thanks to your posts. Yes everyone can make a difference.
Enjoy your day.
Thank you for your kind and insightful words. Ua Mau ke Ea o ka ‘Āina i ka Pono (The life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness).
Go back fifteen hundred years or so, the princes who ruled Ukraine and the princes of the Rus, after whom Russia gets it’s name, were pretty much all Vikings, as were the Normans who invaded England in 1066. If you want to bring genetics in, Europeans are a pretty mongrel crowd.
To be correct, the was no such thing as “Ukraine” even few hundreds years ago, let alone over thousand years ago. Also, the roots of “Rus” is very speculative topic, “Viking” source is unlikely.
Top notch post there, and certainly I alluded to it “It was very common to marry locally within the same genetic stock, rape and pillaging expeditions of course did vary the genetic stock.”
Cross cultural genetic exchanges with the Vikings are certainly spot on, as are the Moors, the Mongolian invasion.
I agree with your assessment of “mongrel” for Europeans (and others). Thing is from my point of view at least, I think it brings genetic diversity and hence genetic stability.
One only needs to do a bit of research to see all sorts of genetic issues when in-breeding is carried out for long periods of time.
Don’t you mean the Moops!
“…sorry, Bubble Boy, the card says moops.”
Moops?
Well between a Moo and a Moose…I don’t know which is worse.
The Slavs and the Vikings are fundamentally different except where they overlapped in Finland and the Baltic States and Swedish expansion down into Central Europe and Poland. Even the Norwegian and Danish Vikings are genetically different whereas the Danes and the Anglo Saxons are genetically inseparable. The Normans weird indeed of Viking stock but the lands in France where they settled were fundamentally Breton and the majority of the so,duets who invaded England were of that stock which is why Southern England genetically has less of the Germanic marker than North England, that marker being the fundamental method to distinguish where and the depth of Norse and Germanic expansion throughout Europe. In general South Europe is more Latin the East more Slav and North west more Germanic with increasingly Celt (though an inaccurate description) on the western fringes . Other mixes can then be added regionally.
One planet, one people now that’s optimistic. Jews and Arabs are originally identical genetically yet that hasn’t helped any. But then a lot of that is because they are seen as Caucasian because of their inter breeding in Europe/US for a thousand years so that has only caused more devision not less in fact. Fact is humankind will always find reasons to hate and fight each other and presently with dwindling resources and over population that will get far worse over the foreseeable future. But I do admire your optimism.
Thank you so much for your touching post spyintheskyuk, a lovely read to muse over before I go to bed.
In my opinion we are definitely at a globalization phase that is causing a lot of growing pain, flirting with Armageddon, as it should be. It is always darkest before the dawn and these are very highly refined technologically sophisticated dark times that lack a spiritual (non-religious) light
It does and will challenge a lot of our beliefs and structures, yet there are events as grotesque as they may be that will bring light and life to humanity’s future for those that survive. Humans have a capacity to adapt and change is unavoidable.
As much as humans has as you correctly say have found reasons to hate and fight they also have the capacity to love and be at peace… no reason needed. The time will come, and yes I am optimistic.
Enjoy your day, thanks again for your insight, greatly appreciated.
Just how is America, or Russia for that matter, an empire?
Go to Wikipedia and look up Russian Empire and American Imperialism.
Russia: One of the largest empires in world history, stretching over three continents, the Russian Empire was surpassed in landmass only by the British and Mongol empires.
American imperialism is the economic, military, and cultural influence of the United States on other countries. Such influence often goes hand in hand with expansion into foreign territories.
The net, it’s there for you to use.
To be fair, Crimea event is even less annexation than West Germany taking over East Germany (there even was no referendum on that).
Yeah terrible expecting to get part of your country back that another country invaded and imposed a puppet regime isn’t it. The Crimea of course was part of earlier Russian Imperialist ambition.
Funny way to phrase things. Nazis invaded USSR, and the latter has pushed them back to the very Berlin. Yes, of course, they have installed friendly authorities, just like USA installed on their part. And socialism had very broad support among people at the time — even in countries like France and Italy, where it was crashed by USA’s occupational administration.
Dear Russia, are you trying to spy on Apple?!
You’re naughty…
Hint: Keep dreaming.
‘Hey, it’s worth a try. If a company is stupid enough to hand over the crown jewels and let us look up its skirt, then let them! Back to the reverse-engineering lab! *sigh*’ – Premier Spyzinskia
This is probably Russia attempting to get back at the U.S. for the economic embargoes we are imposing on them; what better way to to hit American business than by threatening its most prominent companies. Just a thought…
Yes, its a crazy request, but at the same time we can’t absolutely know that spying can’t and isn’t being done on Apple products.
I 99.9% believe that they are not, just have to hope for the best. What else can I do.
Russia wants the source code?!!
If Mac OS X was as easy to hack and compromise as the Windows fanbois claim, Russia would not need the source code.
Apple has stated all to clearly that it does not let any government have access through it’s code through any backdoor or any door if there was such a thing. Russia can stick it in where the sun don’t shine. Apple will not release any code to you for any reason especially with the recent behavior you have been showing. I don’t see this happening at all. And Apple’s business depends on a lot of what there programming which makes there products unique and way better than the rest.