www.theregister.com/2021/08/05/apple_csam_scanning/
As the article states, this has mission creep written all over it.
Scan indecent images now. Scan political dissent in a few years time!
I remember Tony Blair (wish I could find the quote on line) saying the Terrorism Act would only apply to a few people each year. Right. For a while anyone with an SLR in London was stopped and searched and many photographers still are under the act.
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Potential mild irritation for me for 20 years versus even one child saved?
I'll take that deal.
>>Scan indecent images now. Scan political dissent in a few years time!
>>For a while anyone with an SLR in London was stopped and searched
Zippy, you're exaggerating again.
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A somewhat long but nonetheless relevant blog from the same expert which hasn't been cherry picked or tabloid-ed.
blog.cryptographyengineering.com/
Last edited by: No FM2R on Sat 7 Aug 21 at 00:12
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>.. from the same expert which hasn't been cherry picked or tabloid-ed.
The article you reference merely reinforces Zippy's argument. That the technology to detect and trace the communication of (any form of) data exists but what we do not have is any method of preventing the abuse of that technology.
Using "child abuse" as justification is simply cow dung, used along with "terrorism", to sell it to the unthinking.
Ask yourself who is likely to fall foul of Apple's little feature because it certainly won't be the child pornographers or terrorists who will simply switch to more secure communications or storage.
BTW. Why do you have a VPN client installed? Are you hiding something?
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>>. Why do you have a VPN client installed? Are you hiding something?
Yes.
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>>The article you reference merely reinforces Zippy's argument.
Since Zippy's point is that it *IS ONLY* about State control and their increase of mass surveillance with the intent to control your life, and NOT about child molesting then I'm not sure how you make that connection.
The new technology is fraught with difficulty is not in dispute, is it? And the article I linked to discussed that without the tabloid sensationalism.
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>Since Zippy's point is that it *IS ONLY* about State control and their increase of mass
>surveillance with the intent to control your life, and NOT about child molesting then I'm not
>sure how you make that connection.
I'm not sure what you're getting at. You linked to that article implying that Zippy's link to The Register was "..cherry picked or tabloid-ed".
In fact that article is about the Indian Govt.'s demand for message tracing but it acknowledges that the underlying technology is, as Zippy notes with his mention of "mission creep", wide open to abuse. The author even notes in bold text and a much bigger font:
"One last note to academic authors: don’t help bad people build unrestricted surveillance systems and then punt “preventing abuse” to later papers, ok?"
He ends by saying:
"When I read a paper that builds a sophisticated surveillance system, I expect it to address those abuse problems in a meaningful way. If the paper punts the important problems to subsequent work — if what I get is a paragraph like the one at right — my thinking is that you aren’t solving the right problem. You’re just laying the engineering groundwork for a world I don’t want my kids to live in. I would politely ask you all to stop doing that.
Or are we just discussing the semantics of Zippy's post?
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Let us consider some facts, and safe assumptions to kick the "inevitable state intrusion" and "this is driven by the state" scare stories into the long grass where they belong.
Apple has, because of the security of their phones, been under intense state pressure to open them up to law enforcement and security services because access is difficult, near impossible by them.
Apple may have considered, with a high chance of success, that same state agencies may play the "kiddy porn card" to justify to the public and legislatures why they, Apple, should hand over keys to the software and hardware. Might they, Apple, have announced this to a: blunt the kiddy porn argument, b: galvanise public opinion against state snooping and intrusion on apple devices ?
One also has to assume that this scanning/algorithm is not proprietary secret technology only available to Apple. (its not)
One also has to assume that Apple is not in fact an agent of the state but a commercial operation merely seeking to maintain sales and revenue by appealing to public approval and user to whom security is paramount.
One also has to assume that the state would not be so foolish as to publicly drive child porn channels further underground with advance publicity of surveillance and detection methods.
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>> Ask yourself who is likely to fall foul of Apple's little feature because it certainly
>> won't be the child pornographers or terrorists who will simply switch to more secure communications
>> or storage.
"Apples little features" have been determining what you can do and what you cant do with your fondleslab for as long as the tag 3g appeared on the end of it. Apple have been the defacto legal masters of thier own domain for a large number of years.
Why anyone would want one of their phones is quite beyond me,
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>>Potential mild irritation for me for 20 years versus even one child saved?
>>
>>I'll take that deal.
Come to that you can look at every photo I ever have always, if it will protect one child.
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>> >>Potential mild irritation for me for 20 years versus even one child saved?
>> >>
>> >>I'll take that deal.
>>
>> Come to that you can look at every photo I ever have always, if it
>> will protect one child.
>>
That's not the point though is it. What happens if they have a law saying they want a camera in your bedroom because, well, you might be doing something illegal to a child there. You have nothing to fear.
What happens if you get a knock at 3am and dragged to the police station by an ever so polite cop with his gun drawn because one of your holiday snaps matches an algorithm (and what AI system is 100% perfect) and is flagged as a false positive.
There are people in this country who have been arrested because an Internet provider said an IP was theirs - with all the stigma that involves - only for the cops to find out the data was misinterpreted.
It always starts with the extremes - what, you don't like this technology, then you must like child porn. Just like the surveillance and anti terrorism laws that impacted liberties - oh you don't support the Patriots Act, do you support terrorists or flying planes in to buildings. Don't support the Anti Terrorism act, what, do you want more tube bombings.
What happens if you download a newspaper article criticising the Govt. and they start targeting dissenters and you get arrested for having that document on your phone.
Or there is a crime at the local park and an algorithm matches a photo you took to that park and you get arrested.
The mere fact that you were arrested, even if you are totally innocent will impact you for the rest of your life. Travel visas are more difficult to obtain. Every time you get checked at a traffic stop it will show when the police check your name etc.
Basically this isn't about protecting children. If it were, I would have no issue. It's about increasing mass surveillance and as usual using an emotive subject will ensure it gets approved (I can see the Home Secretary salivating over the idea now) and in a few years time the goal posts will have moved so wide that you could get the Amoco Cadiz through them.
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>>That's not the point though is it. What happens if they have a law saying they want a camera in your bedroom because, well, you might be doing something illegal to a child there.
Oh do calm down.
You are totally over-reacting. A combination of paranoia, a persecution complex and some kind of conspiracy worry will eventually drive you nuts.
For someone who seems smart and sensible about most things, you really do seem to have a problem with this type of stuff; typically that which involves the law and, God forbid, the police.
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This is really about the capacity of the authorities to monitor the activities of its citizens.
Embellishing the issue with the emotive does not take the debate forward - children, terrorism, major crime, drugs, systematic fraud etc.
Ultimately it comes down to whether the government is trusted to use the intelligence gathered for the purposes intended (about which we may all agree) or widens the scope which infringes personal liberties or freedoms.
There is a simple choice - accept that unacceptable and criminal activity can flourish under a cloak of anonymity or allow monitoring and traceability.
I would anyway question whether the goals are achievable. If communication transparency was legislated, those so inclined would simply redouble their efforts to evade detaction.
As an aside, any of us can buy an internet device using cash (not a traceable card), and set it up with completely fake ID and free email accounts. The only risk is actually being caught in possession of the device - perhaps enhance police stop and search powers?
It is also worth reflecting on how conspiracies were traced pre the internet age. People talked to each other, made phone calls, sometimes sent letters, etc.
Police, unless they knew which phones to tap, where to place listening devices, cultivated informants etc had no ability to trace a source or conspiracy. In many way it is only the technology that has changed - not much else!
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>> I remember Tony Blair (wish I could find the quote on line) saying the Terrorism
>> Act would only apply to a few people each year. Right. For a while anyone
>> with an SLR in London was stopped and searched
No they were not.
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>> www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/dec/08/police-search-photographer-terrorism-powers
>>
>> and these are just the recorded ones.
There was a thread in these sort of reports where people were challenged by private security guards. When the photographer refused to engage with guards trying to tell them photography was prohibited the police were called.
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>> >>
>> >> No they were not.
>> >>
>>
>> www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/dec/08/police-search-photographer-terrorism-powers
>>
>> and these are just the recorded ones.
They were not anyone and everyone as you seem to be claiming. I for one have recorded several thousand videos in and around london over the last 12 years, I have been challenged by private security staff, and police called ALL OF WHOM affirmed my right to do so.
Last edited by: Zero on Sat 7 Aug 21 at 11:36
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>> www.theregister.com/2021/08/05/apple_csam_scanning/
>>
>> As the article states, this has mission creep written all over it.
>>
>> Scan indecent images now. Scan political dissent in a few years time!
Problem is of course Zippy, is that this only applies to those images uploaded to Icloud, and it is, and has been for some time, an offence to distribute kiddy porn. Uploading to icloud is distributing.
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Not being an Apple user - I presume the iCloud is a shareable cloud but also usable for personal storage, and does things similarly to Google (i.e. automatically backs up your pics unless you tell it not to)?
Made me think back to the old days when you took your film to the chemist to get developed and printed - I guess they'd have reported anything illegal.
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The article states:
The neural network-based tool will scan individual users' iDevices for child sexual abuse material (CSAM), ..
So it's supposedly scanning the whole device, not just data uploaded Apple servers.
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But it needs an icloud account to have scanning access to the phone.
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> But it needs an icloud account to have scanning access to the phone.
It doesn't. The scan is done on the users device by a function of the operating system and utilities.
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>> Problem is of course Zippy, is that this only applies to those images uploaded to
>> Icloud, and it is, and has been for some time, an offence to distribute kiddy
>> porn. Uploading to icloud is distributing.
>>
It's not about kiddy porn and people who views / distribute etc should be locked up for a very long time. This is not the argument.
They are using an emotive offence to introduce surveillance technology that may believe will undoubtedly lead to mission creep and many innocent photos will be flagged and people arrested, even after human review, because we can trust humans to make the right decision all the time.
Last edited by: zippy on Sat 7 Aug 21 at 11:27
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>> They are using an emotive offence
Its emotive because its a particularly disturbing offence that needs to be eradicated. And you, sir, are one of those advocating such stuff should be allowed to carry on merely to massage your personal persecution complex.
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>>
>> >> They are using an emotive offence
>>
>> Its emotive because its a particularly disturbing offence that needs to be eradicated. And you,
>> sir, are one of those advocating such stuff should be allowed to carry on merely
>> to massage your personal persecution complex.
>>
By definition, every offence needs to be eradicated, surely? But we don't advocate wholesale strip searches after every to the shops in case you have shoplifted anything. Or video and audio recording devices attached to everyone to monitor for any other offence that you may commit, for the sake off what ever is the cause celebre at the time.
What I am saying is that this method of data capture - every photo taken on every iPhone connected to the iCloud in the US (and no doubt the rest of the world later) will be examined is overreach and given that they will prove it works, you can be sure that it will be extended to capturing all data available from devices. Imagine taking a photo of the opposition leader in the street in Belarus and being visited by the police and being asked what your political alliances are and what you were doing somewhere?
Or even more innocently, you're at a party and take some snaps which happen to include someone the police are investigating. Suddenly you are added to the list of suspect because, well you have been connected with them as your phone has captured their image.
Last edited by: zippy on Sat 7 Aug 21 at 11:54
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"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" Benjamin Franklin.
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>> "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither
>> Liberty nor Safety" Benjamin Franklin.
The right to keep indecent images of children is not a Liberty that Ole ben would have endorsed. He would have shot you as per the rights of the Second Amendment
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>> By definition, every offence needs to be eradicated, surely? But we don't advocate wholesale strip
>> searches after every to the shops in case you have shoplifted anything. Or video and
>> audio recording devices attached to everyone to monitor for any other offence that you may
>> commit, for the sake off what ever is the cause celebre at the time.
They are not abhorent.
>> What I am saying is that this method of data capture - every photo taken
>> on every iPhone connected to the iCloud in the US (and no doubt the rest
>> of the world later) will be examined is overreach and given that they will prove
>> it works, you can be sure that it will be extended to capturing all data
>> available from devices. Imagine taking a photo of the opposition leader in the street in
>> Belarus and being visited by the police and being asked what your political alliances are
>> and what you were doing somewhere?
I have no intention of going to Belarus, do not know what the opposition leader looks like, more to the point neither do you, and the technology is not available to Belarus because its on the US technology export forbidden list.
Talking of images, do you cover your number plate less you be captured by NPR or speed cameras? becuase you should thats a cat thats been let out the bag a long time ago.
Last edited by: smokie on Sun 8 Aug 21 at 10:26
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I've undertaken a bit of a clean-up of this thread which has resulted in the loss of a number of posts. Sorry if yours was one of them. They were mostly discussing the situation which led to the clean-up, which was unpleasant and uncalled-for content directed at the OP, and therefore they have no relevance now that the comment has been removed.
Please be civil to each other even if you aren't in agreement with the viewpoint of others.
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There are plenty of examples of mission creep where laws etc 'sold' as being anti terrorist or whatever have in the event been used for different purposes. Extradition to the US was oner example. With exception of Abdu Hamza it's been used against alleged financial crime and people who've embarrassed the US Security Services.
The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act is another oft quoted example:
www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/08/revealed-anti-terror-snooping-law-used-for-fly-tippers-and-parking
I'm unconvinced by that case myself. The wording of the Act suggests it's intention was to to what it said and ensure that where surveillance was used it was properly regulated and authorised. I don't see usage against fly tippers, dog owners who don't pick up or people who steal other kid's school places as a bad or egregious thing.
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Wont someone think of the children - No FM2R
