2d ago

Cornered by the UK’s Demand for an Encryption Backdoor, Apple Turns Off Its Strongest Security Setting.

www.eff.org Cornered by the UK’s Demand for an Encryption Backdoor, Apple Turns Off Its Strongest Security Setting

Today, in response to the U.K.’s demands for a backdoor, Apple has stopped offering users in the U.K. Advanced Data Protection, an optional feature in iCloud that turns on end-to-end encryption for files, backups, and more. Had Apple complied with the U.K.’s original demands, they would have been...

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2d ago

Cornered by the UK’s Demand for an Encryption Backdoor, Apple Turns Off Its Strongest Security Setting.

www.eff.org /deeplinks/2025/02/cornered-uks-demand-encryption-backdoor-apple-turns-its-strongest-security-setting

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Troubling precedent, but I expect no one used this anyways. Anybody who needs this would be smart enough to know not to trust so proprietary a device and service.
Given how ~~readily Apple has rolled over for law enforcement in the past~~ loudly Apple has opposed working with law enforcement in the past, only for devices to be magically unlocked anyways, this is (probably) just security theater.
- Yeah, it's 3rd party vendors like greykey and cellibrite that allow LEO to get around apples security.
  To its credit, apple does a fairly decent job of staying ahead of the unlocking tech, but some older hardware and os are easily cracked.
  https://cybersecuritynews.com/phones-cellebrite-tool-can-unlock/
  
  Is this Hardware or software dependent when it comes to Android? Do you know? Curious about whether moving to graphene would even matter.
  Edit: Found the following discussion. https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/14344-cellebrite-premium-july-2024-documentation
- Do you have citations for “Apple has rolled over for law enforcement in the past”? I’m wondering if this is country-specific.
  Fortunately you can still back up your devices locally, and store your photos locally, and these backups can be encrypted.
  
  I don't know about other countries, but Apple itself reports that it provided access to customer accounts at the US government's request 90% of the time
  https://www.apple.com/legal/transparency/us.html
  @drop_and_run@sh.itjust.works
  
  With a warrant. Fortunately end to end encryption is still available in the US (for now).
  
  Apple-FBI encryption dispute
  My recollection was erroneous, as I can't (easily) find evidence of them rolling over. But the devices in question still got unlocked, so in the end it didn't matter whether Apple (openly or surreptitiously) cooperated.

8 comments