24 Sep Apple no longer be able to intervene if justice asks data unlock iOS Devices 8
The release of the final version of iOS 8 marked the start of major changes to Apple’s mobile platform. And not just in the area of issues such as convergence with OS X or opening their APIs, but in the area of privacy and security.
In fact, these changes may be more relevant for many users: to date Apple could be forced to give data users (or help unlock and decrypt) if it received a court order but on iOS in August that changes radically. Apple literally washes his hands, and that only the owner of the device and its use of passwords and lock codes will be able to provide that information. The Cupertino company could decipher that information before judicial requests, but iOS 8 no longer be able to do so.
Unlike our competitors, Apple can not override password and therefore can not access this data. So it is not technically possible for us to respond to government requests for data extract these devices in their possession and are based on iOS in August.
The move was announced by the publication of a new privacy policy linked to iOS operating system 8, and turns that key that uses if the user is using, that depends only on him the only way to achieve decrypt protected content on the device.
To date only the mail application Mail was protected in this way, but in August that iOS based protection owner password affects Messages, Mail, Calendar, Contacts and Images of the device, making it clear that Apple has clearly expanded the spectrum of data that is encrypted with this mechanism.
Unlike Apple, what will Google?
Yesterday Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO, published an open letter in which specifically highlighted the importance of user privacy is to Apple. That letter was a particularly interesting paragraph:
Our business model is quite simple: sell great products. We do not build a profile based on the content of your emails or your web browsing habits to sell to advertisers. No ‘monetize’ the information stored in your iPhone or iCloud. And do not read your emails and your messages to gain information and then deliver it through you. Our software and services are designed to make our devices better. Plain and simple.
Cook’s message is clear, yet without naming its competitor, clearly speaks of Google, who just profitability based on contextual advertising. Without our data that advertising makes little sense, and its business model, one that is now a little more entredicho- is now compromised by Apple reinforces that independence and that reinforcement of privacy.
Of course, Apple can do: controls the hardware and the software, but your business has never been to monetize the information could be collected. Or at least not entirely, because there is also a certain hypocrisy in the words of Cook. An example is Genius, iTunes feature that allows us to obtain music recommendations based on our tastes, and which enable us to discover new artists and new songs … and then purchase at the Apple Store. Inevitably also discuss the security issue that recently hit iCloud, and that these measures Apple tries to forget.
However and with that, it is clear that Apple’s business model is very different from Google, which now faces a reality. The yielding of the privacy control to users on Android imposing measures similar to those imposed on Apple iOS 8 The problem is that Google’s platform is strongly linked to the cloud, and probably much more complicated for Google completely cede that control and the guarantee of privacy and security for users.