Precisely. As humans, we use our senses to discover what is true and to what degree. When online, there's always a reality distortion machine running; the question is how much distortion is taking place
You're right, it's a shallow take in response to a straw man of my position. Clearly content moderation is a HARD problem and the decision-makers at Facebook know this better than almost anyone. They made a decision that presumably was in their best interest, of which I happen to support.
I consume on social platforms, rather than creating. I was growingly aware of the platform's bias on the content I saw and opted out for reality (as close as one can get to it, anyway). The changes this week are a step in the right direction as other viewpoints are more possible, let alone tolerated.
Funny, I just signed up for a Facebook account this week after the news,having deleted mine in 2017. In my opinion, they are taking a step in the right direction. Clearly others disagree, which is their right. What isn't someone's right is to dictate truth, which is what Facebook will ostensibly do less of. Bravo
Fair enough, but some of the protections in Lockdown Mode seem straightforward enough that I'm not sure why they aren't enabled by default. A couple of examples:
1. Device connections - To connect your iPhone or iPad to an accessory or another computer, the device needs to be unlocked.
2. Configuration profiles - Configuration profiles can’t be installed, and the device can’t be enrolled in Mobile Device Management or device supervision while in Lockdown Mode.
I'd suggest turning it on and seeing if you can live with it. Some issues that I've had:
1.) FaceTime calls from people not in your recent calls will be blocked with a silent notification. Sometimes I don't see it for hours
2.) Incoming iMessages will be stripped of Live Photos and document attachments
3.) Using Starbucks in a browser did not work until I disabled Lockdown Mode in Safari for the domain. Fortunately these exceptions are easy to make and persist
I'm not a target for state-sponsored attacks but will generally trade usability for security when reasonable.
> In one encouraging sign, some of the most recent attacks failed against users who had activated Apple’s recently introduced Lockdown Mode, which stops some communications from unknown callers and reduces the number of programs that are automatically invoked.
I'm a huge fan of the idea of Lockdown Mode and have it enabled on my iPhone and MacBook, but I don't think it has mass adoption or appeal. It certainly needs some tuning before the masses will adopt it. Specifically, people in your Contacts should have the option to be trusted. Right now, FaceTime calls are blocked from them if they are not in your recent calls (an issue for me as I regularly purge my call history) and iMessage content is blocked (Live Photos, documents, etc).
This is true in general, but not in Apple's CSAM detections that have been abandoned. They were only scanning for images that matched a know hash of CSAM. This did nothing to prevent new CSAM from being created, only possession of existing material.
I've been a PIA customer several years and have been concerned about them since their acquisition by Kape in 2019. This audit is good news for them and does make me more inclined to stick around when my subscription expires. All consumer VPNs rely on user trust and open-source VPN apps, audited no-log policy, RAM-only VPN servers, and court-tested results are about as good as it can get.
One can upload a file to their Dropbox via a cURL post, provided they have created an app and have an access token, which just takes a few minutes to set up.
For the Twitch issue, it's likely that Twitch stored a secret in your Keychain that persists. If you have a Mac, you can enable iCloud Keychain on your devices to sync and explore the contents. Search for Twitch and delete the entry(ies).
Still waiting for Apple to provide end-to-end encryption on iCloud Backup for devices. Their documentation on this has always seemed intentionally vague.
End-to-end encrypted data ->
- Apple Card transactions (requires iOS 12.4 or later)
- Home data
- Health data (requires iOS 12 or later)
- iCloud Keychain (includes all of your saved accounts and passwords)
- Maps Favorites, Collections and search history (requires iOS 13 or later)
- Memoji (requires iOS 12.1 or later)
- Payment information
- QuickType Keyboard learned vocabulary (requires iOS 11 or later)
- Safari History and iCloud Tabs (requires iOS 13 or later)
- Screen Time
- Siri information
- Wi-Fi passwords
- W1 and H1 Bluetooth keys (requires iOS 13 or later)
Most people won't purchase and use a Yubikey either though. Really just depends on your threat model, if remote attacks or local attacks are of higher risk. An obvious improvement would be the use of both a password and physical security token.
“Tax” is a great model on which to view the situation! I also think of these leadership positions, critical race theory / anti-racism / unconscious bias trainings, and diversity initiatives as a sort of insurance policy against social media-driven outrage. A large organization pays the "premium" to prevent a possible large loss of brand reputation.
As you stated, this functions to benefit the large organizations that can afford the premiums while smaller organizations will go unprotected and pay the costs of the outrage that will be deflected their way.