this post was submitted on 04 Mar 2025
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Providing something that is broken is very different from not providing it at all.
Right but...they did provide it. And now they're not. You wouldn't call removing that encryption "breaking"?
No, because if you know its not encrypted you behave differently than when you think it is.
What does your behavior have to do with whether or not the encryption is broken?
Social media doesn't do nuance.
No encryption was broken.
Broken would imply that Apple has the ability to decrypt stored user data using advanced data protection. This is not the case.
Selling you a box to put your stuff in and selling someone else a locked box to put their stuff in doesn't mean Apple broke into your box. It means your big brother won't let you have locks.
...is that not what they're doing?
No.
They disabled the ability for new users to use ADP.
If you use ADP, only you have the encryption keys. The UK wants Apple to keep a copy of the decryption keys.
There is nothing that can be done to data that is already protected by ADP. At worst Apple can delete it, or turn over encrypted data but there is nothing that is likely to exist in the next 100 years that can break the encryption (even hypothetical quantum computers).
As an interesting side note, if you use Windows and use Bitlocker to encrypt your hard drives while logged into a Microsoft account then Microsoft backs up your recovery key "for your convenience". They've produced these recovery keys for subpoenas.
That is what the UK wants Apple to do.
So existing users can continue using ADP?
Yes, for the moment.
It'll eventually be completely removed, but they seem to have some time to be in compliance and so they'll give their customers time to move before it's all deleted.
Lemmy is not encrypted, my comments are public, your comments are public, we both know that. Anyone with a raspberry pi or an old netbook can scrape them.
If I use an encrypted service and all of a sudden everything that I thought was encrypted was decrypted by the service provider without my consent? That's breaking encryption.
If on the other hand I use an encrypted service and they tell me that they can no longer offer the service, my data will be destroyed after X days, and I need to find another way of storing my encrypted data because of privacy invading government policies? That is not breaking encryption.
Oh that makes much more sense.
No.
Users that do not decrypt their storage lose their storage permanently.
Users that decrypt their storage get to continue to use it, but it isn't not encrypted.
No encryption is broken.
Users are swapping convenience for privacy. (Or privacy for convenience? Whichever way that is).
Broken implies it is unusable or useless. As in "Apples encryption is unusable".
This is not the case. It's not broken. Users are given the option to remove the encryption to be able to continue to use the storage.
Essentially: https://xkcd.com/538/
I always see that one and think "goddamn they'd kill me because I'd never remember the password after the drugs hit, and the more they hit me the less I'll be able to focus and remember"
Not as it is conventionally used.
If you break a lock, that’s different from unlocking it and removing it.
That's not what breaking means...
i think @[email protected] is saying break encryption has a meaning and the journalist does not understand that meaning