Every WiFi network access point that has ever been in range of an iPhone has its network name (SSID) and GPS location (taken from the iPhone) stored and used by Apple.
Apple introduced a way to opt out in March 2024 - you must append the string "_nomap" to your SSID.
The issues around this were discussed more than a decade ago in the IETF's geopriv working group. @coopdanger was one of the chairs at the time, and the utter insanity of expecting home users to change their SSIDs to get this privacy was well-explored. That Apple is only now adding this fig leaf of a "better than nothing" solution would be hilarious if it weren't so stupid and sad.
@jgoerzen reviewed mail providers and the one I use came up on top, Migadu. The only thing I wondered was that John criticized Fastmail for being in Australia where the state has far reaching powers and Migadu is in Switzerland, where the state also has far-reaching powers, as far as I know.
The lawyer that keeps popping up in these situations is Steiger, and he wrote about Proton Mail and Threema (in German). The short summary is that Swiss companies must cooperate with the state and the state cooperates with foreign powers. Furthermore, Switzerland forces providers to keep logs for long times and to hand them out when required. It’s not trivial and not automatic, but my assumption is that it slow and thorough. There’s nobody fighting for your rights before a trial, after all.
I guess what I want to say is that I use them, I like them, but I very much dislike the Swiss privacy fairy dust that Proton Mail, Threema, Migadu and others imply which doesn’t actually exist. In Germany, at least, politicians vote to force providers to keep logs and the constitutional court kicks it out again. Not so in Switzerland. Network analysis is just a legal request away.
I’m not a lawyer and I barely know a thing, of course, so don’t believe me – but also don’t believe them without investigating and understand the implications. Like, maybe the state doesn’t keep logs but it forces every email provider with more than five customers to keep logs? It’s only marginally better.
@jgoerzen reviewed mail providers and the one I use came up on top, Migadu. The only thing I wondered was that John criticized Fastmail for being in Australia where the state has far reaching powers and Migadu is in Switzerland, where the state also has far-reaching powers, as far as I know.
The lawyer that keeps popping up in these situations is Steiger, and he wrote about Proton Mail and Threema (in German). The short summary is that Swiss companies must cooperate with the state and the state cooperates...
“If Nixon wins again, we’re in real trouble.” He picked up his drink, then saw it was empty and put it down again. “That’s the real issue this time,” he said. “Beating Nixon. It’s hard to even guess how much damage those bastards will do if they get in for another four years.”
I nodded. The argument was familiar. I had even made it myself, here and there, but I was beginning to sense something very depressing about it. How many more of these goddamn elections are we going to have to write off as lame but “regrettably necessary” holding actions? And how many more of these stinking, double-downer sideshows will we have to go through before we can get ourselves straight enough to put together some kind of national election that will give me and the at least 20 million people I tend to agree with a chance to vote for something, instead of always being faced with that old familiar choice between the lesser of two evils?
– Hunter Thompson, Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72
“If Nixon wins again, we’re in real trouble.” He picked up his drink, then saw it was empty and put it down again. “That’s the real issue this time,” he said. “Beating Nixon. It’s hard to even guess how much damage those bastards will do if they get in for another four years.”
I nodded. The argument was familiar. I had even made it myself, here and there, but I was beginning to sense something very depressing about it. How many more of these goddamn elections are we going to have to write off as...
« Posting this on behalf of a member who would like to remain anonymous:
I'm an art director and supervisor for a large studio. The studio heads had the bright idea before I started to hire prompters. Several bros were brought onto the film project. I absolutely hated myself for not quitting on the spot but stuck with it because it's mercenary out there. Have a family to feed etc. I decided to use this time wisely. Treat them as I would any artist I had hired. First round of pictures of a sweeping Ariel forest landscape comes through and it's not bad. They submit a ton of work and one or two of the 40 are ok. Nearly on brief. So first round feedback goes through and I tell them about the perspective mistakes, colour changes I want, layers that any matte painting would be split into. Within a day I get 5 variants. Not changes to the ones I wanted but variations.
Again. Benefit of the doubt I give them another round of feedback making it clear. Next day it's worse. I sit there and patiently paint over, even explaining the steps I would take as a painter. They don't do it, anomalies start appearing when I say I want to keep the exact image but with changes. They can't. They simply don't have the eye to see the basic mistakes so the Ai starts to over compensate. We get people starting to appear in the images. These are obviously holiday snaps.
"Remove the people"
"What would you like them changed to?"
"... grass. I just don't want them there"
They can't do it. The one that can actually use photoshop hasn't developed the eye to see his mistakes, ends up getting angry at me for not understanding he can't make specific changes. The girl whose background was a little photography has given me 40 progressively worse images with wilder mistakes every time. This is 4 days into the project.
I'm both pissed about the waste, but elated seeing ai fall at the first hurdle. It's not even that the images are unusable, the people making them have no eye for what's wrong, no thicker skin for constructive criticism and feedback, no basic artistic training in perspective and functionality in what they're making.
Yes the hype is going to pump more money into this. They won't go anywhere for a while.
But this has been such a glowing perfect moment of watching the fundamental part fail in the face of the most simple tasks. All were fired and the company no longer accepts Ai prompters as applicants. Your training as an artist will always be the most important part of this process and it is invaluable. I hope this post gives you a boost in a dark time. » – from a Facebook group called Artists Against Generative Al, via Danielle Sanfilippo, @scottfgray, @Hyades51@dice.camp.
« Posting this on behalf of a member who would like to remain anonymous:
I'm an art director and supervisor for a large studio. The studio heads had the bright idea before I started to hire prompters. Several bros were brought onto the film project. I absolutely hated myself for not quitting on the spot but stuck with it because it's mercenary out there. Have a family to feed etc. I decided to use this time wisely. Treat them as I would any artist I had hired. First round of pictures of a sweeping...
Gregory's Server
@BradRubenstein That's not what @briankrebs is reporting. He says it's the BSSID. Which is worse, because you can't change it as easily as the SSID.
@BradRubenstein @briankrebs Evil Genius
https://www.zdnet.com/article/wired-apple-is-evilgenius/
@BradRubenstein @briankrebs
The issues around this were discussed more than a decade ago in the IETF's geopriv working group. @coopdanger was one of the chairs at the time, and the utter insanity of expecting home users to change their SSIDs to get this privacy was well-explored. That Apple is only now adding this fig leaf of a "better than nothing" solution would be hilarious if it weren't so stupid and sad.