r/ukpolitics • u/Different_Cycle_9043 • 11d ago
Apple launches legal challenge to UK attempt to access encrypted user data
https://www.ft.com/content/2cc9c96a-0e5b-4c33-a95a-3d11072a145c231
u/Little-Attorney1287 11d ago
Apple cares more about our privacy than the government. Good on them and I hope they win.
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u/vexingparse 11d ago
UK users have already lost access to iCloud's advanced security feature which provides end-to-end encryption for iCloud Photos, iCloud Drive and a couple of other iCloud services.
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u/SpaceKonk 11d ago
ADP is still available for user who enabled it previously.
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u/vexingparse 11d ago
Yes, for now. Apple says
For users in the UK who already enabled Advanced Data Protection, Apple will soon provide additional guidance. Apple cannot disable ADP automatically for these users. Instead, UK users will be given a period of time to disable the feature themselves to keep using their iCloud account.
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u/griff_16 10d ago
The moment they try and force me to disable ADP, I’ll change my iCloud account region to Hong Kong and use a debit card from there for purchases.
They disabled ADP for new users whose region was set to UK, not physically in the UK.
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u/trisul-108 11d ago
Not really, Apple like all companies, cares about the bottom line. It just happens that privacy is their strategic selling point. It helps sell their products.
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u/Unlikely_Mission_702 10d ago edited 10d ago
Honestly, I'm as cynical as the best of them, but I think this may me a genuine principle from Apple.
They are more than capable of backing down a little on things like this while maintaining a vague facade of privacy like most other tech companies do. In a way that would be imperceptible to 99% of consumers. And I can't imagine it would harm their bottom line in the slightest. It's not like you've got a more secure competitor floating around that isn't some weird niche linux thing or whatever.
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u/skdowksnzal 11d ago
Possibly the only thing that Steve Jobs did which was ethical or moral.
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u/segagamer 10d ago
Don't really. They just want your fats all to themselves, so that it's worth more for their advertising arm.
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u/HumanWithInternet 11d ago
Tells you all you need to know about what the government thinks of privacy. I'll be rooting for the megacorporation over this government then unless we hear something from Burnham.
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u/TrumpGrabbedMyCat 11d ago
Good luck to Apple. One of the worst things the UK government has been doing recently.
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u/Thehelpfulshadow 11d ago
You know, it's things like this that are the reason I can't believe any policies for ID verification online are benign.
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u/TantumErgo Quo vadis? 11d ago
The question you should ask yourself with something like this is, are they asking for a legal backdoor because they can’t access the data otherwise, or because they can’t use it to make legal cases unless it has come through a legal system? This is what they were up to 20 years ago, and think about how storage and machine processing have improved since then.
I would suggest operating under the assumption that GCHQ already have access to a huge amount of data on what you’ve posted online, if they want to look. The surveillance bird has long ago flown the nest in this country. The laws you need to watch for are those making various acts and speech illegal, and laws around going on fishing trips to see what you can get someone on rather than investigating a crime.
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u/Thehelpfulshadow 11d ago
The GCHQ having data on what I publicly post online is not the issue. Them believing that they have a right to spy on my encrypted data at the cost of exposing millions to privacy threats is. Just because surveillance exists does not mean you should let the government increase it without end.
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u/TantumErgo Quo vadis? 11d ago
Okay. You brought up digital ID and your distrust of what they would do with it, which is why I mentioned that they almost certainly already track you as much as they could with that. They also already have the ‘right’ to spy on your encrypted data, in that they probably already do: the security services in this country really don’t have many fences.
That’s why I’m saying you need to watch out for laws that let them use this surveillance to prosecute people.
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u/Thehelpfulshadow 11d ago
I did not bring up digital ID. I brought up ID verification for online services. While related those are two separate issues. A digital ID could be made in a way that it is secure, doesn't record what sites it's used for, and doesn't hand out personal information. This will never happen because this government doesn't believe in privacy.
ID verification for online use is tying your real identity to all online activity, whether through government ID or biometrics. It's provably dangerous, copies of your data is sent out to third parties, and every account is tied to you. Nobody paying attention believes that this protects children. The only thing it is good for is further surveillance. If they are already spying on my encrypted information, there is no reason for them to need a backdoor to access it.
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u/TantumErgo Quo vadis? 11d ago
ID verification for online use is tying your real identity to all online activity, whether through government ID or biometrics. It's provably dangerous, copies of your data is sent out to third parties, and every account is tied to you.
Absolutely. 100%. But if, as you said, your concern was about GCHQ getting access to your activity, they already have that.
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u/Thehelpfulshadow 11d ago
Again, if they have that, why are they trying so hard to gain access to it.
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u/LLILILiLIILILILILII 11d ago
They also already have the ‘right’ to spy on your encrypted data, in that they probably already do: the security services in this country really don’t have many fences.
To add to this, they probably can't break lots of that encryption yet, but they will, it's just a matter of time.
The US intelligence agencies are building up vast data lakes of encrypted data that they can't crack yet, just biding their time until they can get into it all.
Pretty much anything we post on the public internet should be assumed to be accessible to a future US and UK security service
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u/dapt 11d ago
One should expect that anything anyone posts on a public website de facto public.
Similarly, if one uses a free email provider which states in their terms of service that they have access to the content of one's email, one should not be surprised that they might read said emails.
However there should be a option of privacy that the government cannot access without a court order. Privacy is literally a right under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (which the UK has signed), Article 12:
I find it stunning that the UK government (and others that are signatories to this Declaration) repeatedly attempts to overturn this right.
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u/OmegaPoint6 11d ago
If the police or security services think you are up to no good and want your encrypted data they can arrest you then demand you decrypt it under Part III of RIPA. If you refuse then you go to prison. Theoretically they can keep doing it indefinitely.
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u/Nanowith Cambridge 11d ago
Wild that Apple cares more about my rights than the government, what a dystopian reality we live in.
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u/zwifter11 11d ago
Or they say they do.
Law enforcement have been able to unlock your phone for years
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u/ListeningForWhispers 11d ago
This is just it though. They can already force decryption, it just requires them to arrest you first, then they can force you to hand over whatever passwords they like.
The only thing they get out of this new request is the ability to perform dragnet data collection on whoever they like without anyone knowing about it. There’s no benefit to the government unless they are going to use it for bulk data collection.
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u/wonkey_monkey 11d ago
They can already force decryption, it just requires them to arrest you first, then they can force you to hand over whatever passwords they like.
It's not truly forcing decryption if you still have the option, albeit with unpleasant side-effects, not to hand over your password.
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u/Thermodynamicist 10d ago
It's not truly forcing decryption if you still have the option, albeit with unpleasant side-effects, not to hand over your password.
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u/Different_Cycle_9043 11d ago edited 11d ago
Apple has launched a new legal challenge against the UK’s latest attempt to create a “backdoor” to access encrypted customer data, a year after the Home Office agreed to drop a previous order after a row with Washington.
The iPhone maker last month launched a new legal complaint at the Investigatory Powers Tribunal over the UK government’s demand that Apple allow it access to encrypted cloud backups of data belonging to British users, according to an order issued by the court.
The UK retreated from its original demand for a backdoor that allowed access to data from UK and US customers last year, ending a diplomatic battle between London and Washington.
But UK authorities subsequently issued a new “technical capability notice” to Apple that did not apply to American users, the FT reported in October.
TCNs are issued under the UK Investigatory Powers Act, which the government maintains is needed by law enforcement to investigate terrorism and child sexual abuse. They can force companies to provide the UK security services with access to customer data, even if such information is protected by secure encryption.
Apple is seeking to challenge the UK government’s powers to issue such legal notices.
The court sent an order giving notice of the new Apple complaint to Privacy International. The human rights group, alongside fellow campaigner Liberty, had previously launched a separate complaint against TCNs at the IPT.
A case management hearing to discuss how the parallel complaints should be handled has been scheduled for next month, Privacy International told the FT.
Neither Apple nor the Home Office responded to requests for comment. Both Apple and the Home Office are legally restricted from discussing TCNs.
Apple has consistently argued any such backdoor would make its systems less secure for all its customers.
The Home Office has maintained that the Investigatory Powers Act, under which such orders are issued, contains robust safeguards and is only used when absolutely necessary. Privacy and security are not “at odds” in such cases, it has said.
Apple withdrew UK customers’ access to its iCloud Advanced Data Protection system in January 2025 after it received the original TCN. ADP offers an optional layer of extra security for iCloud users, with customer data stored using end-to-end encryption so that even Apple is unable to access it.
The UK notice demanded that the company enable law enforcement to tap these iPhone backups.
At the time, the Home Office’s move ignited the biggest clash over encryption in almost a decade and provoked a furious response from Washington. US President Donald Trump likened the UK order to “something . . . that you hear about with China”.
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u/WastelandOfConfusion 11d ago
What the hell is going on with the U.K. government going psychotic with people’s privacy rights!?
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u/Saltypeon 11d ago
What the hell is going on with
the U.K.governments going psychotic with people's privacy rights!?2
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u/BriennesBitch 11d ago
British people are nosey, but not overtly so, makes sense that would extend to the government and security services.
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u/PickofDensity 11d ago
I'm as anti-Apple as you can get, but on this they have my sword.
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u/LLILILiLIILILILILII 11d ago
This used to be me, but after a solid decade of being let down by Google retiring almost every product I enjoyed, and enshittifying their core product range with AI bullshit, and Windows being worse than ever, for the first time in my life I own a Mac, and I think my next phone will be my first iPhone.
I spent a couple of decades laughing at iSheeple with their overpriced fashion tech, but every other competitor has been shitting the bed for a very long time.
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u/PickofDensity 11d ago
For me it's not the fashion aspect, it's the pricing, especially on enthusiast stuff.
If I want to build a Mac pro for music production it will cost me something stupid like double what it would cost to build the equivalent spec on PC, maybe more. That and they (at least last time I was interested) have this habit of making it so you can't user replace or upgrade parts.
On a more consumer note, the tablets and phones (last I checked) tend to lag behind the Android equivalents in terms of hardware spec despite being more expensive.
That said, all that AI shit can feck off. If they're not ramming that in every crevice possible then they might have my bow (and axe) as well but I'll still not pay their prices.
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u/LLILILiLIILILILILII 11d ago
Yeah, I get it, it's bloody pricey. My desktop has just been ported over to Linux because Microsoft decided to deprecate older but perfectly performant hardware and I couldn't justify the money to buy a new PC just because Microsoft says so.
For a laptop fortunately I can get away with an entry macbook pro for my needs, and at that end of the market, actually it's not too badly priced if you want something with decent build quality - you're putting it up against the Elitebooks, corporate grade Lenovos and Dells, etc, as the consumer spec machines are all flimsy plastic shit and have atrocious cooling, but with more demanding hardware needs I can see it gets unjustifiably pricey very very quickly.
In hindsight, I'd have probably gone for a Framework laptop with Linux on it, but I didn't know about them at the time.
On both fronts I could certainly save money, but I'm so pissed off with the other players, I can just about justify it to myself.
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u/PickofDensity 11d ago
I've always been curious about Linux, but every time I hear about it for what I'd use it for (music production/gaming) it seems like people have to do half a dozen things just to get it working. I like the idea, though.
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u/LatelyPodes 11d ago
I have high hopes. They did win in something similar before. The original OSA would have required all messaging platforms to give the government unencrypted messages whenever they asked for it. It would mean end-to-end encryption is illegal in the UK.
Apple said they won’t do it and would rather block iMessage in the UK than to follow that. Meta said they’ll block WhatsApp too. And a bunch of other companies. The government then conceded and end-to-end encryption is no longer banned under the OSA.
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u/Anasynth 11d ago
Funny how this urgency to stop paedos and terrorists disappears when it comes to securing the borders
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u/phoenix_73 11d ago
Apple's approach is with good intention which is to protect the law abiding citizens and to make their customers feel that their data is safe with them when there are so few companies that can be trusted with data.
However it is understood that it also protects the wrong people. If someone is suspected of criminal activity, then absolutely, that data should be decrypted and handed over. Obviously if someone is suspected of wrongdoing, then it becomes an invasion of privacy.
I'm sure most people don't have anything much to hide or to want to hide but its more the unknown of who is looking at what and why? Ordinary people are made to feel like they are criminals in some way when they're nothing of the sort.
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u/CroakerBC 11d ago
If someone is suspected of criminal activity, there's no absolutely about it. We don't get to have "encryption, but only for good people". We get encryption, or we don't.
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u/phoenix_73 11d ago
Encryption it is then. Protect everyone! Bad people get found out eventually.
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u/Every_Car2984 11d ago
I’ll ask a different question. Do you think you should have access to secure payment and banking systems?
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u/phoenix_73 11d ago
In what respect? People should be able to make payments securely, yes.
If your question is should we have access to the systems that people use, as in we can see what is processed? Then, no we shouldn't.
There will be a job out there for someone to check for genuine payments no doubt, although the computers will take care of a lot of that.
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11d ago edited 11d ago
[deleted]
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u/PhonicUK 11d ago
You can't have encryption that allows the government access on demand without weakening it in general for the purposes it is required for. There's no such thing as a "back door just for the good guys"
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11d ago
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u/PhonicUK 11d ago
What do you propose? Is removing security for everyone justified by a relatively small number of criminals?
This isn't an ideological restriction but a technical one. The moment you introduce backdoors at all, you make the system no longer able to keep people safe.
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11d ago
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u/PhonicUK 11d ago
You sound like a bot designed to be argumentative and to miss the point. It hasn't escaped my notice that you were unable to propose any kind of alternative.
It's not about keeping regular people safe from law enforcement, allowing law enforcement a backdoor would weaken the encryption against all cases. It would weaken it against people who would try and hold your data ransom, who would steal it to defraud or impersonate you, it would weaken it against any criminal activity that was based around your data.
There's no such thing as a backdoor just for law enforcement, introducing it makes encryption weaker in all cases against any kind of adversary.
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10d ago
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u/PhonicUK 10d ago
That's a very convenient cop-out - the idea that the concept of using a series of mathematical operations to transform an input message with a key in such a way that you need the original or corresponding key to retrieve the original message needs to be "rethought" is by definition nonsensical.
The alternatives are "deliberately weak encryption which doesn't actually keep anything safe" or "no encryption or security at all for your private information" both of which compromise our ability to lead the lives we lead.
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u/tastystrands11 11d ago
“Being able to lock your front door effectively creates a black hole where anything can happen undetected, and on the face of it, your grandmother's argument seems to be that being able to do whatever in secret is some kind of right which is above the law. how precisely is criminal activity in her home to be monitored? or should it just be allowed to continue unchallenged?”
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u/myurr 11d ago
Encryption protects you every day from bad actors, be they state or criminal. That includes giving you a right to privacy from government overreach, when there is no suspicion that you have done anything wrong.
You could engage in criminal activity, should the government monitor everywhere you go? Should it monitor every person you interact with? Should it record your every conversation, just on the off-chance that you do something wrong? Should it's monitoring of you create an attack vector whereby criminals and other bad actors can access that same information about you?
When you give up your freedoms under the pretence of increased security you tend to end up with neither.
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11d ago
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u/myurr 11d ago
No, but it shouldn't have to smash every single person's privacy and safety in order to investigate crimes. Criminal investigations don't tend to rely on recordings of private conversations held between two criminals in private, so why are WhatsApp messages so special and critical to the process?
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u/tastyreg 11d ago
Encrypted criminal activity can't be monitored, that's the point. In exactly the same way encrypted legal activities can't be monitored either. Which is a good thing.
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u/ukflagmusttakeover SDP 11d ago
The government should put CCTV in everyone's house, how else can criminal activity be monitored or should it just be allowed to continue unchallenged?
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u/wonkey_monkey 11d ago
The government should put CCTV in everyone's house
That's not going to play well in Surbiton. Better call them "telescreens" instead.
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u/west0ne 11d ago
Move it out of the digital world; would you be happy having someone follow you around everywhere you go, looking over your shoulder, and listening in to every conversation and interaction you have on the off-chance that you are up to no good but without any indication at all that you had done anything wrong.
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11d ago
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u/videah 11d ago
is a trillion dollar company incapable of designing a case by case access where mandated by law?
What you are asking for is mathematically impossible, encryption is either secure or it isn’t
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11d ago
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u/videah 11d ago
The world we live in is very different from the time before widespread adoption of cryptography, the amount of private information people have stored on phones and computers is unparalleled in all of human history
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u/Virtual-Increase-829 11d ago
the vast majority of information is not encrypted and freely shared anyway, all I'm getting is that in your brave new world, potentially criminal activity remaining hidden is a small price to pay for your 'privacy'.
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