Apple Finds Its Next Big Business: Showing Ads on Your iPhone

After CSAM, I switched the main office machines to Manjaro. A lot of my colleagues sold their beloved iPhones and moved to De-Googled Android.

Luckily, the fiasco with Little Snitch was resolved, and I can enjoy a mac for occasional design work, but Figma is running well in the Browser and if I see any attempt to push me into Ad Hell, it is totally over.

Vertical integration is important for Apple, but as an old Apple user, this will be "no-fly zone" for me.

Actually, CSAM had a positive in my life. Since then, I am using my smartphone less and with basic apps, some banking, calls and chatting.

What does CSAM have to do with this story on how Apple might grow their ad business?

Same here - the constant iCloud upgrade prompts in macOS pushed me to Fedora Linux, and I’ve been a happy camper ever since (performance on the same mac hardware increased significantly too).

If this ad stuff is true, I’ve been eyeing a switch from iPhone to postmarketOS on the Oneplus 6 - the mobile phosh Linux experience is really starting to look pretty daily drivable for my simpler phone use cases.

TFA includes a summary of what data apple will use to target those ads and the incomplete extent to which you can disable it, so I would say the common thread is using a users data for other possibly conflicting interests.

Nothing. This story is an opportunity to Apple bash, so they’re doing it.

Personally I’m deep in the Apple ecosystem. I don’t think I’d leave because of this ads idea, but I share would get pissed off a lot because of it.

Exactly. The Apple bashers never fail to come out of the woodpile.

This article reads like the other completely unsubstantiated Apple rumors.

Bloomberg has a long history of quoting "sources briefed on the matter" type articles and this doesn't feel any different.

I still use Apple computers for design work, properly monitored by Little Snitch and some modifications on my router.

We all have opinions. And I have invested a ton of money in Apple products in 20+ years of usage. Constructive criticism is not "Bashing".

CSAM was a blatant attempt for breaching user privacy and classification with third party agency hidden criteria. We live in a surveillance economy and ads are the highway for privacy abuse. Apple argument: "We don't share the user data" has no ground for me.

In the increasingly connected world, with billions of data points, trusting a big tech behemoth is a suicide act. Allegedly. :)

> After CSAM, I switched the main office machines to Manjaro

> Actually, CSAM had a positive in my life.

This post sounds like a confession that you had CSAM on your machines and because of that switched away from Apple.

(Read what you wrote out loud expanding the acronym)

What was the fiasco that happened with little snitch?

No. And I don't think CSAM is gone. By demonstrating the capability to the governments, Apple actually created a demand for the technology.

Politico reports that the European Union is planning on announcing a new law requiring tech giants to scan for CSAM. That would leave Apple having to figure out how to comply without reigniting the controversy.

https://9to5mac.com/2022/05/11/apples-csam-troubles-may-be-b...

> CSAM was a blatant attempt for breaching user privacy and classification with third party agency hidden criteria.

I feel like there's a good amount of FUD about this, so for anyone who might not know: All online file hosts do CSAM matching against known CSAM images, regardless of the client OS(s) you're using. In Apple's case specifically, matching only happens to images you've uploaded to iCloud Photos.¹

¹ https://www.apple.com/child-safety/pdf/Expanded_Protections_...

How does the article relate to CSAM? Unless Apple is going to target ads on users that flag

I trust the experts on this.

Apple's Plan to "Think Different" About Encryption Opens a Backdoor to Your Private Life.

"That’s not a slippery slope; that’s a fully built system just waiting for external pressure to make the slightest change."

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/apples-plan-think-diff...

CSAM represents an increasingly invasive trend of Apple's idea that "your device is not yours", and integrated ads would be further in that space

The point is Apple was already reacting to an external pressure. They don't make up the rules. They were attempting to be open about it, and also give the user options to avoid it (don't use iCloud).

It's great that you've found an alternative that suits you but I think it's disingenuous to argue that Apple is the culprit.

Talk to your representative.

It was happening long before Apple explained how it was building a more privacy preserving method and told everyone how to avoid it...

Well, it is veteran Apple blogger/fairly accurate Apple leak publisher Mark Gurman.

It's not exactly new, but I do hate it when Apple pushes ads onto the iPhone, especially on the lock screen and in Settings.

I think the point was that your decision to use the abbreviation for child sexual abuse material as a synonym for Apple’s approach to scanning for it is unusual and potentially confusing. Semantics.

My next door neighbour owning a sledgehammer is a "fully built system just waiting" to bash my door down, but I don't lose any sleep over it.