EFE.- Edward Snowden, a former analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the National Security Agency (NSA) of the United States, warned this Thursday of the bad precedent that the new tool developed by Apple to track illegal content on mobile phones may set.
“There is a big difference between what the Apple company does now, which aims to track our iPhones, and what was done before“Said Snowden, a refugee in Russia since 2013, at the” New Knowledge “school forum.
The intention of the American computer giant to search for material related to child abuse in the data stored by users in its services has raised concerns these days among experts, who fear the violation of the privacy of Apple customers.
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Snowden recalled that many large technology companies previously carried out these activities, which were limited, however, to clouds and data storage servers.
“Now the company Apple is developing something completely new, something that we have not seen before, “he explained, while insisting that the Californian company seeks to track” each one’s phone “even before the information on the device reaches its servers.
So if they find “child pornography, they will mark it as illegal,” but then “there will be new categories” of traceable content.
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“Apple is crossing a line, between what everyone has on their phone and what is stored on their servers,” Snowden said.
At the same time, he stressed that once Apple creates a precedent, the rest will no longer depend solely on that company.
“That will not depend on Apple, it will depend on the governments (…) Can he say no to the United States, Russia, China, Germany, France or the United Kingdom? Naturally not. If they want to continue selling their products in those countries, “he concluded.
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