Of course it is. It’s invasive by design. The “recent tweaks” were because of backlash, but now that’s died down
I am surprised by how rabid the Recall backlash continues to be compared to similar features elsewhere. Apple’s equivalent, in particular, seems to not be a concern to anybody. I don’t have anything Apple, so I’m not sure if they ever rolled this out, but they sure announced it to a whole bunch of crickets.
Interesting, I hadn’t seen news about that Apple feature before… There seems to be a lot more press around Recall, which in turn amps up the amount of consumer attention and backlash.
That said (and I wouldn’t want Apple’s “semantic search” even if I had an Apple device), I’d still trust Apple more to manage the dataset securely compared to Microsoft. The Apple ecosystem is far more strictly controlled, whereas in Windows it’s more of a free-for-all (most people just used XP as an administrator, the UAC could be easily disabled on Windows Vista and 7, etc.). Especially with Microsoft’s move to put advertising in Windows 11 and complete lack of security measures in the initial version of Recall, it is very hard to trust Microsoft in this regard.
that’s because “Apple Intelligence” is nearly 100% vaporware
So was/is Copilot+ and Recall (seriously, how do I turn it on to test it?) and that didn’t stop people.
Apple dropped a whole lot of vague shit that they “promised” would have some sort of holistic and on-device/private benefit to users if they pulled a full data profile of you together, kept it on-device, kept it secure, etc, etc.
Windows stealthed an update onto PCs that suddenly started capturing and processing unsecured screenshots of everything that users were doing without ever telling anyone why or what it’s for or how it would work. People found out that it was unsecured by looking in its unsecured folder. It wasn’t the same thing.
That said, obviously, Apple Intelligence is bullshit and doesn’t work or do anything of any use other than making Siri slightly prettier.
Your characterization of both of those events is inaccurate and aggressively framed in opposite directions, and I’m very curious to know why.
I mean, forget the MS bashing, go nuts on them. Why treat Apple any differently? Back in the day they at least were the underdog, but now? What’s with that?
You asked, and the author of the article asked, by proxy “buhwhy no one mad at apple for same thing” and I’m saying they weren’t the same thing. Apple deserves distinctly different shit. It’s not only my “characterization,” it accords with reality, and is why the author and you don’t see people as mad at apple for doing a different, differently shitty thing.
it’s also funny how you can tilt an average lemmy user by somehow saying bad shit about MS and Apple at the same time, I guess
No, it’s an argumentative take that underplays the issues with Apple’s proposed implementation and overplays the issues with MS’s.
Apple’s semantic search stores what you do inside an app (via an API) and they offer a feature that records everything you do and feeds it to an AI.
MS’s Recall was on their insider program, and then only for a subset of their devices, so not so much “stealthed” as up for testing. They always made the same on-device promises (and since the relaunch they also have encryption for the data). I don’t like either implementation, but I don’t think the discrepancy in reaction matches the discrepancy in implementation.
Note that it’s not a MS vs Apple thing. Chrome and Pixel phones have or are planning some Recall-adjacent features, too, that nobody ever brings up.
I’m not interested in taking sides or having an argument about it, I’m calling out how atrocious MS’s PR is and how surprisingly not atrocious Apple’s is. I’d argue the Pixel brand and Samsung in general also get WAY too much of a pass.
I’m curious as to why. I mean, I know why, it’s because MS sucks at managing their image and always have. I’m curious as to why they don’t drag everybody else down with them. I genuinely thought for a moment Recall would be the death of onboard AI features looking over your shoulder, but it clearly wasn’t. Apple’s slow rollout seems to have much more to do with them being incapable of a good implementation with the tech that is available and much less with them having an image issue in this area.
Also, is Recall live? I keep asking. How do I turn on Recall in my Copilot + PC? Does anybody know? Has anybody here touched Recall with their fingers? I am getting really paranoid about the whole thing being a collective prank like Santa Claus.
It is a stereotype but Apple diehards seem to go along with whatever Apple pushes, and people who don’t like them don’t use them anyways. Meanwhile Windows and Linux seems to have more people who are nitpicky about what they use, so group that tends to complain is going to be complaining more loudly about the OS they use would be my guess.
I do think you have a point about how Apple users tend to live with Apple choices while everybody else mostly ignores them. I think this manifests in less of a taking sides thing. Linux activists definitely root against Windows, sometimes more than they root for Linux, and they certainly don’t put the same amount of energy on Apple hostility.
I think this is wider than that, though. Linux and Apple users aren’t nearly as focused on their own quirks and foibles, but everybody loves to dunk on MS. Not that I don’t, necessarily, but sometimes the difference in attitude jumps at me.
It’s not just them, either. There’s a subset of companies, like Epic or Mozilla that get this a lot. It’s more so in gaming circles (EA! Ubisoft! Activision!) but not just there.
It also probably helps that it is easy to ignore Apple and there might not be a feeling of missing out for those who don’t care for the Apple ecosystem. As big as Apple is it is kind of niche in the sense that a Windows or Linux user can just ignore its existence and not feel affected.
But, when it comes to Windows there’s lot of mainstream software, games, and even hardware compatibility that is affected by Windows dominance. Stuff like wine and proton being needed and not getting the same video card driver support leads to more resentment Windows actually having offerings people who tend to complain want.
I think there’s something to the idea that Apple walls its garden so well people outside the wall don’t care about what happens inside it even when they disagree with it on principle.
I think you’re underplaying how big the garden is, though. You are thinking about this just in terms of PC OSs, but that’s not where Apple’s biggest presence is.
I got apple devices, but it is more a take or leave it type situation where I wouldn’t feel like I’m missing out if I didn’t have them. Its just one of those nice options, but not irreplaceable tech to me.
Well:
- MacOS is not malware
- Apple doesn’t make a habit of blatantly lying about their security
- As you said, it doesn’t actually exist
Ah, so Apple just happens to be one of the good massive megacorps routinely deploying anti-consumer practices. Gotcha.
See, it’s that gap in perception I’m interested in. Microsoft wants nothing more than having the closed ecosystem Apple has. From their Surface line to their much maligned store to their subscription-forward, always signed-in account environment.
Why they suck so much at selling that where Apple can get away with murder is much more interesting to me than the perceived differences between the implementations, which I would argue in a number of cases are worked backwards from the brand perception anyway. Part of it is the implementation and the execution rakes Apple chooses not to step on, but certainly not all of it, and that’s fascinating.
so Apple just happens to be one of the good massive megacorps
No they’re just a different type of shitty.
Right. But the reaction they get to their shittiness is very different, which is the thing I keep wondering about. Everybody keeps telling me why Microsoft is shitty and how Apple isn’t shitty in those ways specifically while conceding they are in others.
I want to know why Apple’s shitty doesn’t make them the poster boy for shittiness but MS’s shitty does. And it does. As far back as Windows 95, Windows is the thing you use that you hate to use and love to hate. That takes work and luck. I want to know how you can dig that hole so effectively while your competition can be just as overtly crappy and still come across as sleek and all the way above good and evil. There’s a fundamental truth about branding and squishy human brains buried in that phenomenon.
I want to know why Apple’s shitty doesn’t make them the poster boy for shittiness but MS’s shitty does
It doesn’t. They’re both shitty.
See, we disagree. You and I agree they’re both shitty. The rest of this social network does not, and the larger world ABSOLUTELY does not.
I’d argue once you get into normie land entirely maybe MS starts losing some of the stink, too, but for a lot of that middle space the perception is absolutely not the same, which is why this thread exists in the first place.
That’s because when it comes to Apple, hypocrisy is the way of life.
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The worst thing about it is, even if you switch to Linux for privacy yourself, you’ll also need your friends to switch as well, otherwise if you message them on their desktop, they’re a liability, as the damn recall will be there too, leaking your data.
It’ll be hell for activists.
Funnily enough, Signal has circumvented the issue by marking their chat window as DRM content, making it invisible to Recall.
Lol
They used the invasion of privacy to destroy the invasion of privacy?
The same has been true of email for years, but less bad. Activists will need to be even more careful in who they trust.
In what sense?
- if you send plaintext, their email service could spy on them
- once they decrypt, they could accidentally reply with the decryped text, or it could get backed up if they store a copy somewhere
- screen readers could store decrypted email
In general, if you don’t trust the receiver, you shouldn’t send sensitive information. Windows Recall doesn’t change that, if they’re competent, Windows Recall won’t be enabled.
I think this is more an issue for less technical users instead of activists, because activists will be more careful about who they trust than a secretary or something for a powerful individual.
Um, the core feature is privacy invasion. It does what it says on the tin.
It’s fine if some people want that functionality, as long as it’s not enabled by default.
Part of why i knew so-called “digital rights management” was fucking bullshit was because very little software ever came out that empowered me to manage MY OWN rights in the digital space.
I need there to be FOSS applications that allow me to root-level BLOCK applications from perceiving what I’m doing, to just fucking SANDBOX ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING BY DEFAULT and let me whitelist what specific things are allowed to directly access the hardware.
Sadly I am not as tech savvy as I used to think I was. I might’ve been technologically clever twenty years ago but I hadn’t managed to keep up… I think what I’ve described might be referred to as a “hypervisor”? And I’m told it’s an overbearing, clumsy, heavy-handed overkill measure that would be difficult to implement and make everything a pain in the ass to do. So … shit, man, I dunno… i’m just so damn tired of my hardware being bossed around by people I didn’t authorize.
Maybe it’s time you invested some time in finding alternatives that let you stay in control of said hardware. I know time is in short supply for all of us, so consider your priorities.
Qubes OS ?
I prefer the term Digital Restrictions Management.
A “hypervisor” is more applicable to servers than anything else, but I agree with you on everything else. That first sentence, man… Big companies get DRM for their property, so where’s my DRM, y’know?
Fucking maddening.
Programs ran through Flatpak can only access permissions and directories that it has explicit permission for. This is perfect for a very small program that only does one thing, it can get rather awkward when you need it to access multiple storage volumes. For example, I wanted to have my Steam games stored on different hard drives, but they were never visible through Steam. I had to override the Flatpak permission to give access to my mounted disks for it to work.
The fact that we can choose to enhance the permissions beyond their default scope on a case by case basis is powerful.
Yes.
Worth it.
Honestly it’s what drove me over the edge. I’m on endeavorOS and it has been great honestly. Would recommend 👍🏻
I’ve disabled windows update completely so I can pick and manually dl updates. Never going to put that recall shit on my pc.
How’d you do that? I’ve made registry tweaks, group policy tweaks, etc and my windows machine still eventually hits a limit where it forces updates around the 12 week mark. Granted it’s still longer than before, it isn’t completely disabled.
At that point it’s easier to install Linux.
I run Linux too, but I have to use windows for some contract jobs.
around the 12 week mark.
Not all computers need to tell the date & time, just uninstall clock.exe
It was a combination of things between policies and taking over folder and file permissions. I can look up the specifics I used if you are looking to replicate it. It’s a bitch to undo unless you write down everything you change.
I’ve disabled Windows completely so I can be safe and sound. Never going to put that shit on my PC.
– sorry, it seemed funnier in my head.
What I don’t understand, is what I would need and use it for? Never in my life I thought “damn if only I had a screen recording of everything I did 1 week, 1 month or 1 year ago”. Like I don’t get the use case, ignoring anything else. There is no use case.
I can view my terminal history and my recently accessed files. I have version control with git where I want and need it.
There is no use case.
Another great reason to switch to Linux. Fuck this shit
For windows users
OK, so… where the hell is Recall?
I have a Copilot + device. I am typing this in one, in fact. Recall does not seem to be anywhere to be seen. They added a deployable Google Lens-style “highlight a thing for us to review” thing. It was so intrusive and easy to deploy by accident I got a pretty good notification that I should go turn it off. Maybe that was part of the Recall rollout?
Incidentally, this piece is… a bit weird. Not only is it an ad, but the concerns they seem to flag as still existing (presumably to sell you their security subscription) seem to be that there is no biometric unlock and just the system PIN and that they don’t trust Microsoft on principle. The second is up to you, but the first doesn’t really work for me. Not only is the PIN a valid override to biometrics across the board in general (Windows defaults to that when biometrics fails), but it’s more secure on principle, since it can’t be entered by accident or by force.
I just don’t think the featue is particularly useful for how much potential it has for accidental misuse (even if they never see the data and they keep it entirely secure). It’s not the only one of this class, or even Microsoft’s first attempt at this (a similar feature shipped with Windows 8). It’s certainly become more of a meme than anything else at this point.
No shit.
To the surprise of nobody… 😆
