A week ago I wrote about my difficulties in contacting Apple about my concerns regarding their CSAM scanning. In addition to signing an online petition, I wanted to personally reach out to Apple and tell them of my disappointment at their abandonment of their long-term promise to respect their users’ privacy. Irreal readers are well aware of my position on all this but I wanted to make sure that Apple knew too.
There doesn’t appear to be anyway for the man in the street to communicate with Apple other than through a very circumscribed support framework. Since I wrote that post, I’ve discovered a site about the controversy that has an interface that allows you to email any of several Apple executives. That means that I will be able to reach out directly. In addition, the site has its own open letter to Apple that you can sign. It’s a little easier than the one I originally wrote about because you don’t have to have a GitHub account to sign it.
If you’d like to tell Apple what you think or even just sign the letter—and if you’re an Apple user, you should—this site is an excellent resource. The story of Apple’s CSAM scanning continues to get more complicated and I’ll be writing about further in in a day or two. Android users, I’m sure, are “Meh, what’s the big deal? We’ve been living with this forever.” But many of us are Apple users not because we like paying more but because we respected Apple’s commitment to protecting our privacy. Sadly, it appears those days are over.