[Odenwaelder]

Maybe someone can comment on this: Does Google scan the cloud fotos of its users for CP? Have we seen an uptick of false positives/SWATings since they do that?

Apple is - rightfully and understandably IMO - criticized for their plans, but does anyone know how Google handles this?

[soziawa]

There is some previous discussion about this regarding Facebook here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28119372

The false positive rate does not look great.

[sneak]

Google and FB both scan storage for several different types of contraband, and also have triggers and thresholds for things that use too much bandwidth (eg pirated software download links that are shared widely et c).

[bengale]

Yes they do. The reason apple has done this is because they lagged behind other providers considerably in detecting this sort of content. Facebook for example are reporting millions per year compared to a few hundred for Apple.

Instead of scanning you whole library they came up with a way to do it on device, which is the main difference between other services. If you don't enable iCloud photo storage the system can't work at all.

Very interesting stuff in their technical explanation: https://www.apple.com/child-safety/pdf/CSAM_Detection_Techni...

[barbazoo]

I never realized that that's whats being done but now it's so obvious since everything we upload to GDrive/iCloud/Dropbox isn't encrypted without additional effort and reduced convenience. I use Boxcryptor for Dropbox and it prevents them snooping on my files but if I started using that for pictures, I'd lose all convenience of being able to look at it in the Photos app, create shared albums, etc. It's a pity. I wish there was an encrypted photo service that let me share photos and create albums. It's not even that I have anything to hide but I'm scared that one day, police will knock at my door because of a hash collision or a borked logfile or whatever. What else can I do other than me and my family becoming digital hermits?

[zionic]

-Apple "lagged behind" because it built private and secure services it could not monitor by design. This is a feature, not a bug.

-Facebook's reporting overwhelmingly flags burner accounts signed up via tor etc, only absolute idiots would post actual CP on their real name account on facebook.

-Apples solution is highly invasive and dangerous, and your statement about "only running with iCloud upload" is false. It took less than a week for Apple to announce that they will open these APIs to 3rd party apps.