Division of Justice
“Right here is [sic] the most recent slides now we have on privateness,” Senior Vice President of Companies Eddy Cue wrote to CEO Tim Cook dinner and then-SVP of Advertising and marketing Phil Schiller in January 2013. “Nonetheless much more work to do however good begin.”
These slides, newly made public as an exhibit within the Division of Justice’s ongoing antitrust trial against Google, on “The State of Privateness,” solid a dim gentle on Apple’s rivals, significantly Google. They quote former CEO Eric Schmidt’s infamous remarks on Google’s coverage to “get right up to the creepy line but not cross it.” They unfavorably evaluate Apple and Google’s approaches to account knowledge mixture, voice search privateness, maps, and search. And most notably, they provide over a whole slide to a abstract: “Android is a large monitoring machine.”
The exhibit is, as famous, redacted for public submitting and abridged, so slides not pertaining to Google’s search dominance and different points at trial are lacking. Nonetheless, Apple’s presentation provides a uncommon glimpse into the corporate’s notion of Google, significantly Android, and the way its personal gadgets and providers may stand aside.
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The slide begins with an abridged “Privateness Timeline,” with sure years lower off accidentally or unusual redaction. The slide notes objects like Fb’s 2007 “Introduction of Beacon, which tracks customers even when they decide out,” and Microsoft’s launch of “IE8 with privateness settings off by default.” There is a curious and blunt, tiny-text word beneath this slide: “Computerized privateness to customers would make it more durable for Microsoft to revenue from promoting on-line adverts. Microsoft constructed its browser in order that customers should intentionally activate privateness settings each time they begin up the software program.” Web Explorer 8 was a fraught product for Microsoft, with internal debates about advertising privacy.
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On a slide for “Accounts,” Apple notes that its personal gadgets permit for separate accounts for iCloud, the App Retailer, and iTunes Retailer on a tool, and that Siri, its Maps app, and iAd promoting service “don’t use the Apple ID.” Google, by comparability, “Combines knowledge throughout providers,” with no assist for separate accounts, and the “Solely affordable use case is full authentication.”
Apple makes related factors about “Siri and Voice Search” however takes a selected swing at Samsung’s Android telephones. As soon as Samsung’s since-discontinued S-Voice is used, “subsequent Voice Search knowledge is shipped to Vlingo (backend for S Voice) and can’t be disabled … Transcription, contacts, location, and many others.”
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On a slide about Maps, Apple merely notes that “No adverts service in Maps,” and no affiliation between the app and your Apple ID or iAd. Advertisements are served in Maps, and “All Maps exercise is related to a Google account and is commingled with advert knowledge.” The same assemble is ready up for “Search and adverts,” although surprisingly not in a lot element, given the trial from which these slides have been made public. “Searches are tied to Google Accounts,” and it is all combined with different providers, Apple notes.
The slides finish, at the very least within the exhibit, with “Apple’s Method to Privateness,” which right here is solely a 2010 quote from Steve Jobs about Apple taking privateness “extraordinarily severely” and the way “folks within the Valley assume we’re actually old school about this.”
As noted by Jason Kint of Digital Content Next, the identical batch of displays made public by the DOJ reveals that Apple wasn’t completely averse to gleaning some perception into their prospects’ search habits.
A Google internal email chain from 2016 summarizes a gathering with Apple, which Daniel Alegre summarizes as having “had a brand new request on the information set request part—they wished it to be reciprocal, which means that they wish to know which hyperlinks on Google.com outcomes have been clicked on, or how lengthy it took to fulfill the consumer’s question on Google. Their rationale is that they wished to enhance the consumer expertise with this data.”
Alegre, president of world and strategic partnerships on the time—who left Google to be Activision Blizzard President and COO, then later CEO of Bored Apes NFT provider Yuga Labs—notes that his crew gave Apple “the clear heads up that we do not share this data as it’s key to our ‘secret sauce.'”
John Giannandrea, senior vp for engineering at Google on the time and presently senior vice president of machine learning at AI strategy at Apple, requested in response, “[W]hat are they making an attempt to study precisely? [T]hey know which queries they hand off to us, so what knowledge are they asking for? [If it’s] which internet pages folks in the end go to for a question we might *not* share that rating sign.”
Ars has reached out for remark to Apple and Google.
Itemizing picture by Division of Justice