Apple CEO Tim Cook spoke today at the virtual conference Computers, Privacy and Data Protection, condemning the business model of companies such as Facebook and emphasizing Apple’s commitment to promoting user privacy.
“In a time of misinformation and conspiracy theories drawn by algorithms, we can no longer turn a blind eye to a theory of technology that says any commitment is a good commitment – the longer the better – and all for the purpose of “Collect as much data as possible,” Cook said. “It’s been a long time since we’ve come to claim that this approach doesn’t come at a cost – polarization, lost trust and, yes, violence.” .
Cook highlighted two recent privacy measures that Apple has taken, including the App Store and App Tracking Transparency privacy tags, which will require apps to request permission to track users starting with the following versions iOS 14, iPadOS 14 and tvOS 14. Apple says software updates will be released in early spring.
Today is Data Privacy Day, and Apple marked the occasion by sharing “A Day in Your Data Life,” an easy-to-understand PDF report that explains how third-party companies track user data on websites and apps. Apple’s privacy principles and provides more details about the transparency of application tracking.
Cook’s comments can be heard in this YouTube video starting at 3:50:
A full transcript of Cook’s remarks is available below.
Hello.
John, thank you for the generous introduction and for hosting us today.
It is a privilege to join – and learn from this panel of knowledge – on this appropriate occasion of Data Privacy Day.
A little over two years ago, along with my good friend, the long-awaited Giovanni Buttarelli, and data protection regulators around the world, I spoke in Brussels about the emergence of an industrial data complex.
At that meeting, we asked ourselves, “What kind of world do we want to live in?”
Two years later, we should carefully consider how we answered this question.
The fact is that an interconnected ecosystem of companies and data brokers, fake news providers and division hawkers, pursuers and hucksters who are just looking to make money fast, is more present in our lives than ever before.
And it has never been so clear how it first degrades our fundamental right to privacy and, consequently, our social fabric.
As I said, “if we accept as normal and inevitable that everything in our lives can be aggregated and sold, then we lose much more than data. We lose the freedom to be human. ”
And yet, this is a new season full of hope. A time of reflection and reform. And the most concrete progress of all is due to many of you.
By wrongly proving cynics and convicts, the GDPR has provided an important basis for privacy rights around the world, and its implementation and enforcement must continue.
But we can’t stop here. We need to do more. And we are already seeing hopeful steps around the world, including a successful voting initiative that strengthens consumer protection right here in California.
Together, we must send a universal, humanistic response to those who claim a right to users’ private information about what should not and will not be tolerated.
As I said in Brussels two years ago, it is certainly time, not only for a comprehensive privacy law here in the United States, but also for global laws and new international agreements that enshrine the principles of minimizing data, user knowledge, user access and data security around the globe.
At Apple, spurred on by many of you in the privacy community, these have been two years of relentless action.
We have worked not only to deepen our own privacy principles, but to create waves of positive change across the industry as a whole.
I have spoken countless times for strong encryption without backdoors, recognizing that security is the foundation of privacy.
We’ve set new industry standards for data minimization, user control, and device processing for everything from location data to contacts and photos.
At the same time that we have led the way in functions that keep you healthy and well, we have made sure that technologies such as a blood oxygen sensor and an ECG come with peace of mind that your health data remains yours.
And last but not least, we are implementing strong new requirements to promote user privacy throughout the App Store ecosystem.
The first is a simple but revolutionary idea, which we call the nutrition nutrition label.
Each app – including ours – must share data collection and privacy practices, information that the App Store presents in a way that each user can understand and act on.
The second is called Application Tracking Transparency. At its inception, ATT refers to returning control of users – to giving them a say on how their data is treated.
Users have been asking for this feature for a long time. We have worked closely with developers to give them time and resources to implement it. And we are passionate about that, because we believe it has great potential to make things better for everyone.
Because ATT answers a very real problem.
Today, earlier, we launched a new work called “A day in the life of your data”. It tells the story of how the applications we use every day contain an average of six trackers. This code often exists to monitor and identify users in all applications. , tracking and recording their behavior.
In this case, what the user sees is not always what they get.
At this point, users may not know if the apps they use to pass the time, check in with their friends, or find a place to eat can actually send information about the photos they take. they did, people on their contact list or location data that reflect where they eat, sleep or pray.
As the paper shows, it seems that no information is too private or personal to be monitored, monetized, and aggregated into a 360-degree image of your life. The end result of all this is that you are no longer a customer, you are the product.
When ATT is in full effect, users will have a say in this type of tracking.
Some might think that sharing this degree of information is worthwhile for better targeted advertising. Many others, I suspect, will not, as most appreciated when we built a similar functionality in web trackers that limited Safari a few years ago.
We see the development of these types of privacy-focused features and innovations as a core responsibility of our work. We always have, we always will.
The fact is that the debate on ATT is a microcosm of a debate that we have been having for a long time – one in which our point of view is very clear.
To be successful, technology does not need extensive personal data, combined on dozens of sites and applications. Advertising has existed and thrived for decades without it. And we are here today, because the path of the least resilient is seldom the path of wisdom.
If a business is based on deceptive users, on data exploitation, on options that are not choices at all, then it is not worth our praise. It deserves reform.
We should not look away from the big picture.
In a time of misinformation and conspiracy theories drawn by algorithms, we can no longer close our eyes to a theory of technology that says any commitment is a good commitment – the longer the better – and all in order to collect as much data as possible.
Too many still ask themselves, “How much can we get away with?” When one has to ask “what are the consequences?”
What are the consequences of prioritizing conspiracy theories and violent incitement simply because of high engagement rates?
What are the consequences not only of tolerance, but of the reward that undermines public confidence in life-saving vaccinations?
What are the consequences if we see thousands of users join extremist groups and then perpetuate an algorithm that recommends even more?
It has been a long time since we have claimed that this approach does not come at a cost – polarization, lost trust and, yes, violence.
A social dilemma cannot be allowed to become a social catastrophe.
I think that last year and certainly recent events have brought home the risk of this for all of us – as a society and as individuals just like anything else.
Long hours at home, the challenge of preventing children from learning when schools are closed, the worry and uncertainty about what the future holds, have all thrown away how technology can help – and how it can be used to damage.
Will the future belong to the innovations that make our lives better, more fulfilled and more humane?
Or will it belong to those tools that draw our attention to the exclusion of all others, which aggravate our fears and accumulate extremism, in order to broadcast ever more invasive advertisements on all other ambitions?
At Apple, we made our choice a long time ago.
We believe that ethical technology is the technology that works for you. It is a technology that helps you sleep, not keep you up. This tells you when you have had enough, which gives you space to create, draw, write or learn, not to refresh again. It’s a technology that can disappear in the background when you go hiking or take a bath, but it’s there to warn you when your heart rate is rising or to help you when you’ve had a bad fall. And that all this always puts privacy and security first, because no one has to change the rights of their users to deliver a great product.
Call us naive. But we still believe that technology made by people, for people and given the well-being of people, is too valuable a tool to be abandoned. We still believe that the best measure of technology is the life it improves.
We are not perfect. We will make mistakes. That makes us human. But our commitment to you, now and always, is that we will keep our faith in the values that inspired our products from the beginning. Because what we share with the world is nothing without the trust that our users have in it.
For all of you who joined us today, please push us all forward. Continue to set high standards that put life first. And take new and necessary steps to reform what is broken.
We have made progress together and we need to do more. Because the time is always right to be bold and courageous in the service of a world in which, as Giovanni Buttarelli said, technology serves people and not the other way around.
Thank you very much.
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