Apple today said that Meta has made 15 interoperability requests under the Digital Markets Act (DMA) in the European Union, which is more than any other company.
In a statement provided to Reuters, Apple said that Meta is asking for changes that could compromise user security and privacy.
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In response to Apple's comments on Meta's requests, Meta said the following: "What Apple is actually saying is they don't believe in interoperability. Every time Apple is called out for its anticompetitive behavior, they defend themselves on privacy grounds that have no basis in reality."
John Gruber (Mastodon, Dithering):
Apple says Meta is seeking low-level access that would break both user privacy and device security.
Meta says Apple is using "privacy" as a bullshit excuse to avoid even reasonable interoperability.
But without reading the requests, there's no way to say which side is more right than the other.
Apple:
It's getting personal. How abuse of the DMA's interoperability mandate could expose your private information.
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If Apple were to have to grant all of these requests, Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp could enable Meta to read on a user's device all of their messages and emails, see every phone call they make or receive, track every app that they use, scan all of their photos, look at their files and calendar events, log all of their passwords, and more. This is data that Apple itself has chosen not to access in order to provide the strongest possible protection to users.
Except that with the OCSP preference that Apple reneged on, Apple does get to track the apps that you use.
It's not clear to me which request would enable Meta to "log all of [the user's] passwords." I doubt that's actually what they want to do.
Separately Meta also wants to access their message history. Access to private communications needs to remain fully under the control of users.
I would love for apps to be able to access my message history because right now Apple doesn't let me back up or search my own messages.
For instance, if a user asks Siri to read out loud the latest message received via WhatsApp, Meta or other third parties could indirectly gain access to the contents of the message. No one is in a position to understand the full risks of that.
This is one of the scariest examples they could come up with?
Nick Heer:
These are, so far as I can tell, similar to the things the Commission is requiring here.
Nick Heer (via Hacker News):
The EC preliminary findings under the DMA indicate that Apple must take steps to enable the operability of devices from other brands with its iPhones. The EC has launched public consultations with interested companies to gather feedback on compliance.
Steve Troughton-Smith: