
Apple’s Silence in China Sets a Dangerous Precedent - tysone
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/31/technology/apple-vpn-china-dangerous-precedent.html
======
sriku
Apple stood for privacy in the US where privacy is part of law. It didn't
stand by privacy in China where privacy in some forms is prohibited as part of
law. Asserting the US law in China would discount China's sovereignty,
implicitly declaring "your principles are inferior to ours".

A global company needs to be sensitive to these political/cultural differences
and accommodate them. Even in the US where "privacy" is part of law, the legal
system recently ruled that Facebook can continue to track users online even
when they're logged out. So pretending that the privacy issue is one of
"morality" is just borrowing the emotional power of the "morality" label for
something that is not a universal law on the planet ... not even within
aspects of the US. It is not different from a middle-eastern global company
offering christmas discounts for its products in western countries, or Amazon
not selling banned books in the countries they operate, or selling books on
witchcraft and sorcery as though the books were of the same standing as, say,
Principia Mathemtica.

Permitted? Do. Not permitted? Don't. ... unless the goal of your company is to
champion a particular political ideology. So, frankly, this NYTimes article
is, from a global perspective, "politically incorrect".

~~~
chibg10
This amount of cultural relativism is silly and frankly just plain ignorant.
China doesn't restrict free speech for cultural reasons. The CCP restricts
free speech because it fears losing its ruling status.

~~~
smallnamespace
While you may be right about the CCP's motives, China has its own long history
of political thought, including the correct role of the State and public
dissent. Guess what? For the vast majority of Chinese history, rulers viewed
public dissent as tantamount to open rebellion and reacted accordingly.

Political systems are in part products of their culture. Free speech is not
part of the cultural or political history of China, as it is in the West.

~~~
option
This is called culturalism. Saying X is not for race Y is racism. Saying that
X is not for culture Y is culturalism. There is really not that much
difference here. Because I am Chinese/Saudi/Russian etc. in no way implies
that I, or my culture, does not value such a basic right as free speech

~~~
Sacho
I don't understand the point you're trying to make. Is it culturalism to say
that Western cultures value free speech? If you just wanted to say that parent
was wrong that Chinese don't value free speech, why the diatribe about
culturalism and racism?

You also haven't really put forward any argument that the Chinese value free
speech - you can make a base argument that it's valued in some Western
countries because they've codified it in their laws - most notably the FA in
the US(it's questionable how much this "basic right" is respected in reality).
Calling it a "basic right" is culturalism by your own definition, as you apply
your own cultural values(whatever they may be) over the whole of humanity.
What makes you think humanity as a whole values this "basic right"? Millions
of people live in countries where free speech is not as important as religion,
for example, and blasphemy laws exist.

~~~
hartator
You seem to omit that's possible that we have universal pricinciples that's
superior to whatever culture. You can attain these principles via philosophy.
Any individuals can rediscover the values of free speech, freedom of
government arbitrary, freedoms of thoughts and actions by just reflexion
itself.

~~~
chii
One cannot disassociate philosophical principles with the culture and history
that brought about it.

By claiming there's some Universal Principal that's superior is basically
saying that you're own beliefs and culture (presumably the one and the same as
the proported Universal Principle) is superior.

This isn't mathematics where there's some objective truth.

------
bmc7505
As much as I dislike Apple, they made the right choice here. While it may be
easy to praise Apple's stance against FBI backdooring the iPhone's secure boot
and condemn their compliance with removing VPN apps from the Chinese app
store, the latter policy is completely unlike the former for several good
reasons. With the Chinese market, you need to choose your battles.

Removing VPN apps from the Appstore does not compromise the privacy of any
Apple users, and does not prevent existing users of these apps from continuing
to use them on their devices. I would imagine Cook fought pretty hard to
protect the privacy of Apple users to get this concession from the Chinese
censors. For comparison, on Android, China is forcing users in Muslim regions
to install apps that scan for "terrorist content" and track user activity.

[https://thinkprogress.org/china-muslim-surveillance-
policy-c...](https://thinkprogress.org/china-muslim-surveillance-
policy-c0ee4721882b)

~~~
mtgx
> Removing VPN apps from the Appstore does not compromise the privacy of any
> Apple users

That's such BS. VPN apps are banned _because_ they give users privacy. So it's
logical that by removing them it hurts people's privacy in China.

> and does not prevent existing users of these apps from continuing to use
> them on their devices.

And that's a copout and you know it. As soon as people reset their phones or
buy new ones they won't be able to "continue using them". Taking that as a
"win" is absurd.

------
csense
This is only possible because Apple has a "walled garden" app store and
doesn't let people install stuff from outside it. The solution is simple:
Publish an official jailbreak allowing expert iPhone users to root their
phones and use third-party app stores.

Then Apple's not violating Chinese law by directly providing VPN's, instead
they're removing themselves from a situation where they're in a position to be
capable of enforcing Chinese law. The user is free to install whatever they
want on a device they've bought.

~~~
millstone
Is this actually necessary? You can install a VPN profile on your iPhone by
manually typing in the settings, without going through the App Store.

~~~
yorwba
If that VPN profile is limited to well-known VPN protocols, there is no
possible combination of settings that gets you past the Great Firewall, a VPN
app needs to add their own or it won't work.

------
chj
I don't think Apple has any other choice, except to open up iOS system so that
it doesn't have the responsibility to censor apps. It's interesting to see how
Apple's centralized control turns out to be a convenient tool for
authoritarian governments.

~~~
Steko
This is the point John Gruber made:

 _To me, the more interesting question isn’t whether Apple should be selling
its products in China, but rather whether Apple should continue to make the
App Store the only way to install apps on iOS devices. A full-on “install
whatever you want” policy isn’t going to happen, but something like Gatekeeper
on MacOS could.

Keep iOS App Store-only by default. Add a preference in Settings to allow apps
to be downloaded from “identified developers” (those with an Apple developer
certificate) in addition to the App Store. In that scenario, the App Store is
no longer a single choke point for all native apps on the device.

The App Store was envisioned as a means for Apple to maintain strict control
over the software running on iOS devices. But in a totalitarian state like
China (or perhaps Russia, next), it becomes a source of control for the
totalitarian regime.

I don’t expect Apple to do this. They’d rather deal with the negative
consequences of the App Store as a choke point than give up the benefits
(including the profits) of maintaining complete control over all software on
the platform.1 But if you’re angry about Apple’s role in this VPN crackdown in
China, I suggest you direct your anger at the App Store as the single source
for third-party software._

~~~
Inconel
As someone who just recently started using an iOS device and finds the lack of
sideloading mildly annoying, can anyone with some expertise in iOS security
chime in with whether or not allowing sideloading of apps on iOS represents
any serious security implications for iPhones? From my admittedly amateurish
understanding, iOS sandboxing is significantly more robust than Android, is
this just a way for Apple to maintain total control of, and profit off of,
apps, or does this policy have a basis in security as well?

~~~
tristanj
The decision to prevent sideloading dates back to the release of the App
Store. Upon release of the App Store, Apple charged a 30% royalty on every app
sold. Developers were outraged by these fees, and fought against them. If
Apple allowed side loading, then developers would sell their apps on their own
websites and then tell users to sideload the apps. Apple had to prevent side
loading to ensure success of their App Store. At the time, people with a
developer account could always sideload apps, however they were much more
difficult to obtain back then (had to send in verification).

Security was not the primary consideration. iOS was a rushed project and it
took them many revisions to implement security features. In iOS 1.0, all apps
ran as root. iOS didn't have ASLR until 4.3. This was fine since mobile
malware barely existed back then.

I would argue Apple's sideloading motivations are primarily monetary based and
for "protecting the user experience" (typical Apple PR talk). Why though, does
android allow sideloading? I'd say it is because Android was ~2 years behind
iOS and they needed to catch up. Therefore they made it very easy to build
apps for their platform and let any developer install/test apps without an
Android Market account. Also Android chose to be open source and there is
little stopping someone from building their own version of Android without
sideloading restrictions.

------
IBM
I'll repost my comment from the other thread that got flagged for being a
dupe:

They absolutely stake out moral positions on issues like this all the time.
The difference is they only do it in the West where rule of law prevails and
they can actually exert influence.

They've done it with various anti-LGBT efforts that have taken place around
the US, they've done it with the fight with the FBI and they're doing it right
now in Australia [1], among others.

What they don't do is shoot themselves in the head in some misguided attempt
at ideological purity.

Also this seems absurd to me:

>The company has not fully tested its political and economic leverage in
China. It hasn’t tested the public’s immense love of its products. It hasn’t
publicly threatened any long-term consequences — like looking to other parts
of the world to manufacture its products.

If China's authoritarian regime is objectionable then do what countries have
always done in history: isolate them economically, diplomatically or
politically. Try to foment and support an insurgency or revolution or just
invade them yourselves. I'm not sure anyone is willing to risk nuclear war to
bring democracy to China but those are your options. Apple isn't a vessel for
anyone's foreign policy objectives and it isn't a substitute for the state.

[1] [https://www.macrumors.com/2017/07/20/apple-talks-
australian-...](https://www.macrumors.com/2017/07/20/apple-talks-australian-
government-encryption/)

~~~
mikestew
Apple has most certainly taken a moral stance in the past as you point out.
The galling part of the article to me was "The company has not fully tested
its political and economic leverage in China." It is not Apple's _job_ to take
a political stance. They can if they want, as evidenced by the examples you
laid out, but there is no requirement. If the NYT wants to talk politics and
precedence, perhaps they should direct their criticisms toward the U. S.
government, et. al., who collectively think that China's membership in the
WTO, and therefore I assume free trade with China, is just a-okay.

Apple is playing by the rules, and this time decided that this is not the hill
they want to die on. That's their prerogative. Don't like the rules? Then go
complain to those that make the rules to begin with, not those that play by
those rules.

~~~
rtpg
it's not their job to do it.

It's nobody's job to do it.

They still potentially can fix the problem. Wouldn't it be great if they used
their influence to help fix things?

I agree that there's a "choose your battles" aspect to this. Considering what
Apple did with the San Bernandino case, this seems (ideologically) right, but
the potential losses are pretty high.

~~~
cbhl
Google and Facebook took this stance and look where it got us? China just made
their own bloody search engine and social network.

We need to stop looking to corporations as doing the jobs our government
should be doing.

~~~
virtuabhi
Let us keep passing the buck... We need to stop looking to governments as
doing the jobs United Nations should be doing.

"Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does."

~~~
Clubber
That's a good point but China is 1 of 5 nations in the UN with veto power.

------
nabla9
Apple's silence reflects the cynicism of consumers that buy Apple products.

Apple is mainly selling a brand and not a product. Apple is archetypal
emotional brand. It's intimate with its customers and it is loved.

As most global companies, Apple as a company has no morals. It takes moral
stance when it's builds up the brand without hurting the sales. Only way to
make Apple to sacrifice something is to threaten the brand and make Apple
users feel dirty.

More stories like this. People must stop loving and identifying with brands.
All brands.

------
prewett
Is this a news piece or an opinion piece? The article is terrible. Apple has
two choices: comply with the laws of China when operating in China or not
operate in China. They can refuse to comply on principle, get kicked out of
China, and get sued by their shareholders for breach of fiduciary duty. They
can use all available means (none) to fight it. Or they can obey the laws of
the country they are operating in.

I bet the author would take a dim view of a Chinese company refusing to obey
an American law in America.

~~~
int_19h
It's not just about Apple. Apple is still headquartered in US. Thus, it's also
a moral quandary for US, because American lawmakers can make it a more stark
choice for Apple: they can pass a law saying that no American company can aid
and abet human rights violations. Then the choice for Apple would be to
operate in China and comply with laws of China, or operate in US and comply
with laws of US.

Is that too extreme? In this case, perhaps (or perhaps not!), but where is the
boundary? We all remember how IBM helped implement Holocaust. I don't think
anyone would argue that if someone wanted to do something like that today
(say, use machine learning to identify closet atheists and gays in Saudi
Arabia?), we'd just say "Oh well, they're just operating under these laws, and
who are we to judge? It's all culturally relative anyway."

So, at some point we draw a line and say, "no, you can't do this, not if you
want to be present in our society". Where is that line? And why shouldn't it
lie at authoritarian government censoring political speech?

~~~
TrickyRick
> We all remember how IBM helped implement Holocaust

Do you have more details of this? I've never heard about it before.

~~~
nl
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust)

~~~
TrickyRick
Thanks! Added to my reading list

------
MVf4l
I won't call obeying local laws or following host's rules sets precedent. MNCs
have been following the local rules since day one. What do you expect?

Would you stop speaking local language because it helps the rulers
communicate? Would you stop using the bank notes because it's issued by a
dictatorship? You didn't because it's essential to run your business within
the country.

The US is your own country, you have obligation to fix it, that's why you
stand up against FBI. But not for other countries, they have to fix their own
country by themselves.

------
Veratyr
It makes no sense for Apple to do anything but comply. Its only real options
are to manipulate corrupt government officials (which is against US law) or
leave and:

\- There are plenty of competitors in China and its people will continue to be
well served by them should Apple choose to leave.

\- The people of China aren't going to benefit at all from any Apple
departure.

\- Apple is a publicly traded company; its duty is to its shareholders. 20% of
Apple's Q2 17 revenue came from China:
[https://www.apple.com/newsroom/pdfs/Q2FY17DataSummary.pdf](https://www.apple.com/newsroom/pdfs/Q2FY17DataSummary.pdf)

So leaving is also not an option, an attempt to do so would be pointless and
crater the stock so bad investors would revolt.

The article suggests a "public fight" but that seems incredibly naïve to me.
China just doesn't work that way. The fight was lost when the GFW went up.

------
npunt
Worth pointing out that this happened on the same day that TestFlight
increases the number of beta testers from 2k to 10k. If someone open sources
an iOS VPN app, you've now got 10k people that can sideload an app via the
efforts of a single person with an apple developer account.

Obviously this is a loophole and not meant as a mainstream solution, but past
solutions to getting around the great firewall (including VPN itself) have
also been only for the technically informed and connected - often foreigners
working in China. Basically it lets the technical elite have a way around the
firewall to keep business running.

Personally I think it's unlikely these two bits of news are connected (upping
testflight is likely about iOS 11), but still it may have a positive effect
until it, too, is clamped down on.

~~~
prewett
I think anyone can download Xcode and compile to their device, so there's
nothing stopping an open-source VPN app.

~~~
npunt
True, and really there's always some kind of super-high friction loophole in
computing. For these types of loopholes to have an impact though a) people
have to know about them, b) people have to be able to do them, and c) they
have to be easy to do.

TestFlight is as easy as getting an email, downloading the testflight app, and
downloading the app you need. Its a trivial amount of steps, which makes it a
powerful loophole.

------
bangonkeyboard
When China next tells Apple to backdoor iMessage encryption, the question is
not whether Apple will cooperate, but how the public will ever find out that
they had.

------
ksk
Wow, this is quite a ridiculous article.

>When Apple took a public stand for its users’ liberty and privacy, the
American government blinked.

Nope. They got access via other means, and didn't need Apple's help.

>While American tech companies frequently criticize decisions by American
officials, they appear loath to do so in China.

Do you also expect a Bulgarian company to comment on Sri Lankan politics just
because they're doing business there? Its not wrong to feel for citizens of
another country, but that is a personal matter. I don't see why a corporation
should be meddling in the internal politics of another country.

To the author: Have the US tech companies stopped dealing with the NSA and the
CIA? Has the CIA given up their backdoor access to
Google/FB/MS/Apple/Oracle/etc?

------
AndyMcConachie
What dangerous precedent? That Apple is a company that is governed by the rule
of law?

I find it fundamentally strange that we expect our corporate overlords to do
anything other than maximize their profits. I'd certainly like them to do more
than that, but I don't have the expectation that they will. And expecting them
to break the law, or leave the Chinese market, is simply just crazy.

It sucks that China treats its citizens in this manner, but I plan on abiding
by Chinese law the next time I'm in China or I wouldn't go. Why should Apple
be any different, and why is this somehow their fault?

~~~
maus42
>I find it fundamentally strange that we expect our corporate overlords to do
anything other than maximize their profits.

There is difference between what we can _realistically_ expect people to do
(often, not much, and even after accounting for that, still disappoint) and
what they _should_ do and we should expect them do (do what is right).

To continue with the illustrative examples from fiction. Nobody _expects_
Theoden to do much anything useful after listening to all that poison of
pouring out of mouth of the Wormtongue. But is it what he _should_ be doing?

------
bpodgursky
Does anyone here think China is more free or informed because Google held a
hard line and got banned?

------
qrbLPHiKpiux
Easy for China to threaten seizure of Apple's manufacturing capabilities.
Shareholders won't like that. When something doesn't make sense, follow the
money.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
China would probably never go that far. At best, they would just cut off the
retail market in China and leave it completely to the 黄牛 yellow cow scalpers
like it was 10+ years ago.

------
largehotcoffee
VPN apps are completely different than what happened with the FBI unlocking
request last year.

------
cletus
Good advice I got once: not every surface is a slippery slope.

------
partisan
The day after Apple stands up to the Chinese government, Foxconn will be
producing phones that no longer have the Apple logo, but will otherwise be
Apple iPhones.

There is nothing Apple can do. In the name of profits, they have put their
entire business in the hands of the Chinese government.

~~~
differentView
>The day after Apple stands up to the Chinese government, Foxconn will be
producing phones that no longer have the Apple logo, but will otherwise be
Apple iPhones.

That's just silly. Foxconn would do nothing of the sort.

~~~
partisan
I don't know if it is just silly. Their IP is in the wind.

The third shift is a real phenomenon for brands manufacturing in China even
under good circumstances. I am simply extrapolating from that reality.

------
mstaoru
Privacy concerns aside, without running VPN half of the "allowed" (i.e. not
explicitly banned) Western Internet is completely unusable thanks to Google
CDN, Google Fonts, Facebook Retargeting, Twitter panels etc. any of which
stall the loading forever and the content never shows in Safari / Mobile
Chrome. Many hybrid apps are unusable as well. Thankfully they didn't remove
manual VPN configuration. Just made it all even more inconvenient.

------
gigatexal
Who do people think Apple is? A saint? a 501(c)? an NGO? No, they are a multi-
national profit maximizing corporation that sees not capitalizing on the
growing middle class of China as an existential threat. So while the
restrictions that the People's Republic of China (sic) imposes on it's
citizens are reprehensible it is a place where Apple must abide by the rules
if it wants to sell phones and other hardware and services.

------
the_common_man
Absurd article. Why is this special to Apple? Why can US govt not take a
stance and ban all chinese articles from their country?

~~~
0xbear
That'd be very bad for business. The government is particularly hypocritical
in this regard. Our BFFs in the Middle East _execute gays_, oppress women, and
finance terrorism, and we pretend not to notice.

------
skc
I don't know why people that love Apple find it so hard to admit that
ultimately Apple first and foremost care about money. (And that's ok!)

That's _all_ that this issue is about at the end of the day.

------
ksec
The latest data have Apple nearly dropping out of the Top 5 handset vendor.
May be it should be the Top 4 vendor to complain first ?

------
johnsmith21006
Interesting contrast to Google deciding to leave China. Apple has also chosen
to use a China gov controlled cloud provider.

------
Spooky23
Why does a western moral standard give Apple the right to break Chinese law?

Where do you draw that line? What US laws are ok to break? Should Apple export
other US laws like labor standards? If so, Alabama or California law?

Like it or not, globalism means that we're participants in a huge global
community. Part of being in a community is respecting your neighbors, even
when you disagree with them.

~~~
maus42
As many others commented elsewhere, moral relativism is not very robust
ethical system in a global community.

If you ever have kids, why would you teach them some morals over others? Would
you teach that some moral standard (pick any! say, "it's not generally okay to
steal others' stuff") would just _stop_ by the virtue that they just happen
move to different jurisdiction where the government is not interested in e.g.
property rights? Or it is okay that just the natives of Thiefmark have their
stuff stolen by others? Can you go and take their stuff with you to Hobbiton,
given they live in Thiefmark and King Thiofden is not going to punish you for
that? What if the raiders of Rohan move to your neighborhood?

This is a different issue whether it makes sense or is productive in the long
term to fight against the Chinese law in some particular way. But sensible
ethical systems are universal.

~~~
Spooky23
I don't disagree, but I won't walk into the home of an acquaintance and tell
him why he's wrong either.

There's obviously a line there. But a computer company isn't going to win
against a police state.

------
bad_user
The fanboyism here is staggering.

------
shmerl
Money talks, human rights walks.

~~~
Bakary
Without a minimum threshold of money and power you can't maintain human
rights, let alone turn them into international norms.

~~~
shmerl
Isn't it the opposite case here? Lot's of power and money involved, while
human rights are violated.

------
honestoHeminway
Lets assume that censorship for any given tech is allready existing and tight.

That means censorship only will struggle when new tech arrives and deploys to
fast. This means, most vital for the fight against censorship is actually the
development of new tech that is censorship resistant. This means tech that is
not of the walled garden variety- tech that allows users to chose other
severs, circumvent the defaults, allows users to run a local service instead
of a centralized server. Tech that allows to draw copys of softwar without
central registration. Apple by beeing apple does harm to free speach right
there. The VPN removal is just the cherry on top.

~~~
d33
> Lets assume that censorship for any given tech is allready existing and
> tight.

That's an interesting assumption, though one could argue otherwise. How did
you come up with this reasoning?

------
mcappleton
I would hardly consider this "setting a precedent", given the fact that this
is standard practice for the Chinese government and any company who works
there.

