Techlore Talks Apple Confirms Government Spies on Notifications!
Dec 14, 2023
The podcast discusses the government's collection of data from Apple and Google push notifications, exciting updates from the Tor Project, Simple Tools selling out, involvement at the Bitwarden conference, and the importance of external validation in completing a course.
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Push Architecture Exposes Metadata
- Push notifications route through Apple or Google so apps avoid continuous background connections for battery reasons.
- That architecture gives platform providers visibility into notification metadata and timing even when message content is encrypted.
Choose Apps That Protect Notification Content
- Use apps that encrypt or locally generate notification content, like Proton Mail or Signal, to block platform access to message bodies.
- Prefer clients that send blank push notifications and build the visible alert on-device when possible.
Timing Metadata Is Sensitive
- Even when notification content is encrypted, Apple/Google can still see which apps you use and when you receive notifications.
- That timing and app-usage metadata can be exploited to infer group membership or activity patterns.