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Comment by walterbell | Hacker News Reader

Apple should provide an option to opt-out of Siri "learn from app" for ALL applications.

At present, this must be done individually for every app, https://www.imore.com/how-stop-siri-learning-how-you-use-app.... When you later install new apps after setting up the device, you have to remember to go into Settings and opt-out again, for every app, forever.

How many people know that iOS devices will default to Siri reading plaintext for all apps, including E2EE messengers?

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It would be much better if I could just uninstall Siri. I don't want a voice assistant, and never have.

> It would be much better if I could just uninstall Siri. I don't want a voice assistant, and never have.

I just don't turn it on and so never use it.

Per the article, you are still using "Siri" (non-voice features), even if you never enabled Siri-for-voice: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39928357

Car Play will not enable with Siri turned off (at least in my 2019 Subaru).

Same here. I do think it makes some sense in that case.

I'm also in the situation where I use Siri for nothing, but I want to use CarPlay. I don't use the voice control for anything, in the car or otherwise. How does it make sense to force me to have Siri enabled?

There's a bunch of parts of CarPlay which assume you can use Siri. Interacting with notifications, sending / responding-to messages, searching for things in maps, etc. Apple could disable everything that would kick itself out to a Siri-interaction for input, but that'd probably feel confusingly-broken.

> Car Play will not enable with Siri turned off (at least in my 2019 Subaru).

I drive a 2003 Golf: there is no Car Play.

“Siri” (whatever it has morphed into) is a pervasive DWIM engine in iOS these days. When you do a search for an app Siri decides what to display (e.g. when I go to a certain location with a “smart” lock and pull down search, the app for that lock is always offered first, but never in other locations).

These days the voice part is just a UI mode. I use it on my watch and occasionally on my phone when I am wearing earbuds and my phone is in my pocket, but have it disabled on my Mac.

> DWIM

Siri is worse than Cortana in this respect…

> DWIM

Thanks, learnt something new! (It stands for Do What I Mean).

Interesting pages:

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DWIM 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_least_astonishmen...

"I don't want a voice assistant, and never have."

"It's not the customer's job to know what they want" -- Steve Jobs

I'd be happy to have a voice assistant that was actually smart. Every few months I ask Siri if it's powered by a language model yet. So far it hasn't even been able to understand the question.

Absolutely. One extremely annoying anti-feature is that to use CarPlay you must have Siri enabled.

> Apple should provide an option to opt-out of Siri "learn from app" for ALL applications.

You can.

Use the free Apple Configurator tool to generate a profile that has:

    - "Allow Siri" unchecked
    - "Allow Siri Suggestions" unchecked

Apple Configuratior is great. You can disable all sorts of things, e.g. iCloud access.

If your iPhone is on $org MDM, you can do the same on MDM.

The Apple Configurator is only allowed for a Managed Apple ID.

I was able to use Apple Configurator to put a phone into single app mode with a normal, non-developer ID.

Maybe there is a subset of things you can do?

> single-app mode

Isn’t that what “guided access” is for?

No. Guided access doesn’t work well for creating a control panel on a wall. I wanted it to boot into the app with no password.

Guided access is finicky and the failure modes are extremely bad for preventing random people from accessing things they shouldn’t.

The app won't even let me get past the login screen

> The Apple Configurator is only allowed for a Managed Apple ID.

Huh ? Its available freely via the App Store.

No restrictions whatsoever on who may download and use it.

I downloaded it and it won't let me do anything. When I try to login it says I need a managed Apple ID.

I've been using it for many years now, multiple installations on new macs and I've never seen such a thing.

I can only think it must be something specific to your setup.

Looking at the version I presently have installed, there is an Account menu and it says "sign in...", so I'm clearly not signed in.

Managed Apple ID seems to be some sort of MDM-style thing[1] , I've certainly never done that and no idea how it works ! I have always just used Apple Configurator in plain-vanilla mode.

[1] https://support.apple.com/guide/deployment/managed-apple-ids...

Ah, I understand my confusion now. I was trying to use the iOS version of the app. I'm using the macOS version now with my iPhone connected and it's working. Thanks for the advice! :D

>How many people know that iOS devices will default to Siri reading plaintext for all apps, including E2EE messengers?

Is there more on what Siri "learn from app" actually does? Does it scrape entire screen contents? Or just metadata? Or only what the app developer decides to send?

Apple can change this silently in the future, as long as it remains compatible with their T&C.

My understanding is that the "learn from app" setting relates to it watching out for NSUserActivity, which is something the app developer has to explicitly send out. The app developer is motivated to do so because NSUserActivity powers a lot of system-integration features.

https://developer.apple.com/documentation/foundation/nsusera...

Man I am really starting to hate these big tech companies. Everything they do is designed to be as invasive as possible.

The best solution is to set this as opt-in instead.

And not one with dark patterns where you are asked to opt-in multiple times at inconvenient moments.

I haven't setup an iPhone in a while, but last time I setup a Mac, it asked me to configure Siri or Skip/Later, etc. That's opt in to me.

From the article:

“The user is given the option to enable or not enable Siri, Apple's virtual assistant. But enabling only refers to whether you use Siri's voice control. Siri collects data in the background from other apps you use, regardless of your choice, unless you understand how to go into the settings and specifically change that”.

A concern with Siri is it sends your voice data to a server to parse. When Siri is disabled, what data is collected via third party apps? I would imagine any time you use voice as a command in an app the iPhone send the data to a server to parse, even in third party apps. Is that the concern, or is it other data?

"Siri" is not just the voice assistant, Apple also uses that designation for other "intelligent" features, like "Siri Suggestions" [0]. The related personal information is shared across devices via Apple servers. Apple states that any analytics shared with Apple are anonymized [1], but users may still prefer to not share analytics in the first place. However, that can't be opted out globally, it can only be disabled per app [0]. Except maybe by turning off Siri in iCloud [2]? It's not clear. That's the criticism, it's difficult for users to understand what settings are enabling or disabling what exactly. It's quite complicated overall, and difficult to tell what you are and aren't sharing.

[0] https://support.apple.com/guide/iphone/about-siri-suggestion...

[1] https://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/data/en/siri-suggestions...

[2] https://support.apple.com/guide/iphone/tell-siri-about-yours...

Opt-in patterns are only for 3rd party apps, not for Apple themselves. One rules for me, others for thee.

You can just disable Siri if you're that concerned?

Edit: Turns out — you can't! See the reply below.

From the article:

  The user is given the option to enable or not enable Siri, Apple's virtual assistant. But enabling only refers to whether you use Siri's voice control. Siri collects data in the background from other apps you use, regardless of your choice, unless you understand how to go into the settings and specifically change that,’ says Lindqvist.

You're right, I somehow missed that paragraph — I swear I read the article before commenting.

Not condoning or anything, but perhaps the thinking is that, if the user can re-enabling siri at a later date, they don't want siri to start with no memory?

If/when a user actively consents to "learn from app", it's no different than setting up a new device, e.g. mail downloaded from IMAP server, data transferred from old device, or from cloud services.

Now imagining a EULA for Helpful Pre-Stalking..

Why would you think that?

If I enable some personal assistant at some point in time, I absolutely do expect it to start with no memory.

The problem is that 'Siri' is a pretty ill-defined term that Apple sprinkles onto a bunch of unrelated features if they have anything that sort of looks like 'learning' if you squint hard enough.

It’s so strange they do that, given that Siri doesn’t have good rep!

> You can just disable Siri if you're that concerned?

Apple fights you from disabling Siri as much as they can. I've tried to disable Siri multiple times, but it turns off other unrelated features/services, so it's basically impossible.

For example, if you're using CarPlay, it's required that Siri is enabled, even if you don't use the voice controls.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com