Hacker News Reader

Comment by Frederation | Hacker News Reader

If Apple had the wherewithall, theyd give up on the UK and be done with it. Should they not prevail legally. Pipe dream, I know.

View on HN

I never get this perspective. Firstly we do give them a crap load of revenue. Secondly it'd probably trash any of their non US business almost immediately as people start looking for contingency in case they pull out of other countries. Thirdly they didn't pull out of China. And fourthly there are a lot of Apple engineering staff here in the UK - it'd cripple them because they won't move to the US.

They will comply with the law and make a lot of noise and not a lot else.

How can a company the size of Apple be crippled by employees in the UK?

Literally a large chunk of the ARM core team are in Cambridge including most of the GPU folk and there are a ton of infra and software team in a couple of other UK locations.

On top of that, a big chunk of the follow the sun on call engineering (SRE) are here that look after global infra and most of the European support operation are in Northern Ireland.

Fruit Engineering Ltd. hires brits and contracts with offshore Apple Inc. The former does not have the keys and cannot be forced to do anything iCloud-side.

It's not like corporate doesn't know all the tricks already. The only reason they need is whether the UK market is worth the hassle. That's all.

Define a “crapload.” My understanding is that it’s actually a number that could be walked away from.

8000 staff including very high level engineering and technical.

Isn't that potentially devastating to the UK, not Apple in the long run? Choosing to walk away from the market in terms of supplying goods does not mean needing to walk away from high level engineering staff.

Of course, you may mean these staff are only required to service the UK market...but it sounds like you mean they are valuable to Apple, at which point I am unsure as to why they would not be retained/shifted as appropriate.

Also my apologies, I assumed revenue here. Also thank you, I had not considered staffing, but it makes sense.

Yes it’s more critical staff. And it’s more a cultural thing. I know a couple of Apple folk and they will definitely not relocate to retain the job. Especially in the current political climate.

You don’t actually need as much money to survive in the UK as the US for example. So there isn’t the motivator to retain high level salaries other than luxury.

It would be “no thanks” and take a 30% cut to go and work somewhere else.

> Yes it’s more critical staff. And it’s more a cultural thing.

Ah yup, that 100% makes sense and I don't know why I didnt consider it. I should no more than anyone the value of more "key staff" as it were, and the impact a shock to those kind of staff can have.

> You don’t actually need as much money to survive in the UK as the US for example. So there isn’t the motivator to retain high level salaries other than luxury.

I did not know this, I am over in AU and don't know that much about the UK to be honest. I've only heard things in passing about London really and even then all ive heard is "VERY EXPENSIVE, RENT BAD" so thats super interesting.

> It would be “no thanks” and take a 30% cut to go and work somewhere else.

Yes, good for them too. I have taken (including recently) such pay cuts because I have strong opinions of where I will work, or who I will work with.

Thanks for coming back to answer my questions, I found it super informative. I didnt intend to sound aggressive in my first response so i'm glad you did!

The Apple engineer staff can keep their jobs.

The perspective is that if Apple bricks its devices for a couple days in the UK the pitchforks will come out considering they have the moral high ground and the better marketing team to pitch it to the general population.

Whether it's good for a US corpo to interfere with the stable 1984 progression of the UK is another issue. If I were in a decision making position at Apple I wouldn't want to bother with this either. Just take the easy marketing W and move on. Maybe prepare a plan for market exit just in case they're not satisfied with disabling encryption and demand a global backdoor.

What happens when Australia blocks this next? Then Japan? Then Brazil? Then Sweden? Then the US?

"What if every country on Earth violated everyone's rights" isn't really much of an argument against standing up to countries that try. If that actually happens then we're all screwed anyway. Until it does actually happen, why roll over and allow it to happen without even trying?

If Apple gives in, it will certainly happen in dozens of countries. China alone would be a dealbreaker.

Apple gave in to China years ago. Apple gave operation of iCloud servers to a chinese company.

According to Apple, everything in their system still works the same and they still have control of their own hardware, even if it’s in a Chinese data center. Systems like iMessage are still fully end-to-end encrypted even in China. Maybe they’re lying but it would be a huge opportunity for devastating leaks if that’s true.

    > Systems like iMessage are still fully end-to-end encrypted even in China.

I do wonder about this. How can an authoritarian state allow a (very!) large foreign corporation to operate an important communications network without data transparency to their domestic spy agency? I am not normally a tin-foil-hatter, but I just assume that the domestic spy agency has a copy of the private encryption keys used for HTTPS/TLS. Then, Apple can continue to advertise "end-to-end encrypted" (in Mainland China), but the local spies can read the comms.

The simplest answer to your question is "it exists" and "iMessage isn't important," but instead, you chose to write a whole fiction for your brain. If that's critical thinking, I'd call it hallucination.

See, I don't see just withdrawing from the country as 'standing up to'. It's just giving up in a more disruptive way, especially when It seems very likely to me that other countries will start demanding the same.

Actually taking them to court and objecting seems more productive to me.

> I don't see just withdrawing from the country as 'standing up to'. It's just giving up in a more disruptive way...actually taking them to court and objecting seems more productive to me.

"objecting" alone does nothing. Objecting + lawsuits or objecting + withdrawing might accomplish something.

I'd agree that lawsuits are a good idea but they are also entirely dependent on the courts (of the same country that already wants to violate people's rights) to do the right thing. If the lawsuit works and the government forces the government to back off it's a good thing, but if not a company keeps the power to take their technology and leave. They can choose to do that regardless of what the laws or courts of another country thinks.

Walking away might be seen as a company "giving up" on the corrupt country that wants to violate people's rights, but it's certainly not a company giving up on their principles. A nation full of people angry that they won't be able to get highly sought after products and services can change policy too.

I wish this issue were playing out in Australia right now, rather than the UK. It would be hilarious to see Apple walk out of the Australian market right before a federal election.

I wish they placed a red warning on every phone instead: "Your government is forcing us to weaken your security because it wants to snoop on you."

One of the problems of digital surveillance is that is doesn't feel intrusive, indeed it can be fully hidden from the users. With a message like this displayed every time you unlock your phone, plenty of people would start asking questions.

> red warning on every phone instead

This is silly. The average consumer will just avoid Apple products.

> "Your government is forcing us to weaken your security because it wants to snoop on you."

They're not allowed to actually tell you about the UKGOV order. That's the point of it being a secret order.

And yet

Apple can't discuss any of the details, but I'm sure they could point their customers to a person who can.

"This feature is no longer available in the UK.

For further information, contact:

Mr Xxxxx Yyyyyy

UK Home Office

02070 xxx xxx

xxxxx.yyyy@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk"

> Mr Xxxxx Yyyyyy

*Mrs

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_Secretary

Isnt that their soft plan? They plan on just removing the encryption for all UK users to make the point moot domestically if this gambit doesnt bare fruit. If they want to continue to push that they want it for all users globally, Apple can attempt to leave the market fully.

Apple pulls data protection tool after UK government security row (bbc.com) - 1769 points , 1105 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43128253

I hope for the same. Likely not for the same reason as you, but we are together in hoping.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com