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Comment by drnick1 | Hacker News Reader

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

What is your point? If anything, PRISM argues that Apple users are more secure; it took the NSA a solid five years longer to work their way into Apple. But at this point, every provider is compromised, every country is compromised, so again - what is your point? The government knows a lot about everyone, it has nothing to do with choice of computing platform.

It is also worth noting that the USA is not the only country collecting data on US persons (and everyone else.)

The question is not, does the USA know about you, the question is really, how many governments know all about you and how does that information manifest in your life?

> But at this point, every provider is compromised

Yes, and its probably fair to assume that Apple and/or the government can access any of your files on your devices or in the cloud. My suggestion is not to use any "provider." Use free software, and keep your data locally on encrypted drives.

Unfortunately, that isn't good enough. Any government has a library of exploits in free software, and there are many documented cases of this. Your encrypted files are only as good as the clients that access them, and that's where the weaknesses lie. Along with the traditional aspects of surveillence, of course. "Amateurs hack systems; professionals hack people."

For the vast majority of people, the hassle simply isn't worth it, especially when the massive reduction in convenience is paired with basically no improvement in security.

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