- Advanced Data Protection.
Advanced Data Protection.
Advanced Data Protection is our most advanced form
of protection for customers' personal data in iCloud.
- [Joanna] There he is, Apple's lead data security guard.
Okay, fine.
Senior Vice president of software engineering.
And he's announcing the company's new, yes.
- An Advanced Data Protection.
- Or what most techie people know
as end-to-end encryption,
a security feature to keep our data more secure.
Apple will soon offer end-to-end encryption
to most of iCloud, including backups of your device
and messages, photos, notes, and more.
It's a big step, which privacy groups
have called on the company to make for years.
What took so long?
- Some of the steps we took
over a decade ago in designing iCloud
and the way we encrypt it,
were necessary precursors to build toward this moment.
And using end-to-end encryption for the other types of data
like passwords and browser history and so forth,
helped prove out that technology.
- [Joanna] What technology is that exactly?
I asked Federighi to break down all of this,
and the bigger implications of security tools like this.
Can we take a picture here, a little selfie?
Allow me to explain end-to-end encryption with a photo.
Can I get like a bunny fingers?
- Sure.
I can't see where my fingers are, but. (chuckling)
- Okay, now this photo lives in my iCloud Photos account.
With Apple's standard data protection,
which is what we all have now,
the photo is encrypted by the device
with a key that can unencrypt or unlock the photo.
All that is encrypted while it goes to Apple's server.
And Apple holds a key that can recover the photo.
If hackers got access to Apple's servers
and that key, they could see the photo.
But if I had Apple's Advanced Data Protection turned on,
that selfie would be end-to-end encrypted,
meaning Apple doesn't have the key at all
and can't see or unlock that photo.
- Well now with Advanced Data Protection,
we're giving users the option to keep that key
only on their devices,
which means that even if an attacker
were to successfully breach the Cloud
and access all that data, they'd lack the key to decrypt it.
- So you'll never see that photo, Craig?
- We do not wanna see your photo.
- [Joanna] Which gets to one of the biggest issues
Apple's had with end-to-end encryption, data recovery.
If you can't get into your device,
you wouldn't be able to access your data
because you're the only one with the key now.
Apple doesn't have it.
- But there are incidences and, you know,
we do see it happen where customers
not only lose their device,
they also forget their device passcode.
- Oh, yes. It's like you've met my mother-in-law.
- (chuckling) Well, I think we all have those. Yeah.
And so in that case, if your mother-in-law had set up
you, say, as her recovery contact,
you would actually be able,
with information you couldn't use directly,
but that you could use to assist her,
you'd be able to help her recover her data
that was protected with Advanced Data Protection.
- [Joanna] Apple requires you set up
a backup recovery method in case you need to recover
end-to-end encrypted data.
One option, a Recovery Contact where you can set up a friend
or family member to assist you with recovering info.
There's also a Recovery Key option,
so you can generate a key
that you can print out and keep in a secure location.
While Apple already had end-to-end encryption
on services like Health and iCloud Key Chain,
the company's now bringing it to a total of 23 services,
but you'll have to turn it on yourself.
Why not make this something that's turned on by default?
- A user activating this feature
is taking on an additional responsibility.
They're taking on responsibility for their data recovery,
for setting up a Recovery Contact
or securing a Recovery Key.
All users may not be ready or willing to do that.
- With this sort of encryption enabled,
companies, even under court order,
cannot hand over user data
because they technically can't even get it themselves.
End-to-end encryption has long been great for user privacy
but awful for law enforcement and governments
who are trying to get their hands on data
to help investigate crimes.
Is this something that weighed into Apple's decision
as you roll this out?
- We deeply appreciate the work of law enforcement
and support the work of law enforcement.
We view that we're really have the same mission at heart,
which is to keep people safe.
Ultimately, keeping customers' data safe
has big implications on our safety more broadly.
There's sensitive information
that were an ill-intentioned attacker,
whether that be a foreign adversary or organized crime
to get access to information of our political leaders
or others who have particular secrets,
or access to systems, could be disastrous for us all.
And so we see this as important
to accomplishing the the mission we share,
which is to keep users safe.
- End-to-end encrypted iCloud backups will come to US users
before the end of the year and be released globally in 2023.
Does that include China?
- Oh yeah, we believe so.
We wanna roll out across the world.
- Do you know how the Chinese government feels about this?
- They have not told me.
- In 2020, Reuters reported that Apple dropped plans
to let iPhone users fully encrypt their backups
after the FBI complained
that the move would harm investigations.
Was this at all part of Apple's delay?
- No, you know, I've heard that rumor,
but I don't know where it came from.
- In addition to all of this,
Apple's also introduced
a new Message Contact Key Verification,
which further verifies the sender and receiver
for those who require extreme security.
You can also now use a hardware security key
made by other companies, such as Yubico,
to authenticate your Apple account.
What's the prompt for all these new security features?
How much of it is aimed at Pegasus and other recent attacks?
- As customers have put more and more
of their personal information of their lives
into their devices, these have become more and more
the subject of attacks by advanced actors.
The only way to ultimately secure against these things
is to stay one step ahead of the attackers.
- [Joanna] The next step, though, lies with us
and whether we decide to turn on Advanced Data Protection.