On Tuesday, Apple CEO Tim Cook called for a comprehensive, national privacy law in the United States at the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) Global Privacy Summit in Washington, DC.
Cook has sued for the fundamental role of data privacy in the quality of life – as well as the law that it will and will not.
Self-proclaimed data privacy activist has pushed back another bill, strictly against the Open App Markets Act. Apple claims that this is because the data is under threat of privacy. The Open App Markets Act, designed to reduce Apple’s hold on the App Store, will compromise user privacy by making user data less secure, he said.
First introduced in August by Senators Amy Cloboucher (D-MN), Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), the Open App Markets Act will bar Apple (and Google) from allowing third-party apps. . Owned App Store.
If the bill becomes law, these “big tech giants” will be required for competitive gatekeeping of their app stores by allowing “sideloading” from third party app stores. The idea is to promote consumer preferences by giving startup apps a chance to compete in the market.
But the Open App Markets bill would take bad actors, malware and ransomware to the red carpet, Cook said. Cook likened the threat to a series of ransomware incidents involving malware in the guise of the Covid-19-tracking app, and the harassment of Android users by stealing important data.
According to Cook, the Open App Markets Act will bring the same danger to iPhone users. “Privacy and security may not be secure,” Cook insisted. “Taking away a safer option makes people have less choice, not more.”
To put it bluntly, “Apple believes in competition,” Cook insisted. “We value innovation and its role in pushing us forward [as a society]”While the sponsors have a pure motive, the unintended consequences of forcing them to allow unexpected apps on iPhones will be profound,” he said.
Cook’s speech came in the wake of the App Store opening bill. In February, the Senate Judiciary Committee decided to pass the law in a landslide vote (20-2). And in March, the EU followed suit with a similar Digital Markets Act.
Federal Privacy Act
Calling for a federal privacy law, Cook said a national data privacy law would create a check on the power of new technologies.
“Man cannot evade his moral responsibility by weakly blabbering on, ‘The machine did it to me,'” he said. “Technology will continue to shape our world, but social impact is not predetermined. Technology has the potential to enrich [society] And [fuel] Innovation without invading human life – the loss of privacy is not inevitable. “
One might say that technology does not hurt people; People hurt people.
Cook stressed that the answer lies in a law at the federal level, applauding the European Union’s GDPR as well as Brazil’s rival, the LGPD.
Cook has previously used industry conferences to advocate for a national privacy law, including an industry conference in October 2018 in which the GDPR came into force the same year.
Without data privacy, the world would find itself in a “data industrial complex” where anyone’s data could be stolen with impunity in the name of providing services, he said. Businesses that rely on certain amounts of data – such as advertising – “do not need our permission to dig deep into our personal lives,” he said.
He likened data privacy breaches to real-life attacks and abuses. “Imagine if there was a stranger following your every move with the camera while taking your child to school, or watching your every keystroke from behind you. You don’t call it a service – you call it urgent. “
This is why Apple maximizes the amount of data processed directly at the device level and prefers end-to-end encryption of its users’ data “without a back door.” Not to mention last year’s rollout of Apple’s Apptracking Transparency (ATT) framework for blocking apps using software development kits (SDKs) that integrates developer data with third-party user data for ad targeting (which Facebook Reiling sent).
The path to a national privacy law will not be easy, but Cook argues that the means justify the latter.
“As much as we can lose in the world without privacy, I know how much we can gain if we get this right,” he said.