HN Explorer

Ask HN: Will Apple, Google, Amazon and Others Install Backdoors for Australia?

49 points by andrewstuart ↗ HN
New legislation requires companies to secretly install backdoors if the government asks or risk multi million dollar fines.

Will Apple, Google, and Amazon install Australian backdoors?

Or will they just exit the country?

23 comments

[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 66.8 ms ] thread
bufferoverflow
It's an interesting situation. I wonder if Apple will bend over and give up user's privacy, or will exit Australian markets.

Google and Amazon will definitely sell out the users.

(and I'm not an Apple user)

hndamien
I really hope Apple leave, otherwise they have no significant distinguishing feature.
jamesholden
One thing I do respect about Apple is that they do try and protect their users.
alpaca128
As long as it's not their wallets/right to repair, and their users don't live in China, then yes.
Queenie_15
Apple already operate data centres in China without privacy controls - seemingly happy to provide full government access in exchange for access to a lucrative market. Google currently have no operations in China.
londons_explore
Apple's users in China don't have an expectation of privacy. Chinese consumers have never had a web service offer privacy, and therefore don't expect it. Apple running a priavcy-less service in China isn't violating the users expectations, as long as they don't ever claim it's private or secure.

Australian users however do expect privacy. They do expect that their chat messages will only be read by the recipient and not the government.

tinus_hn
Apple servers in China are accessed by the same clients as Apple servers in the US. They don’t get to see the things Apple servers in de US don’t get to see.

They get to see a lot and what happens with that is up to the Chinese government, just as it is up to the US government what happens to what the US servers see.

throw_me_baby
Not really. They offloaded those data centers to 3p controllers. They refused backdoors publicly for the US, so likely they'd either exit publicly or create an "Aussie iCloud" like china.
adventured
There's a third option. Force the Australian government into a showdown in which they have to ban Apple devices and services from all of Australia (via the telecom carriers). Don't leave willingly, stand by the people of Australia until you can't any longer; don't harm your customers willingly, make the government harm them by physically revoking market access. That would have the benefit of producing a very public demonstration of what's actually happening.
Insanity
Well, Google wanted to run their software in China until their employees disagreed :)

So maybe it depends on the employees?

Either way, anything we'd comment would just be speculation.

jamesholden
They are looking at ways to clamp down on leaks and stuff internally from what I hear. They will just get better at hiding projects from the employees going forward.
acct1771
Compartmentalization has worked for intelligence agencies looking to stop their agents from putting the whole moral puzzle together.

Why not Google?

jamesholden
This is a good question. I'm very curious to see the impact this has too. Personally I am appalled that this legislation went through. Very scary precedent.

I want to think Australia shot itself in the foot here, if big companies will be exiting or if Australian developers are looked over for projects because they don't want to deal with this backdoor BS.

acutesoftware
The way the law reads, we won't know if they have installed backdoors for Australia as they aren't allowed to notify people about it.

Mind you, if they all exited the country - along with Netflix and Facebook then I'd imagine the bulk of Australia would suddenly take a serious interest in it and the law would get revoked.

pleasecalllater
Yes, of course. Censorship for China, backdoors for Australia, espionage for USA, lies for the rest of the world. Unfortunately the only thing that counts is money. We are just providers of information they sell.
draugadrotten
Under the Five Eyes partnership, isn't this just a law passed so that Australian citizens can be forced to install backdoors on behalf of the US.

The CIA is said to not spy on American citizens domestic activities, but ASIS and ASD can do that for them.

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

marsRoverDev
I think that the best solution here would be for the major players to go dark together for a day or two. No Google, no Bing, no WhatsApp, no Facebook.

I say this as an Australian developer who relies on these services to communicate with family back home. The Australian market is so small that these companies could do it, and I think that it would have the desired effect. Australia is a country which requires these services, and if every single citizen was suddenly without these facilities then something would be done about the problem.

Right now, the average person in Australia is not informed about the changes, and they do not know the impact it will have on them long term. It needs to be brought into sharp focus.

That is of course, if these companies actually see it as a threat to them - which is up in the air.

shard972
> Right now, the average person in Australia is not informed about the changes, and they do not know the impact it will have on them long term. It needs to be brought into sharp focus.

I feel like there has been a decent amount of coverage on this topic as it was a main subject in the final sitting days in the year and you had the labor opposition ceding their "no" position.

Maybe it's not fully explained technically to everyone, but people generally understand that encryption is generally ubiquitous on the internet.

I think in the end alot of people actually don't mind the idea that the government should have some power to snoop on someone they think is doing bad things. They understand to varying degrees what kind of abuse that will lead to, but just don't see the inherit dangers ever applying to them or someone they know.

shanghaiaway
Yes, they will install backdoors. We just won't know about it.
alpaca128
We WILL know about it if their services continue to be available in Australia.
mmjaa
Not just Australia - the UK too, don't forget.
bigbluedots
They can comply, or they can block Australian users from their services. I really hope it's the latter, as the Australian public largely doesn't know about this law and maybe wouldn't care if it did.