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Apple announced dramatic new privacy and security measures at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference.
The latest updates include Apple’s changes to its own browser, Safari, and its own communication tools, as well as its privacy and security expectations of third-party app developers.
The company hopes to make it easier for Apple users to browse the web without being tracked and to protect children who communicate online through Apple products, among other upgrades.
Brand new features were also promised, including Live Voicemail, which will give iPhone owners a live transcription of voicemails – as they come in – so users can privately decide whether to answer the call.
Apple’s announcement said the new features represent the company’s “deeply held belief” that “privacy is a fundamental human right.”
Apple CEO Tim Cook at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2023, the annual event marking this week’s announcement of the company’s new security and privacy updates
Speaking at the event, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering, Craig Federighi, said of the updates, “Privacy is built into every new Apple product and feature from the start.”
“We’re focused on keeping our users in the driver’s seat when it comes to their data,” said Federighi, “by continuing to provide industry-leading privacy features and the best data security in the world.”
Federighi touted major updates to Safari’s Private Browsing options and an expansion of Lockdown Mode as specific examples.
Launched last July, Lockdown Mode is a feature unique to Apple products that dramatically reduces the likelihood of hacking by making certain features and apps useless.
Here’s what Apple users can expect when the major update comes out this fall.
Safari private browsing
Apple boasts its track record as the market leader in “private mode” options for web browsing and hopes to maintain that lead.
At WWDC 2023 this week, the company announced further protection against both automated web trackers and more human threats from people who may have access to an Apple user’s device.
“Advanced protection against tracking and fingerprinting,” the company says, will prevent websites from using the latest techniques to identify a user’s device and track their browsing habits.
One feature in this vein, “Link Tracking Protection,” automatically locates and removes additional code embedded in web page URL links, which sites have used to track Internet users across websites, email clients, and app services. (Link Tracking Protection also applies to Apple Mail and programs other than Safari.)
The company says Safari Private Browsing will soon have a new feature that locks browser windows when not in use, allowing customers to keep their tabs open and secure even when they move away from their screens.
Safari Private Browsing will soon have a feature that locks browser windows when not in use, so customers can keep their tabs open and secure even when they move away from their screens
Communication security
Apple’s parental controls, “Communication Safety,” which previously included software designed to alert children when their device might be sending or receiving photos in messages that contain nudity, has been upgraded to identify video as well.
The feature will now also be more widely applicable across Apple’s operating systems, keeping kids safe while using AirDrop, FaceTime video messaging, and when using the Photo Picker to decide which of their own content to send.
To further ensure privacy and protection, this full safety feature is automated and processed on the personal device itself, meaning Apple or any third-party app never has access to personal data.
Parents have the final say on which devices and accounts in their Family Sharing plan have Communication Safety enabled.
And the company offers app developers a new API that allows them to seamlessly integrate their own app’s features with Communication Safety.
Apple will soon add “Sensitive Content Warnings” option in iMessage, AirDrop, FaceTime and elsewhere so Apple users can avoid seeing “unwanted nude photos and videos”
Aside from the kids, Apple also says it will soon offer the option for “Sensitive Content Warnings” in iMessage, AirDrop, FaceTime, and elsewhere for adult users, so all Apple customers can avoid “unwanted nude photos and videos.” to see.
Live Voicemail
Apple wants to make it easier for iPhone owners to know when answering a call is okay.
Their answer is Live Voicemail, an upcoming feature that will provide a live transcript of an incoming voicemail.
It is securely generated on the iPhone using Apple’s Neural Engine, a network of processors designed for machine learning tasks.
iPhone owners can read a voicemail message as it arrives and make an informed decision on whether or not to record it.
Unknown callers go directly to Live Voicemail without ringing if the user enables the Silence Unknown Callers setting. Apple’s press release states that calls flagged as spam by carriers don’t show up in Live Voicemail at all, but are instead immediately hung up.
Lockdown mode
The relatively new ‘Lockdown Mode’ feature was designed for Apple users whose privacy needs – because of their celebrity, work, activism or other characteristics – were considerably more extreme.
The Lockdown Mode updates maintain that spirit and provide even more protection for individuals who, in the company’s words, “could be targeted by rental spyware because of who they are or what they do.”
New protections coming to Lockdown mode include the ability to set stricter wireless connectivity defaults, expanded protections around media handling and sharing, and the ability to test (‘sandbox’) certain suspicious programs.
Among these and more improvements, Lockdown mode is coming to Apple Watch watchOS soon.
App privacy improvements
Not content with making its own hardware and software secure, Apple said it will release new tools to app developers and more detailed information about the data practices of third-party software development kits (SDKs) used for their platforms.
According to Apple, this information will help third-party developers provide consumers with more accurate “Privacy Nutrition Labels” before they choose to purchase and download their software products.
“These changes also improve software supply chain integrity by supporting signatures for third-party SDKs,” Apple noted. in his announcement“to add another layer of protection against abuse.”
Apple reminded its customers that all of these new privacy and security upgrades will be “free software updates” when they arrive this fall.