At this summer's HOPE conference, Joshua Aaron spoke about ICEBlock, his iPhone app that allows users to anonymously report ICE sightings within a 5 mile radius, and to get notifications when others report ICE sightings near them. You can see the full talk, and the lively/infuriating Q&A, here,
Pretty meaningless in the context of our current dictatorship.
Cell towers and GPS info don’t provide any information about what the user is doing on the device.
“They received an ICE block push” isn’t a meaningful piece of information compared to location. It’s already a targeted search. What do you think the government will do with that information?
Quite the opposite. Getting notifications from ICEBlock shows that they are potentially “fugitives” or “aiding and abetting criminals” or “targeting law enforcement”. These are not my words, these are words from the current federal administration. A random location tells them nothing about any of that activity.
We’ve reached the inevitable future where the govt is using any and all information they can get to target “criminals” and feeding them into databases and processing them with shitty AI in order to decide who they’re going to harass that day.
It’s still a targeted search, which may be bullshit but isn’t a trawling operation. If they’re targeting you, a demerit for simply having ICEBlock installed is the least of your worries. And if Apple goes full collaboration, then any “improper” app install is going to be a danger regardless of whether it’s pushing.
I’m telling you it’s not a “targeted search”, It’s an AI-generated output from a bullshit generator.
You don’t know that.
Also correct. But some apps are more sensitive than others.
Getting the information in the first place is a targeted search. Unless Apple goes full collaborator they will require a court order. They have already made the decision (for whatever reason) to target you.