Breach in Privacy – Apple FaceTime Glitch: Kaitlin Jean-Noel – Week 4 Post 1

Attention all Apple iPhone and iPad owners:

If you haven’t heard of Apple’s newest error, you must be living under a rock. News spread all over social media on Monday, January 28, 2019, about the FaceTime bug that allows callers to eavesdrop on whoever they are calling. When the user calls someone they are able to hear live audio of the person on the other end of the call before they even accept the call. The recipient of the call will not even be notified that the caller can hear them because their screen remains on the incoming call alert screen. If the recipient attempts to dismiss the call by pressing the volume button, the caller will be able to view live video of the recipient.

The bug seems to be affecting users with products running on iOS12.1 and macOS Mojave or anything newer – the updated version that allows group FaceTime.

Apple released a statement saying that they are working hard to fix the error. As for right now, the group FaceTime feature is unavailable to all users. But if you are still worried of breaches in your privacy, you can disable FaceTime completely. This can be done by going to Settings > FaceTime > the sliding the button to the right to disable the FaceTime feature. For Macs, users can open the FaceTime app, click FaceTime on the menu bar to reveal the drop-down menu, and clicking ‘Turn FaceTime Off’. Apple hopes to have this error fixed by the end of the week.

When we discuss the IoT, one of the main concerns is always privacy. Well, our fears are becoming a reality. Many people have been joking about going back to flip phones and I just might be down for that. I miss my slider phone and I don’t think it would invade my privacy as my iPhone did.

 

Sources:

https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/28/tech/apple-face-time-bug/index.html

https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/1/29/18202057/apple-facetime-bug-how-to-fix-video-eavesdrop

4 thoughts on “Breach in Privacy – Apple FaceTime Glitch: Kaitlin Jean-Noel – Week 4 Post 1

  1. I did not hear about this glitch until recently, and I am very glad I was able to find out more information about it by reading your post. This is an issue that affects me directly because I am an iPhone user. It is scary to think that my privacy is at jeopardy. I have used the group facetime with my friends, and wonder if someone has overheard me. After this issue was discovered by a teenage boy, his family immediately went to contact Apple. However, Apple did not answer their complaints for about five days. This is concerning in itself. Apple was made aware of a privacy flaw and did not act right away. Apple finally addressed the problem after an article was published on a popular user’s site. Apple should have taken care of this problem when it was first found. This makes me become more aware of my privacy of a user and the potential problems that can arise from using different technology. I hope Apple releases the update that will fix this issue as soon as possible. I think it was interesting and important how Kaitlin tied this into the IoT. Safety and security are most definitely one of the major issues found with the Internet of Things.

    Perlroth, Nicole (2019, January 29) “Apple Was Slow to Act on FaceTime Bug That Allows Spying on iPhone”
    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/29/technology/facetime-glitch-apple.html

  2. I believe that technology innovation will always have to be in balance with privacy and security issues. People have always worried that Apple’s devices- iPads, iPhones, Macs, etc- with cameras and FaceTime could be used by hackers. However, now it’s becoming a real concern. It’s interesting because when I look around in my classes at peoples computers, most of them have covered the camera with a stickie note of some sort. I live my life assuming I’m always on camera. For now, I will disable FaceTime which is unfortunate because that is how people connect with relatives and friends around the world. This especially affects me because I have a 9-year-old sister at home and facetime is how I communicate with her while I’m away at college. I hope Apple fixes this bug soon so we can feel safe again.

  3. Hi Kaitlin! I actually have not heard about this glitch, so I am happy you brought attention to it in this blog. I have a couple of things that I thought of that built off of this finding. Firstly, I wonder what the legal ramifications of this are. In class, we have talked a lot about how legislation has not truly caught up to technology yet. Would the this fall under invasion of privacy? Copyright laws? Unlawful technology breaches? Who would be at fault? Apple? The software engineers? The subsidiaries that test the software? Secondly, I wonder what information has been leaked due to this glitch. Some things are harmless, like my mom finding out I don’t want to take her call. However, others can have serious consequences. What happens if a government official was purposefully on the receiving end of one of these invasions? How long has this been going on? Who was privy to this knowledge? Lastly, I wonder what they will do in the meantime while fixing the glitch. I think a FaceTime update should be sent out reverting this app’s software back to the previous version. Hopefully this will mitigate the damage.

  4. Hi Kaitlin,
    I remember seeing this the other day and it being the top trending issue on Twitter for the entire day. Of course, I was instantly fearful of the lack of privacy that Apple was creating in their users lives. I instantly tested this out for myself and found that my phone for some reason did not have this bug. I would consider that luck of the draw but this bug did make me think about the privacy issues we deal with when purchasing technology. I could only think of all of the things on the iPhone that can be used to spy on us consumers. Whether it be this FaceTime bug or phone tapping or the use of cameras on Snapchat to analyze our faces for crime, privacy is always going to be a big concern for consumers who are slowly evolving in the Internet of Things market. I found an article on TheSpectrum that talks about a study conducted at Northwestern University on the way that phones can spy on you. According to the article, some apps can send your video, audio or screenshots to third parties in ways we may not have been expecting. This sending of our data to third parties is often for advertisers and app developers. However, the fact that applications can do this without the user’s consent is terrifying. I think that this will continue to grow as a new topic of study in the technological world and it will benefit us as citizens to be vigilant about what we are letting on our phones or how we contact people.

    Source:https://www.thespectrum.com/story/life/features/2018/07/08/new-study-says-your-phone-spies-on-you-just-not-in-the-way-you-think/36675727/

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