Are Live Photos a Spy Tactic?

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This blog will be a continuation of last weeks blog but focusing on live photos. Live photos were a feature that was released in 2015 alongside the release of the iPhone 6s (Loyola). Live photos is feature that allows users to see the moments before, during, and after the still photo was taken. These three second clips also included sound therefore a mini video was saved every time a live photo was taken The feature allows users to how they and their friends got ready and posed, it is entertaining when taking silly group photos.

 

How to Turn off Live Photos

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Despite the perceived positive aspects, the drawbacks may be overlooked. There are a few purely mechanical reasons to not utilize the live photo feature. Live photos take up a lot of data, if someone captures a lot of photos while this feature is enabled, they will run out of storage more quickly than if it was not enabled. When users try to take live photos in poor quality lighting, these photos take up even more space because the camera is forced to stay open longer in order to capture more more light (Moon). Lastly the live photo software is not compatible with all software which means users may not be able to view their photos on other platforms. These are the mechanical problems and may not affect all users but there is a sinister side to this conspiracy.

 

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In part one of Youtuber, Shane Dawson’s, two part conspiracy video, he explored the live photo feature on iPhones. When he showed this feature to his friends, they were surprised that it recorded the moments before and after the photo was taken including the audio (their extreme reactions could be for the sake of the video). Further into the scene, Shane states that Apple released a statement saying they are always listening/recording but the data goes away unless you save it. Shane then suggests that the data both from Siri and the live photos is saved into a database. As suggested in my previous blog, this information can then be sold to third parties for advertising purposes. Shane also proposes that the photo and auto data may be used as a form of blackmail for hackers.

 

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If hackers obtain the audio and videos they can hold that information against you in order to obtain money. iCloud, as storage service provided by Apple, has previously been hacked and the private photos of everyday people were released to the public. Therefore it is plausible that hackers would use a similar tactic for monetary gain.

 

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Shane also explains how the combination of this technology and the face scanning technology if iPhone X’s and other apps available in the Apple app store such as. Snapchat and Zepeto, have given people the ability to make it seem like anyone said anything. There is technology available to the public that allows them to use audio clips of any person’s voice as well as photos of them to make it appear as they are saying things they may or may not normally say in an internet video. As always, theories like this bring up the question of “when will technology go too far?”

 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradmoon/2016/11/11/how-and-why-to-turn-off-live-photos-on-your-iphone/#3d5fa65b1600

One thought on “Are Live Photos a Spy Tactic?

  1. I think this is entirely possible. There’s too many stories of people getting ads for things that they’ve never searched up, which makes me think that data is definitely being sold to third parties. I think it’s really creepy how Apple admitted that iPhones are constantly listening, and I think it further demonstrates how technology interferes with our privacy.

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