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Don’t Just Call It Blockchain: Apple’s New AI Privacy Technology Explained
Apple is taking a deep dive into artificial intelligence with its new Apple Intelligence suite of functionality on iPhone, iPad and Mac. While some requests, with user permission, will be routed to OpenAI’s ChatGPT, a senior executive says Apple’s AI services rely on a “blockchain” model to ensure user privacy.
But what does it really mean? After Apple’s keynote presentation, Senior Vice President of Software Engineering Craig Federighi and Senior Vice President of Machine Learning and AI Strategy John Giannandrea took the stage for a press interview about the giant’s big AI push of consumer technology, moderated by content creator Justine “iJustine” Ezarik.
When asked how Apple would ensure that its customers’ information remains private if they leave their devices, Federighi explained that user requests sent to Apple servers are anonymized, as their IP addresses are masked and the server itself is blocked to keep a record of information. Additionally, an image of the server software will be shared publicly so it can be audited by independent security researchers, and user devices will only interact with servers with verifiable software.
“It’s a clever type of blockchain-like attestation registry to ensure that the iPhone will only trust software that has been publicly published,” Federighi said, adding that Apple will soon publish a white paper on its security model. “It’s a really great step forward in terms of the level of trust you can place in server computing.”
As the company delves into the artificial intelligence and personal data it uses to provide its services, he added, “it is essential that you know that no one, not Apple, nor anyone else, will have access to any of the information used to process your your request.”
One of Apple’s top executives actually said that the company is using “blockchain-ish” technology, but Federighi didn’t specifically say that the company is using real blockchain, and he certainly didn’t say that the tech giant is is building on a decentralized platform. model.
Decipher reached out to Apple to clarify Federighi’s comments, but did not immediately receive a response.
What does it mean
Apple shared some details in a extensive blog post on security Monday on Private Cloud Compute (PCC), which Apple designed to handle user requests. As Federighi noted, it anonymizes user requests and then relies on servers that use publicly verifiable software to handle those AI needs.
Apple calls this last point “Verifiable Transparency”. Sound familiar?
Essentially, Apple will make images of its software public to demonstrate that its system is safe. Then, it will create a control in the system to ensure that devices can only interact with servers that use publicly shared software for control purposes. And that system is built with cryptography.
“This promise is also an enforceable guarantee: User devices will be willing to send data only to PCC nodes that can cryptographically attest to running publicly listed software,” the post reads, with a bullet point further emphasizing that Apple “ will publish measurements of all code running on PCC in an append-only and cryptographically tamper-proof transparency registry.”
Additionally, the post adds: “Specifically, the user’s device will wrap the payload key of their request only on the public keys of those PCC nodes whose attested measurements match a software version in the public transparency registry. And the same rigorous code signing technologies that prevent unauthorized software from being loaded also ensure that all code on the PCC node is included in the attestation.”
Public keys? Knots? A “cryptographically tamper-proof transparency registry,” of all things? It’s not hard to see why Federighi would call this a “blockchain-ish” approach. It’s also easy to see why crypto-natives are targeting Apple on social media for not actually calling it blockchain when it apparently shares so many commonalities.
“Saying blockchain without saying blockchain” tweeted Wei Dai, research partner at cryptocurrency investment firm 1KX, with a screenshot from the blog post.
But while the Private Cloud Compute model is designed to be transparent and invites public scrutiny, Apple isn’t launching a decentralized network: it’s ultimately still running the show as a centralized player. There is no decentralized consensus model in play, and users ultimately still have to trust what Apple says about its privacy mechanisms.
“Not my reading” tweeted Riccardo “fluffypony” Spagni, founder of privacy coin Monero, in response to Dai. “I think it’s more like a linked list, or even more like it [Github]. There is no consensus mechanism here, there is a central editor.”
“This is not a blockchain,” Spagni added a further answer.
However, Apple has been exploring the potential of blockchain technology. In a patent application filed in 2023 and released earlier this year, Apple sought to patent a “Distributed Network Management System” that explicitly mentions the potential use of blockchain in some implementations. Elsewhere, a recently granted the Apple patent describes a “decentralized registry” used in the publishing process of media assets.
Private Cloud Compute is not a blockchain, based on what we know so far. But Apple said in its security post that further details are forthcoming and that the company does not appear to have closed the door on potential use cases for blockchain technology. What’s here is “blockchain-ish,” at least, in the words of Craig Federighi, and that’s an interesting statement from Apple nonetheless.
By Ryan Ozawa.