this post was submitted on 27 Oct 2023
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Privacy

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago

I don't think anyone believes apple is good for privacy and they are certainly not good for freedom.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Sooo what was the bug? That it didn't randomise MACs when connecting?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago

yeah, there was a feature that was supposed to do it, but they never implemented the feature properly, which made it literally useless, and it was discovered just now, 3 years later

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

How is this a problem when the hardware address is dumped once packets are out onto the web? Are you worried your router knows it's you? Outside your subnet, on the internet, your Mac address is not part of the packet.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (2 children)

that's wrong. the device exposed the real mac address on port 5353 (udp) which is apple's "bonjour" service, which acts as a service discovery/zeroconf network tool.

that means that other devices in the same network can know your real mac address, this makes it very easy for say ISPs to track you across networks if you use friends networks, open wifi networks in coffee shops etc.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Still within a subnet. If you connect to an internet cafe Wifi, you should be more worried about your dns traffic for identifying you.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

DNS tracking can be mitigated with Oblivious DoH, DNSCrypt or even a VPN.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

And so on and so on. If you want to be tracked, you can be tracked, regardless of a mac address, or the hoops a user jump through to create the illusion of privacy. I can think of lots of unconventional ways to track a naive user.