Then why wouldn't they say, "the government asked us to do this"? Apple is taking all the negative publicity this way.
My favorite theory is this:
Apple wants to create a chilling effect on reverse engineering iOS. They're starting to catch regulatory attention and lost their recent suit against Corellium. By putting neural hashes in the encrypted OS image, they can accuse anyone who reverse engineers iOS of:
1. Being in cahoots with child abusers
2. Knowingly possessing CSAM
I would hope that most courts would see through that paper thin logic, but the idea would be simply to introduce enough doubt that most reverse engineers don't want to risk it.
My favorite theory is this:
Apple wants to create a chilling effect on reverse engineering iOS. They're starting to catch regulatory attention and lost their recent suit against Corellium. By putting neural hashes in the encrypted OS image, they can accuse anyone who reverse engineers iOS of:
1. Being in cahoots with child abusers
2. Knowingly possessing CSAM
I would hope that most courts would see through that paper thin logic, but the idea would be simply to introduce enough doubt that most reverse engineers don't want to risk it.