From a purely technical perspective, they could just force private relay for all Apple-bound traffic. Thailand would have to choose between working iPhones and blocking private relay.
Wikipedia disallows editing from iCloud Relay IP addresses, so not a great idea in general. And if you really think authoritarian governments are going to choose iPhones over control, well…
I was specifically suggesting doing this for Apple-bound communications, not for all traffic. In that situation blocking private relay would just break app store and other important functionality, rendering the devices borderline useless.
> And if you really think authoritarian governments are going to choose iPhones over control, well…
lol, Thailand doesn't even block VPNs. You really think they'd do something as drastic as banning Apple devices over this?
There are many authoritarian countries were banning iPhones would simply be unimaginable, there's no way they'd even think about doing that in places like Russia.
> Just break app store and other important functionality, rendering the devices borderline useless.
If Apple breaks laws isn't that what Governments should do? For instance in Europe (was it Netherlands ?).Apple has blatantly ignored a ruling on app store and allowed fines to accumulate. The government should have blocked the app store but instead let itself be bullied by Apple
> You really think they'd do something as drastic as banning Apple devices over this?
I dunno, but the feature is disallowed for a reason. It's more than a VPN because it's so much easier to use than VPNs are typically and I believe it's also enabled by default with iCloud.
They would need not to ban Apple devices, as Apple has a history of following local censorship and citizen spying laws, even if they violate human rights. They have never put an effort against governments, etc. like Google. See China, for example.
If history teach as anything is that autocratic government favors control over their people in lieu of apple devices. And capitalistic companies favors money in lieu of human rights.
How else could it be? It's simply not possible that all worldviews are equal. It's undoubtedly true that my view of the world is simply better than someone else's and vice-versa.