[KaiserPro]

> yet almost nothing seems to be done to prevent CSA.

for the UK, there has been a massive shift to prevent this kind of stuff.

anyone who even volunteers with children or vulnerable adults needs to be screened. Charities are required to have policies for dealing with vulnerable people safely.

but to the point, Apple halfarse CSAM reporting.

Whatsapp which doesn't do "CSAM scanning" reports in one hour more CSAM than apple does in a year. From memory meta (instgram, facebook and whatsapp) reported millions of cases of CSAM for 2021, compared to apple's ~250 (not thousand, just 250)

for facebook its automated scanning, but for whatsapp, its just design. its really obvious how to report a message/image. in imessage, its impossible, there is no mechanism to long press/select/other a message.

Now, Facebook are bastards in virtually every way, but for whatsapp at least, they have made GUI changes that have real positive impact on CSAM protection.

Apple has not.

They made some noise about hashing, but thats invasive and ironically noisier than having user reports.

[john_strinlai]

>anyone who even volunteers with children or vulnerable adults needs to be screened

as far as i am aware, that is common practice in many countries. the problem is that screening is typically a quick check of "has this person been suspected or arrested for something involving minors already" and perhaps a few questions on a piece of paper. its not like they give everyone volunteering for a fieldtrip an extensive 1:1 with a psychologist and an mri. any predator who has not previously been caught will easily pass screening.

>From memory meta (instgram, facebook and whatsapp) reported millions of cases of CSAM for 2021, compared to apple's ~250 (not thousand, just 250)

easy enough to explain. instagram and facebook are social media with billions of public posts. whatsapp is in a similar enough boat, with large (up to 1000 participants?) facebook-like groups of otherwise strangers and a lot of marketing and inertia for social-media-like use.

i imagine instagram is a majority of it. it's disgusting on there.

on the other hand, apple is not a social media company nor facilitates large group chats (imessage goes up to 32 participants).

i doubt adding an easier UX for reporting would make a material difference in the number of reports apple submits because you're typically already talking with people you know when using imessage.

[KaiserPro]

I just looked it up, its the ncmec.org annual report, the one I am referencing is from 2024, not 2021. I mis remembered

Apple reported 250 items

Instagram 3.1million whatsapp 1.1 million facebook 8.8million tiktok 1.3 million snapchat 1.1million

Look I hate meta, more than you would know. But apple have very little excuse here. Even Anthropic reported more CSAM than them. I get your point about group vs 1:1, but frankly that holds only a tiny amount of water. Even if you did want to report it, you can't, not through apple at least. And if you did report it to the police, there is a high chance you'll loose your phone for use as evidence.

[john_strinlai]

>Apple reported 250 items

Instagram 3.1million whatsapp 1.1 million facebook 8.8million tiktok 1.3 million snapchat 1.1million

those numbers seem absolutely in line with what i would expect when comparing the largest social media platforms on the planet and a company that does 0 social media and extremely limited group sharing.

it seems very strange to me to put any blame apple here when its just a statistics game. billions of image posts = millions of reports. simple as.

and anyways, if i received CSAM from one of my phone contacts im going directly to the local police, skipping the apple -> ncmec -> state -> local pipeline. i think most people would be in the same boat.

a report button is useful when you don't know the identity of the perpetrator. but when you do know them, you should be going to actual law enforcement, not hoping your report eventually gets routed to the right agency.

[KaiserPro]

Sorry but this is denial. I know I'm not going to change your mind, however:

> it seems very strange to me to put any blame apple here when its just a statistics game. billions of image posts = millions of reports. simple as.

Apple's platform hosts billions of messages and photos. It is the Paedophile’s choice for distributing images and videos. The problem for us is Apple's halfarsedness in tackling this leads to clientside scanning or backdoors in encryption. They are not doing anything at all to stop this, and compared to whatsapp of all fucking apps, they are doing nothing.

[john_strinlai]

>I know I'm not going to change your mind

you might if you could back up statements like "apple is the pedos choice for distributing images and videos" with any sort of data.

but you wont be able to, because it's not true.

and, again, apple is 1:1 transmission. you know who is distributing the CSAM in that case. dont be lazy, go to the actual police.

instagram, facebook, whatsapp is 1:many transmission with strangers. a report button makes a lot of sense there.