Apple Uses Machine Learning To Chronicle All the Bra Pics On Your iPhone (vice.com)

New submitter bumblebaetuna shares a report from Motherboard: It's already well known that iOS 11 included some advanced updates to the phone's artificial intelligence, and this includes improving the photo app's ability to identify and categorize what is in each of your photos. There are thousands of objects the phone can identify, ranging from "abacus" to "zucchini." Weirdly, despite not having categories for, say, "nude," or "underwear," there are multiple categories for bra: brassiere, bandeau, bandeaus, bra, bras, and brassieres. Searching for this folder in your photos app may reveal an unexpected surprise. Though there are some pretty archaic terms like "homburg," "habiliment," and "danseuse," the "bra" category is unusual compared to the other quotidian labels the app slaps on your photos, and is as risque as the terms get.

Comments

Maybe Apple has a dirty mind

[hyades1]

"Danseuse", mentioned in the summary and TFA, is French for a ballet dancer. Also, sometimes, a lady of negotiable virtue.

Re:Maybe Apple has a dirty mind

[TWX]

Everyone is of negotiable virtue.

For a scant few, the price is to serve a life-sentence.

So that's what she's doing in there

[bobbied]

That's what Siri is doing in there, sorting my photos... She gives me the creeps....

You got it.

[AndyKron]

I don't want my phone analyzing my pictures. Fuck Apple.

Can it identify foods?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can it identify a hotdog?

Hotdog
Not hotdog
Eggplant

Well, no, not generally

[fyngyrz]

a bra doesn't reveal any more than any bikini top does.

I suspect you're just not very familiar with nice bras. There are other interesting variations on bra design as well. Many of them are quite sensual. Go to google, make sure the nanny safe search is off, enter "transparent lace bra" as the search term, and then click on "Images."

Very few sightings of bikinis will look like that.

And then there are the metal / chain bras. Kill the safesearch, use "chain bra OR bralette", search, the click images.

You can search "cupless bra" as well for something a bit different.

There are definitely some interesting looks out there that leave most bikinis in the dust.

If you're really lucky, you'll hook up with someone who knows to wear them, too. :)

Re:Well, no, not generally

[apoc.famine]

Quick! Soothe their eyes! Cutest Disney Animals evaaaaa! Click NOOOW! CLICK NOOOWWW!.

Negotiations

[fyngyrz]

Q: Lady, would you sleep with me for a million dollars?

A: Yes, I would.

Q: Would you sleep with me for a dollar?

A: What do you think I am?!?!

... We've already established what you are, madam, now we're just haggling over the price.

Google do just that since 2 last years

[denisbergeron]

in their photo apps and cloud photo album... I use it like every time I try to find one of my (10!)^256! pictures

Re:Google do just that since 2 last years

[RhettLivingston]

Google does not do this. Google does not use end-to-end encryption in storing your data. This allows them to analyze your photos in the cloud. In return for opening your entire photo world up to them (and anyone who can pry it out of them legally or illegally), they do give you some nice features. I enjoy the assistant-generated collages, animations, and movies.

Apple, on the other hand, stores photos using end-to-end encryption. Their cloud servers cannot analyze them. They are performing this analysis on the device. And the results of the analysis are kept under the same security as the photos.

Google may start doing photo analysis on the Pixel 2 with its new AI chip soon, but they are not now. When they do, it is still unlikely that they will give up on being able to access your photos while they are on their server.

Re:Google do just that since 2 last years

[AmiMoJo]

Google does not use end-to-end encryption in storing your data.

They do. I suspect you don't know what end-to-end encryption is. It just means that the connection between the two endpoints is encrypted, and they do use that (HTTPS) when storing your photos in the cloud if you enabled cloud sync.

Also, the image recognition features are done on the phone. They do additional stuff in the cloud like the collages and auto-photoshopping, but the image recognition stuff works just fine without cloud sync enabled. Same with Google Translate (with databases downloaded for offline operation). I have not tested Lens in airplane mode yet.

The "AI" chip in the Pixel 2 is nothing of the sort. It's an image processing accelerator, a parallel DSP processor suited to image manipulation tasks.

Re:Google do just that since 2 last years

[TheFakeTimCook]

Apple, on the other hand, stores photos using end-to-end encryption.

One problem I have with this is that the default passcode is limited to a 6-digit number (digits only). You can change the passcode settings to enable alphanumerics, but the default is just digits.

Given this default lack of entropy, and the fact that the secret keys in the hardware are known to Apple, it's trivial for the company to break the encryption on the vast majority of devices if they really want to. I'm not suggesting they're secretly complying with the government, but they probably do mine the "easy" information for statistical reasons just like every other company.

So they allow people that don't really care to keep their passcode simple, and those who are more sensitive to security to have a Horse Stapler Passphrase.

Explain to me why CHOICE isn't a Good Thing(tm)?

It's "on your phone"

[RhettLivingston]

The article points to Apple's support site that states clearly "When you search your photos, all of the face recognition and scene and object detection are done completely on your device."

It is great that the AI is finally moving off the cloud and onto the device. This is where it belongs. We should be highly praising any software that implements personal assistance features like this locally. They have the potential of eventually supporting personal clouds made up of nothing but my devices with cradle to grave encryption.

Apple's provision of end-to-end encryption of user data stored in their cloud forces this architecture. They don't have the ability to decrypt your photos stored in iCloud and analyze them on a cloud server. So they have to do it on the device. Kudos to Apple for taking the high road instead of the easy road.

We should have no concerns whatsoever about what it is capable of recognizing. Ultimately, I want it to be capable of accurately recognizing anything in the pictures. Why not? Both the analysis and the photos are stored with the same security. If an attacker can get the analysis, then they can just skip that and get the photos instead.

The important thing is secure storage of both the picture and any analysis of it and that neither ever leaves my device pool at any point in time without explicit intentional action on my part such as "sharing" a photo. Apple is almost all of the way there. I'd like to have the further option of pulling the encrypted cloud storage out of the picture and just have my devices automatically synchronize to each other.

Re:no more revealing than a bikini top

[Anonymous Coward]

Even if it does reveal everything, so what? The photos are already on the device, it's not like the phone is downloading porn on its own. Another pointless controversy.

Re:The interesting question

[apoc.famine]

Hey, we've all got our fetishes....