Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook said on Wednesday customer data was being “weaponised with military efficiency” by companies to increase profit.
Speaking at an international conference on data privacy, Apple CEO Tim Cook applauded European Union authorities for bringing in a strict new data privacy law this year and said the iPhone maker fully supports a US federal privacy law.
That trade in personal information “has exploded into a data industrial complex”, he argued in an impassioned speech congratulating Europe for introducing the GDPR privacy regulations.
“Our own information, from the everyday to the deeply personal, is being weaponized against us with military efficiency,” he said. “These scraps of data … each one harmless enough on its own … are carefully assembled, synthesised, traded, and sold.” he added.
Apple, which designs many of its products so that it cannot see users’ data, has largely avoided the data privacy scandals that have enmeshed its rivals Google and Facebook this year. “The desire to put profits over privacy is nothing new,” Mr Cook told a packed audience of privacy regulators, corporate executives and other participants.
Post Your Comments