Chinese experts have reportedly found a way to identify users of Apple's encrypted AirDrop file-sharing service, a favorite form of communication for protesters critical of China's strict control of its citizens. AirDrop allows iPhone users to share files with other iPhone users nearby via Bluetooth, without an internet connection. The device logs are supposed to be encrypted. But justice officials with Beijing's municipal government said Monday that experts at the state-backed Beijing Wangshen Dongjian Justice Appraisal Institute had discovered a means of identifying a sender's device log, allowing them to obtain the phone numbers and email addresses associated, in a "technological breakthrough," per Time.
The municipal government's justice bureau claimed the breakthrough followed complaints about "the transmission of inappropriate information with anonymous traceability via AirDrop" in public places, like subways and shopping malls, per CNN and Business Insider. The method "raised the efficacy and accuracy of case detection and resolution, and has effectively helped police ascertain several case suspects," it added. AirDrop was widely used by pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong in 2019 and those protesting against China's zero-COVID policy in 2022, per AFP. Apple, which "has long faced criticism for making perceived concessions" to China's Communist Party, has yet to comment, per the outlet. (More China stories.)
,
uBlock 
,
and
Ghostery 
)
