In early June 2017, China implemented its new cybersecurity law. It stipulates that cross-border transfer of data collected in China is only permitted where such transfer is necessary for the smooth conduct of a transaction. In addition, it describes the state authorities that are responsible for overseeing the safety inspection, the safety inspection criteria and the types of transfers that must necessarily undergo a prior safety inspection.
According to Reuters, under this law, all enterprises designated by the Chinese government as “critical information infrastructures” have the absolute obligation to store their data locally, if such data is collected or generated in China and constitute “personal information” or “critical data”.
Also, to comply with Chinese law and continue to operate in China, Apple has announced that it will now host iCloud data from Chinese users locally. In early January, we informed you that Apple’s iCloud services in China would soon be operated by a local public firm, as confirmed by the iOS publisher. It is Guizhou on the Cloud Big Data Company (GCBD), owned by the government of Guizhou, a province in southern China, which will have to tackle this task in partnership with Apple. It should be noted that it is in this same province that the iPhone manufacturer launched the project to create a datacenter at a cost of nearly $ 1 billion a few months ago in order to comply with the regulation of the empire. middle.
Reuters said this migration will take place at the end of the month, and said that the rank of migrated data include encryption keys to access these accounts. The iCloud data will be hosted on servers located in Guizhou from February 28th.
Currently, encryption keys are stored on US servers and are not accessible to government requests, except court decision. Because, if Apple has publicly opposed the establishment of “backdoor” to allow national authorities to access the content of iPhone, the company provides access to data stored on the cloud, subject to a judicial decision.
The Chinese case will be different: once the data, and the keys migrated, they will be accessible much more simply for the authorities of the country. “Now, according to Apple, encryption keys for Chinese iCloud accounts will be stored directly in China. This means that the Chinese authorities will no longer need to go through US courts to request access to iCloud data from their nationals; instead, they can use their own legal system to request access to these data, “experts said.
Human rights activists fear that the authorities could use this power to hunt down dissidents, citing cases from more than a decade ago when Yahoo inc. transmitted user data that led to two arrests and jail sentences. Jing Zhao, a human rights activist and Apple shareholder, said he could consider more serious human rights issues stemming from Apple’s transmission of iCloud data than in the Yahoo case.
In a statement, Apple said it had to comply with recently introduced Chinese laws that require that cloud services offered to Chinese citizens be operated by Chinese companies and that the data be stored in China. The company said that although company values do not change in different parts of the world, it remains subject to the laws of each country.
Apple, which claims to have defended that iCloud is subject to these laws, admits to having failed. The publisher believes it is better to offer iCloud as part of the new system, as disabling this system would result in a poor user experience and reduce privacy and data security for its Chinese customers.
Note that the company has taken the trouble to tell its customers the way to go if they want to do without iCloud and store their data only on their device.
Apple’s decision highlights a difficult reality for many foreign technology companies operating in China. If they do not accept applications for partnership with Chinese companies and data storage in China, they risk losing access to a lucrative Chinese market.
