Apple Pulls Data Protection Tool After UK Security Dispute

Apple is taking the unprecedented step of removing its highest-level data security tool from customers in the UK after the government demanded access to user data.

No UK customer data stored on iCloud—Apple's cloud storage service—will be end-to-end encrypted, making it accessible to Apple and shareable with law enforcement if presented with a warrant due to the suspension of the ADP. I Photo: Apple

Advanced Data Protection (ADP) ensures that only account holders can access items such as photos or documents stored online through a process known as end-to-end encryption, BBC News technology editor Zoe Kleinman reported.

Earlier this month, the UK government requested access to this data, which even Apple cannot decrypt.

Apple has consistently opposed creating a "backdoor" in its encryption service, arguing that doing so would inevitably allow bad actors to exploit the system. In response to the UK’s demand, Apple has now decided to disable ADP in the country.

As a result, no UK customer data stored on iCloud—Apple's cloud storage service—will be end-to-end encrypted, making it accessible to Apple and shareable with law enforcement if presented with a warrant.

Apple expressed strong disapproval of the decision, stating it was "gravely disappointed" that the security feature would no longer be available to British customers.

"As we have said many times before, we have never built a backdoor or master key to any of our products, and we never will," the company reiterated. The ADP service began being withdrawn for new users at 15:00 GMT on Friday.

Access for existing users will be disabled at a later, unspecified date. It remains unclear how many British Apple customers have signed up for ADP since its introduction in December 2022.

Professor Alan Woodward, a cybersecurity expert at the University of Surrey, called the decision a "very disappointing development" and described it as "an act of self-harm" by the UK government. "All the UK government has achieved is to weaken online security and privacy for UK-based users," he told the BBC.