[RahulNagaraj]

Elon Musk has warned that he could ban the use of Apple devices in all his companies. The warning comes after the tech giant announced plans to integrate AI into its operating software.

The warning comes after Apple announced its plans to integrate ChatGPT into its operating systems at this year's Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), held recently. The tech giant even rebranded the AI integration, calling it "Apple Intelligence".



Reports state that Musk, who runs a number of companies, including Tesla, SpaceX, and X (formerly Twitter), blasted Apple for having "no clue" about AI data privacy, making its devices a security risk to his companies.

The Tesla CEO took to social media to voice his complaint, stating, "It’s patently absurd that Apple isn’t smart enough to make their own AI, yet is somehow capable of ensuring that OpenAI will protect your security and privacy!" He further added, "Apple has no clue what’s actually going on once they hand your data over to OpenAI. They’re selling you down the river."

Later, in a separate post, Musk stated, "If Apple integrates OpenAI at the OS level, then Apple devices will be banned at my companies. That is an unacceptable security violation. And visitors will have to check their Apple devices at the door, where they will be stored in a Faraday cage."

Musk even went on to reply to a post by Apple CEO Tim Cook, where he commented, "Either stop this creepy spyware or all Apple devices will be banned from the premises of my companies."

Source: CarExpert

Link to Team-BHP news

[Asish_VK]

So What's next ? He will stop developing of Twitter (or X , whatever) app for IOS ?

[SmartCat]

Strongly agree with Elon here. Chinese Android smartphone brands with Chinese AI integration will be far safer from security & privacy point of view.

[Hayek]

If anyone believes that smartphones of any kind are allowed near any sensitive Tesla, SpaceX or other Musk company data (barring those controlled by the respective companies), I have a beautiful marble palace in Agra for sale.

[HillMan]

We don't allow camera phones in labs, I'll be surprised if Tesla and SpaceX are not already doing so.
As far as AI on phone is concerned, your data privacy was handed over on a platter the day you choose to use a smart phone.
GenAi or LLM based assistants are only a uptick to your Siri and Ok Google.

What will change in near future is the usage of these assistants offline without internet.

[Duster85]

He is doing all this without even knowing the actual working of the AI inside apple devices. First, all features which require usage of data from messages, photos, mail etc. are done on device. More complex tasks which require high amount of processing are sent to apple's own servers which are running on apple silicon. Apple claims the software of these servers is publicly auditable by independent engineers. Only very complex tasks are handed over to Chat gpt and that is done with the user's permission every single time it sends data to chat gpt. Apple spent a lot of time talking about how their AI was designed with privacy in mind at their WWDC 2024. Chat gpt is not integrated on the OS level. If mr Elon is still not satisfied, I don't know what to do. Besides Samsung hardly mentioned privacy in their Galaxy AI launch event and Elon didn't make any big deal about it. I don't understand what's the problem now.

[deathwalkr]

Originally Posted by Duster85

He is doing all this without even knowing the actual working of the AI inside apple devices.
*snip*
Besides Samsung hardly mentioned privacy in their Galaxy AI launch event and Elon didn't make any big deal about it. I don't understand what's the problem now.

I think we would be doing Mr Musk a grave injustice when we say he does not know actual working of something. He does shoot his mouth more often than not, but tech related maybe just maybe he knows what he's talking about...

As for Samsung, I think it would stem from the fact that Apple were all about privacy and were taking potshots at Android phones for that. But with this new integration, will that claim be shot to pieces?

[Duster85]

Originally Posted by deathwalkr

I think we would be doing Mr Musk a grave injustice when we say he does not know actual working of something. He does shoot his mouth more often than not, but tech related maybe just maybe he knows what he's talking about...

As for Samsung, I think it would stem from the fact that Apple were all about privacy and were taking potshots at Android phones for that. But with this new integration, will that claim be shot to pieces?

That is exactly the point. One of the key selling points of Apple has always been privacy. I watched the entire WWDC 2024 event and multiple media interviews as well where they constantly mentioned the key differentiator for apple intelligence being privacy. If you notice carefully first the first tweet Mr Elon made was about him not being comfortable with OS level integration of Chat gpt(which is not the case). In the second tweet he talks about apple sharing user data with chat gpt and how they won't be able to ensure user privacy while doing that. But the thing is the data being shared is not more than what users would have shared if they were using the chat gpt official app. This makes be believe he just tweeted without much prior research. And users anyways do have a choice of not asking chat gpt if they don't want. So I feel like Mr Elon is just trying to mislead people.

[man_and_machine]

Actually Musk is in between the rock and the hard place. Everyone is, but either they don't know they are or just don't care He has been vocal that he is. The only way for him to be able to achieve what he wants is to create a Tesla phone, which by the way was doing rounds for a while.
Some time ago, Musk has talked about why he choose Apple over Android (all brands) and that was the tight data google integration in android, where you could not control what goes where, or at least did not know well enough what goes where. Apple on the other hand had made is amply clear that 'You' are not the product and the iPhone was, which in contrast to the google model where 'You' are the product since everything else from google was free. This is a touchy subject with fans from either side ready to go to arms on it, but we will rest that topic here.
Now Apple intelligence as they call it, is supposed to be a GPT-4o sandbox from OpenAI that Apple will have exclusive access to. There is the entire ecosystem on top of the LLM that Siri will connect to, but OpenAI being what it is the lines are really as blur as the lines between Android and google, maybe even more. Also, OpenAI by itself is an oxymoron, there is nothing open about it, and the drama over what is should be has been playing out in the open in the last months.
Peak Apple is behind us, and they were too late to catch up, unlike the older times where Apple would wait and watch and then just ruthlessly execute well on the winning idea. This time around they will find it very expensive and time taking to catch up. So, they realise they need to leverage rather than build. At least for the first few years while they will build on their own, but this time their iPhone base is too large to catch up and lose.
Now, with AI you really don't control what goes into the AI model. It's always listening, its needs to, build, update and maintain context. Unlike Siri which wakes up only when called, this new AI platform will need to always be on.
For instance, if the iPhone maps were to show you which parking spot is empty when you reach parking lot at a Target, it need to know you are 'there', you are 'in the car', slowed down to 'park', and that your weekend pattern is to be 'there' on all 'those days' etc. This is what scares Musk (and should also scare most of us). It's not about taking photos, videos or listening to voice in a call, or reading the SMS. The omnipresent nature of the multi-modal AI and the difficulty to figure out what is knows, how it knows and what all it is ingesting to know is what build the mis-trust.
Musk does not trust OpenAI, especially after he quit it.
Also, there is an economic interest with his own xAI that someday he hopes will catch up and maybe get head of OpenAI.