In more recent years, Apple has introduced a number of interesting and privacy-preserving features for iCloud subscribers. It even rebranded its subscription to iCloud+ around the release of these new features, highlighting the fact that iCloud is more than just a storage subscription.
If youâre a more privacy-conscious person, you should definitely make sure youâre taking full advantage of the three features mentioned below.
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Introduced in 2021, iCloud Private Relay essentially serves as a mini VPN of sorts. When using Safari on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac, Apple will encrypt your DNS query and HTTP traffic and send it through their proxy. Afterwards, Apple strips your IP address (though retains a rough idea of your region), then sends it through another proxy, which then in turns gets your request website to you.
While this feature does unfortunately only work in Safari and isnât a system-wide feature, it does protect you from websites that may want to build a profile on you through your web activity. Itâs available for all iCloud+ subscribers, for as little as $0.99/month.
This feature was also introduced in 2021, and itâs sort of self-explanatory.
As an iCloud+ subscriber, when youâre signing up for a new website, email list, subscription, or anything else youâd need to prove an email for â Apple will provide a custom, one use email just for that one service.
This has two key benefits. For one, it prevents your personal email address from being sold to a data broker and getting spam emails.
On top of that, it means that if your email does get sold for spam (or if you just donât want to hear from whatever company you gave your email to anymore) â you can cut that email address off in just a second, and youâll no longer see any emails associated with that address in your inbox. You also have the option to turn it back on if youâd like.
In short, Hide My Email provides a level of granularity for email thatâs both privacy-focused and convenient.
While Apple does tote the privacy benefits of everything they make, iCloud data isnât truly private if you arenât utilizing Advanced Data Protection. iCloud data is encrypted by default, but Advanced Data Protection brings end-to-end encryption to every iCloud service.
With end-to-end encryption, it means that Apple couldnât decrypt your data even if they wanted to. Only you hold the key to decrypt your iCloud data. This does mean that if you lose your recovery key, you also lose your data â and thereâs nothing Apple can do to help.
Advanced Data Protection means that key categories like iCloud Backups, iMessage texts, Photos, and more are no longer accessible to Apple â no matter what. You can check out this great explainer on our YouTube channel for a deeper dive on Advanced Data Protection:
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Michael is 9to5Macâs Weekend Editor, keeping up with all of the latest Apple news on Saturday and Sunday. He got started in the world of Apple news during the pandemic, and it became a growing hobby. Heâs also an indie iOS developer in his free time, and has published numerous apps over the years.
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Despite a new version reportedly being around a corner, I still personally believe AirPods Pro 2 are a great deal. They're already equipped with USB-C, and continually gain new software features. With them consistently going on sale, it's a great purchase to make. Features like Adaptive Audio are incredible.