People trust Apple. A recent survey found that only a tiny percentage of Americans think the iPhone maker is irresponsible with their personal data.
That’s good news for Tim Cook and co., who have worked hard to differentiate themselves from Facebook, the least trusted tech company by a wide margin.
The recent privacy survey, a collaboration by SurveyMonkey and Recode, asked “Which of the following companies do you trust the least with your personal information?” The possible choices were Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, Lyft, Microsoft, Netflix, Snap, Tesla, Twitter, and Uber.
Just 2 percent of respondents answered Apple, putting the company in a tie with Amazon and Snap.
Facebook was the big loser, with 56 percent of respondents judging it the least trustworthy. Not surprising, given that the company’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg is testifying before congress this week about millions of privacy violations.
Google did second worse in the survey, though it scored very far behind Facebook. Clearly people don’t remember that the two companies have very similar business models: gathering private information about people and then selling it to advertisers.
Photo: Recode
Apple’s privacy pledge
A pop-up window in the recently-released iOS 11.3 gives Apple’s pledge to protect the privacy of its users: “Apple believes privacy is a fundamental human right, so every Apple product is designed to minimize the collection and use of your data, use on-device processing whenever possible, and provide transparency and control over your information.”
The company is adamant that it’s never going to sell the private details of iPhone, iPad, and Mac users. “We could make a ton of money if we monetized our customer — if our customer was our product. We’ve elected not to do that,” Tim Cook said proudly.
Cook and Zuckerberg recently had a well-publicized spat about Facebook’s business of selling user information. And Zuck was ready to drag Apple into his testimony before Congress if he saw a chance.
