When Apple moved iCloud data for Chinese customers over to Apple partner Guizhou-Cloud Big Data Industry earlier this year, a lot of privacy advocates were worried about the implications.

They might have even more cause for concern now, as Apple’s iCloud data in the country — including users’ emails and text messages — is now being stored by a division of the state-owned China Telecom. Apple confirmed the change late on Tuesday.

iOS 12 beta 3 added a great new feature in the Photos app. Now, when you share a photo, you can choose to copy a link to that photo, and share that instead. This is a lot like sharing a file from Dropbox. You can even copy a link to a whole slew of files and share them by sending a single URL.

Shared photos are stored in iCloud, and the link is accessible to anyone that has it, for up to a month. Let’s see how it works.

July 1, 2012: Apple shuts down its MobileMe web service, pushing users to switch to iCloud.

Launched in 2008, MobileMe was a subscription-based suite of online services and software created by Apple. It included features like “Find my iPhone,” a MobileMe photo gallery, chat facilities, online calendar, storage and other cloud-based services. After letting it limp along for four years, Cupertino finally decides to pull the plug, giving Mobile Me users until the end of July to remove their data from the service.

In this week’s Cult of Mac Magazine: Imagine if your Apple Watch could tell you which days were best for you to do a workout, and what kind of workout you should do. Well it can, sort of, thanks to a hidden feature that few people have yet discovered or know how to use.

You’ll find that story and more in this issue. Get your free subscription to Cult of Mac Magazine from iTunes. Or read on for this week’s top stories.

Apple released macOS 10.13.5 today, an update that brings the long-awaited Messages in iCloud feature to Mac users.

The new feature, which Apple rolled out to iPhones and iPads earlier this week in iOS 11.4, should free up space on your Mac. More importantly, it will finally allow you to sync iMessages with all your Apple devices via the cloud.

The iOS 11.4 update finally brings Messages in iCloud, which means you can treat your iMessages like you treat your photos.

Your messages will sync across all iOS devices and should work soon on Mac. (Update: It works on Mac now, once you update to macOS 10.13.5). You can even delete them from an iPhone or iPad that’s short on space. But they will remain accessible from the cloud. Here’s how to switch on iCloud support for Messages.

A locked iPhone can’t be accessed without the passcode, and even Apple can’t unlock it. But Apple has to comply with government requests for iCloud information.

And there are a lot of them. The company received 3,358 requests to access personal data in the second-half of 2017, with about half of these coming from the United States.

Apple is looking to hook more people to subscribe to its iCloud storage service — and like good salespeople they’re willing to give you the first hit for free, after which you’ll have to start paying.

At present, Apple offers you a tiny amount of storage for free as a preview of its iCloud storage. However, this is such a small amount that users will run out even if they’re only backing up the videos and photos on their iPhone. For most customers, it’s therefore necessary to pay a monthly subscription fee to Apple to cover all your storage needs.