By the end of this month, Apple will move all accounts to iCloud of Chinese citizens and residents on the Chinese server.
This move of data from iCloud on Chinese servers is nothing new. The American company since last year Apple announced that in order to be in full compliance with Chinese law, it will take this step.
Currently, all data owned by users worldwide is stored on servers in the United States (USA). This means that any content in these accounts is subject American legislation. If a country wants to find out the account information of an iPhone, iPad user, Mac or other device Apple with iOS / macOS, must first file a legal claim with the US authorities. Only after a state court finds that the request is well-founded will the data be made available to the authorities in that country. To date, Apple did not provide confidential user data. Either from the US or from other countries.
However, Chinese law prevents it Apple to keep confidential the data of all Chinese users or those with resident in China. Every time when the Chinese government requests information about a user, they have to make a clear request that goes through one judicial process in the USA. Finally, the state court will decide whether the data will be sent to the Chinese government or not.
In order to avoid this cumbersome procedure and not to conflict with the government of the most economical country in the world, Apple decided that all accounts iCloud of Chinese citizens and residents, to be stored on servers in China. This means that the Chinese government will no longer have to apply to a US court when they want confidential data of an iOS user or macOS.
Despite the fact that Apple gave assurances that these data will not be at the discretion of the Chinese authorities, human rights activists do not welcome this migration of accounts iCloud in China. They discussed a case that occurred more than 10 years ago, when the American company Yahoo! Inc. provided the Chinese government with more information about dissidents. Data that eventually led to at least two arrests.
Leaving aside the assurances given by Apple, as the information in iCloud they will not end up in the curious hands of the Chinese authorities and as this migration will not create a breach of access for local authorities, this is hard to believe.
Migration of accounts iCloud of Chinese citizens will be done on February 28, 2018, during which the service will not have any functionality problems. The new host of these accounts will be the servers Cloud Big Data of Guizhou. Location of cloud also used by other large companies such as Alibaba Group si Huawei.
