Apple's fascinating AI privacy play

Apple found a very clever way to train its generative AI systems without violating users’ privacy, and the details are pretty fascinating.

In a recent blog post, the company lays out the elaborate method it devised to train its large language models and other generative AI systems like Genmoji (Apple’s term for custom, AI-generated emoji).

The system relies on synthetic data, but the clever part is how the company verifies this synthetic data against real-world use cases on millions of devices, without violating its famously watertight privacy commitments. It’s a very clever system — here are the details of how it works.

Of course, whether it works remains to be seen.

But I’m very grateful that Apple — in contrast to what seems to be the entire AI industry — tries to protect our privacy and data. If only the rest of the players in the burgeoning AI field were so thoughtful and respectful.

Also in today’s newsletter:

• For external storage, Cult of Mac writer Ed Hardy swears by these Samsung T9 SSDs — and they’re currently on sale.

• The Chipolo Pop is an interesting and inexpensive new tracking tag that works with both Apple’s Find My network and Google’s competing Find My Device, but there’s a small wrinkle.

• Big news in the world of cables: Beats just launched a new line of colorful and durable cables for your Apple devices. But USB-A? In this day and age?

• This refurb M2 Mac mini is a great bang-for-buck deal.

• Based in Sydney, Australia, Espresso Displays makes some of the best portable monitors around. The company just launched a new 4K touchscreen display, which we put through the paces in our hands-on review. The conclusion? It’s superb.

— Leander Kahney, EIC.

^{A message from the Cult of Mac Deals team}

^{A message from the Cult of Mac Deals team}

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