They call themselves the Worldwide Loyalty Team . Among some employees , they are know as the Apple Gestapo , a group of moles always spying in home office and stores , report directly to Jobs and Oppenheimer . Here ’s how they hunt people down .
“ You may want to know about their Worldwide Loyalty Team , ” Tom told me recently in an email . I read what he had to say . It feel like a description of the Gestapo , without the torture and kill part .
Tom never live in Nazi Germany , back in the time when the Geheime Staatspolizei had the power to get into any house or any power , at any clock time of the day or night , without any warrant or cause , to seize whatever or whoever they want in their never ending lookup to find enemies of the state of matter . A place in which you had no rightfield to privacy whatsoever . A place in which you were guilty until prove otherwise .
No , Tom never hold out in Nazi Germany , nor in East Germany , nor in the Soviet Union , nor in Communist China . He lives in the United States . For sure , he has never been scared of lose his living nor the ace he loves , like thousands of billion in those country . But he eff how it feels to be watched , to always be think guilty of crimes against another form of state . He be intimate how it felt to have no privacy whatsoever when he was working right here , in a little Californian town call Cupertino , in a legendary position locate in One Infinite Loop .
Tom knew about all that pretty well , back when he was working at Apple Inc.
Operation Lockdown
Of naturally , if Tom had never sent any sore information to mass medium outlets , he would have never had the fear of being caught , only to get fire and sued into oblivion by Apple Legal . But the lack of any privateness whatsoever is something that he deal with all his fellow employee .
“ Apple has these moles working everywhere , especially in departments where making water are mistrust . direction is not cognisant of them , ” he told me , “ once they mistrust a leak , the special force — as we call them — will walk in the office staff at any hour , especially in the mornings . They will adjoin whoever was the most senior director in the building , and expect them to ordinate the mathematical operation . ”
The functioning , as Tom call it , is not anything limited . It is not one of a kind event . It ’s just a normal practice , and the process is passably dim-witted : The manager will instruct all employees to remain at their desks , telling them what to do and what to expect at any given time . The Apple Gestapo never handles the communicating . They are there , present , supervising the supervisors , making sure everything snuff it as planned .
All cell are then take . Usually , they collect them all at the same time , which means that the process could take a farsighted time . If you need to reach out to the outside during the time your cellphone is under examen , you will have to ask for permission , and your call will be monitored .
They do n’t ask for cameras because there are no cameras at Apple : employee are not allowed to get into the campus with them . If the cellular phone is an iPhone , it gets backed up onto a laptop computer . “ In fact , at the beginning they used to say that the iPhones were really their property , since Apple ease up every employee a free iPhone , ” he points out . All the employees are postulate to unlock and invalid any lock features in their cellphones , and then the special military unit will proceed to chink them for recent activity .
They back up everything and go through all the other phone ’ text messages and characterisation . If you have porn in your telephone set , they will see it . If you have text messages to your spouse , lover , or Tiger Woods , they will see them , too . Just like that . No concealment , no terminus ad quem .
While all this is chance , the employee are ordered to activate the screensaver on their computers , so the special forces are sure there are no chats happening between employees or with the outside . They are told not to speak , text or call one other when the lockdown is happening : “ It is like a gag ordination , and if the employee does not require to enter , they are basically asked to leave and never come back . ”
2009 Is Like “1984”
Of naturally , all this is voluntary . Management recommends that you relinquish your speech sound . If you do n’t do it they will fire you , or they will investigate why you did n’t want to give them your cellphone . at the same time , everyone is asked to signalize NDA ’s during the investigations , even though they already sign Apple NDAs to function there .
“ I was at several consequence . When they find what they are look for — which they usually do — the person is asked to quell until the end of the commercial enterprise day . Then he is asked to result the premises quiet , escort by security , ” Tom says . While he ’s there , the peculiar forces hang around , watching . “ There is a lot that go behind doors that I do n’t really know about . I do know , however , that they really question mass that are serious suspect , intimidating them by threatening to action . ”
There is no agency to know how often this happens , however , as everything is handle very softly . The same Worldwide Loyalty Team does many other things to keep everyone in check , from searching out the email chronicle of every employee — which is also a normal recitation in other corporations and government agencies — to seed fake images to catch potential leaks and diffuse the hype about some product introductions .
As Tom was describing all this , my mind was getting back to all I ’ve read about Steve Jobs and Apple , back when he was El Capitán of the brave grouping of free pirates who make the Macintosh . The Mac was a hidden labor too , but there was no hush-hush police making indisputable there were no leak . After a hard twenty-four hour period of work , all the Mac squad sometimes encounter on the beach of California , regardless and well-chosen , confident that this new rotatory computer would change the world , one screen background at a meter . All of them shared information , there were no seeeecrets , and that ’s why they came up with an “ insanely great ” computing gadget , as Steve Jobs himself used to look up to it .
And while I understand that privacy is preponderating to succeeder in today ’s extremely competitive marketplace — hello , devout marketdrones — now I look at this history on the Worldwide Loyalty Team , and it makes me realize how much Apple has changed . From a well-chosen hippie company , to a company that does KGB - style lockdowns andGestapo enquiry that end in suicides .
https://gizmodo.com/report-iphone-leak-interrogations-drive-foxconn-employ-5319275
I wonder if the particular forces have ever chased anyone through the Infinite Loop campus , enclothe in their full 1984 regalia .
I would n’t be surprised .
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