Posted by meetpateltech 16 hours ago
> Users can now prove the authenticity of a photo taken on iPhone 18 Pro models with Apple Reference Image, powered by the new sensor in the Main camera that can sign every pixel it sees. When a photo is taken in the new Reference mode, the camera captures signed sensor data that Private Cloud Compute develops into an unalterable reference image.5 Reference images can be viewed in the Photos app alongside the main image, like a digital negative, to visually compare the two assets and determine if any edits were made. APIs are available in iOS, iPadOS, and macOS 27 for third-party apps to enable viewing of these reference images.
A depth map from the apple camera (again, signed) would show that the entire image had the same distance from the camera.
This is a pretty standard application of trusted computing and can be done entirely on the iPhone. A server would only possibly be needed for anonymization (while retaining key revocation capabilities if a key does end up leaking), but there are serverless ways to do even that (TPMs have supported these for a while now).
I think a big part of validation for things like these are just "could it have been modified since Z event happened", because Z was not something people paid attention to before.
It may not be in reach for you and I - but within reach of anyone with the budget to run a 'bot farm'
Proof of captured image with hardware-based-attestation can be increased by adding extra information besides the RGB channels, like depth mapping (which a projected screen wouldn't be able to fake), and eventually light field recording (plenoptic imaging, e.g. Lytro).
things like color rendering, sharpness, screen door/morie, motion blur, and yup even good ole depth queues in the lens system all show up as artifacts.
case in point, outside of a few specific niche cases like the mandalorian, that virtual production video wall thing is not actually being used all that much because of the amount of post shoot cleanup required to fix all those issues, it wasnt actually that much cheaper and its not really better either. especially when you factor in how hard it is to shoot that way.
Pre-AI fake videos sidestep this sort of issue by lowering the video quality.
Add some motion blur, some camera shake, some poor lighting, the camera being slightly out of focus, and make the video 720p instead of 4k.
I suspect it’s significantly less than millions.
It helps but doesn't solve credibility issue.
Then we might move to an age where photos which were not signed by someone will be treated as fake.
What we need is almost something like the classic "press C+A+D to log in" or the idea of "above the browser pane"... something an image cannot show you unless it's legit. Perhaps a personal thumbprint icon that is different for each viewer, so you know its your device telling you that something is real and not just some mock fake thing?
Will this also work with third-party camera apps like ProCam?
It's still distinct from actual AI generation imo.
Congrats to Apple achieving nation-wide tracking, embedding some kind of yellow dots[1], but this time this time this is based on strong cryptography and non-removable, targeting people who don't use AI under the slogan "we are fighting AI fakes", but people still "love the feature".
The problem is real, but this solution seems to not really solve it in any practical sense.
So, 90% of photojournalism outside of the major cities, then.
We really need Apple to open up true depth APIs to make forgery non trivial.
1) I see a photo online and doubt it's provenance
2) I contact the photographer and ask to see their cloud image (???!)
2a) I borrow someone's mac to download the image (.jpg?) and it can be verified on that?
We really need it for journalism. Otherwise we will not know what is real and what fabricated with ai.
On the other hand if this becomes mandated by law I can see it become treacherous for endusers.
Security is never a binary property, however, and can usually be better expressed in terms of how expensive it would be to subvert a given mechanism. "This image is either authentic or would have cost at least $x to fake" is already much more useful than nothing at all even without $x trending to infinity.
I wonder what the common thread is.
Regulation.
For China I would assume like other services, if there's some cloud involved, it should be on Chinese soil and accessible to China.
For EU harder to guess, but again the lock-in with "Private Cloud Computing" feels related.
It’s likely DMA — Apple would be required to provide APIs for signing for 3rd party apps too.
https://c2paviewer.com/articles/samsung-galaxy-s25-c2pa
https://security.googleblog.com/2025/09/pixel-android-truste...
On the other hand, ignoring standards altogether is the wrong way to go because the ecosystem after capture won't be there.
Or feature Thunderbolt rather than normie USB-C so you can record 4/8K ProRes to an SSD, and power a multi monitor setup with your iPhone Pro. macOS would be sick. Or (waterproof) exposed PCIE lanes so 3rd parties can integrate an ecosystem of backpacks like how Pi Hats work.
The old iPhone 17 Pro has USB 3.2 Gen 2, which is good for 10Gb/s.
You can already record 4K60 ProRes to an external SSD. This feature already existed for a year, so I assume you didn't actually need it?
> and power a multi monitor setup with your iPhone Pro. macOS would be sick.
I think you're looking for a MacBook Pro the size of an iPhone.
[1] https://www.samsung.com/us/support/owners/app/samsung-dex
You could argue most people wont need that speed, but most people don't need pro phone too.
Can you show me the workflow which uses this and has an iPhone as the bottleneck
Can already do iMessage over satellite. Most “data” is download and I predict some satellite service that sends basic broadcasts (traffic, news, Text-to-speech podcasts) squeezed into a few mbps by pointing your phone at the sky (or a small cabled antenna for around the clock use). Would love to go carrier-less.
My iphone 16 pro max can do 4K ProRes HDR or Log at 120 FPS when plugged into a SSD. If I had more builtin storage I could do it without the SSD. If you don't mind more dongling you can also have an external display along with the external SSD.
I actually do this because it's the behavior I've wanted for years, and I care about it enough to go through the relentless annoyance.
Never thought they would do it all within one update. In terms of hardware that is pretty much everything I wanted other than Silicon Battery.
The only thing that need radical change is iOS.
Please, not again.
– Sincerely yours mobile developer
That’s partially why they’re in the mess they’re in with AI. The CFO wouldn’t let them buy enough GPUs to train their models.
They needed all that money for more important expenses, like share buybacks, instead.
I don’t think Siri is sentient yet.
Personally iSO 26 is so unbelievably glitchy, it's only not embarrasing because you know others spent $$$ on the same thing so everyone pretends it's fine.
I don't use the apple podcasts or music apps. (Overcast and Spotify for me). I haven't run into any serious problems.
I have Reduced Transparency, Reduce Motion, and Prefer Cross-Fade Transitions, all enabled. You have to have Liquid Glass set to Clear for Reduce Transparency.
I do use the Apple Podcasts app, but YouTube Music and DI.FM Radio apps for music.
I never see any rendering issues / glitches, and the UI is smooth & snappy.
It's NOT possible to turn LG off in iOS 26. It is possible to reduce transparency and motion (i tried with and without enabling those and it's broken anyway).
Yet that’s still just repairing what they previously broke. I still can’t listen to music AND listen to a voice memo or a video clip.
The net price for a new phone then can be considered a relatively inexpensive hobby when looked at from a per week.
I have no idea how much ram my phone has. So long as apps run well, why would I care?
> the most important property of compute devices right now
Memory didn't matter when iPhone 12 was released, but these days it determines which local LLMs you can run on device. That's the point of that comment.
How about avoiding that scenario again? Is that a good enough reason? Being a diligent, informed consumer?
You can't possibly expect Apple to take that market segment seriously.
I am not sure single digit tk/s on weak model like ChatGPT OSS 20b @ Q3_K_M is going to be worthwhile.
Not to mention this has to be <0.01% of users who "want" to do this. The iPhone tooling would make it hard to even configure and spin up a local LLM.
According to what? (I don't disagree, just curious)
Small, memory efficient programs run better everywhere. It feels like theft to make consumers pay for our inefficient software. Electron / react on the desktop is such a rort.
Sure. Right along with Intel Core 2 Duo and Windows Vista.
Also, if they make a neo 2 from the A19 with 12 GB that'd be cool.
It’s just a software restriction. I’m sure they have macOS running on iPhones and iPads internally, probably both through a VM and natively. But it’s very Apple to block this use case.
> iPhone
Pick one.
The A19 Pro had 12 GB and was around 77GB/sec memory bandwidth for reference. If I was a betting man, I'd say the memory bandwidth on the A20 Pro is the same.
Since 1984, Apple has targeted regular people, not spec nerds. You're not the market.
Threadcount, Watts, cubic inches: different products use different misleading measures.
Apple basically need to release a new model every year to fit the phone upgrade cycle so I suppose it’s not that surprising to see one with so few compelling features. Maybe next year.
I mean, I can't remember the last time they DIDN'T say that. Variable aperture is kinda cool I guess. 256Gigs of storage basically means everyone's going to have to upgrade their iCloud storage monthly spend just to back this thing up. I've stopped sending my camera roll to iCloud just to save on space.
This is an interesting choice. Photos from my phone would literally be the last thing I ever turned off backup for.
To each their own...
Which means this original comment is somewhat disingenuous: "256Gigs of storage basically means everyone's going to have to upgrade their iCloud storage monthly spend just to back this thing up."
Clearly there is another option (as evidenced by your own behavior). But let's not pretend that option is free, either.
Likewise the 6th gen iPad Mini is what I was waiting for to get a tablet to sketch.
Sometimes a device hits just right.
how do you backup your photos when the phone gets full. I dont have a mac and the process is excruciating. Also the formats get messed up so some photos become unusable. I stopped taking 'live' photos because of this.
The two formats I've found that they don't back up accurately are rotated photos (if one's a stickler for "originals") and cropped screenshots (JPEG instead of PNG). Possibly the sidecar files for edits too.
Sometimes Google photos shows the wrong orientation for my pixel photos/videos but it's just a display issue.
Everything you stated to is useless to the person you replied.
Not unlike the "Best jacket of the season" being the one that is most fashionable as opposed to the most functional.
Now I think all the iphone cameras still suck compared to an actual camera, but the improvement over the last 10 years has been dramatic.
"MASSIVE improvements in Camera". Where? Evolution, refinement, sure. Massive? Hm.
It will probably keep most of its value too, if hardware price inflation continues.
Always said that I didn't see a reason to upgrade once I had 5G UW
The downside is that you need more money up front to purchase it.