Ask HN: How does Apple and other companies prevent leaks?

4 points by mkristian 10 years ago | 7 comments

Obviously leaks occur, but how can companies like Apple prevent that their designs and features are leaked?

Do they have some special water marking system or other security system to prevent files and pictures from being leaked? I can imagine that during the development phase developers must come and go. Some leave on their own and some leave angry maybe with a potential intent to leak images, files or other information. So how would they protect themselves against this?

I cannot imagine it is only by contract.

mydpy 10 years ago |

Game development companies do not allow cell phones. Email encryption and monitoring. Disabling USB ports and other means of transmitting digital content. Strict compartmentalization with a rigid organization structure.

runjake 10 years ago |

Strict compartmentalization.

In Apple's case, this is well-documented in several public articles and books, such as the Jobs biographies and any of the "expose" articles that come out the week of a new iPhone release.

danielki 10 years ago | |

ZDNet had an article about Apple's secrecy in 2009 [0]. Of note:

> Apple closely monitors all communication on its corporate network and routinely plants false information with employees in an effort to track leaks.

[0] http://www.zdnet.com/article/apples-secret-society/

Someone1234 10 years ago | |

Wasn't there some great money quote about how many people in the iPhone team had never seen an actual iPhone until Jobs held it on stage...

danielki 10 years ago |

Compartmentalization, as runjake mentioned below, is key.

I worked at Microsoft during the development of Windows 8 (disclaimer: I no longer work there, and only speak for myself here). Certain "secret" features were not available in the "default" OS configuration until shortly before they were announced. Access was restricted only to those who needed it, and only then with manager (or, I believe at one point, director) approval. If you had access, you were under strict instructions to only enable the features when nobody else was around.

Artifacts from this process are probably what resulted in the "workaround" in the Developer Preview build [0] to revert back to the classic start menu.

Similarly, with the Surface, much of the company was in the dark until the official announcement. Some of the lengths they went to in order to keep it secret, included only a few executives knowing and trying to avoid ordering multiple parts from the same vendor [1]. The team worked in a vault-style building where one door had to close before the other would open [2].

There's also the giant "fear of being sued or prosecuted" thing. Big companies can afford good lawyers, your average employee probably cannot. Hell, Win8 was released over 3 years ago, I no longer work at Microsoft, yet I've still gone back and triple-checked this post to make sure I'm not disclosing anything about it that's not well-known to the public.

[0] http://blogs.msdn.com/b/balsharfi/archive/2011/11/04/metro-s...

[1] http://money.cnn.com/2012/10/28/technology/mobile/microsoft-...

[2] http://www.techradar.com/news/mobile-computing/tablets/how-m...

Spooky23 10 years ago |

Google Mao's works on cells and guerilla warfare and Manhattan project secrecy.

In short, you don't give anyone the big picture, have a vote cadre of leaders committed to the cause, have enforcers watching/misdirecting/culling the herd.

Spooky23 10 years ago | |

s/vote/core/