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An Apple fan says they lost '20 years of digital life' after using an Apple gift card (www.techradar.com)
submitted 8 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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An Apple fan who has spent “nearly 30 years as a loyal customer” says they’ve been “permanently” locked out of their Apple Account due to what might be the overzealous actions of Apple’s automated anti-fraud system. It’s left them locked out of “20 years of digital life,” and it all started with the seemingly straightforward purchase of an Apple gift card.

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[–] 40 points 8 months ago (4 children)

i think it’s easy to make comments like this from the peanut gallery, with the benefit of hindsight and a self-selected group of users who will agree. but Apple should be legally obligated to address this. the solution can’t be “this idiot didn’t spend his nights and weekends doing 3-tier backups and high availability infrastructure diversity!”; that’s not scalable. if we just accept that companies can do this, they will continue to. but this has been on the front page of HackerNews. it’ll probably make it to Tim Apple’s desk eventually, so we’ll see what shakes out.

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  • [–] 8 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    Apple should have to address this but backups are ALWAYS the solution.

    If he only saved on his hard drive and lost access we'd say it.

    If he only saved on an external drive and lost access we'd say it.

    If he only saved on a thumb drive and lost access we'd say it.

    But for some reason he only saved on Apple's servers and all of a sudden we aren't supposed to say it?

    No. Always make backups of important data. Always.

    Hopefully Apple gives him access back but let this be another reminder to everyone to never allow for one point of failure for your irreplacable data even if it's a big corporation.

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  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago

    i guess in these situations i think of my aunt, who is in her 80s. she has an iPhone. should she buy a NAS and host Immich? i don’t think “make backups” is the simple advice it appears to be for the vast majority of people

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  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago

    You're right. It is easy to make these comments but it's also a cautionary tale. It's becoming increasingly difficult to use something within a "walled garden" but also retain ownership/access of it yourself.

    Just having an external HDD for a backup goes a long way.

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  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago

    I completely agree, that why I said I don’t blame the guy, was just doing what Apple encouraged him and all of us to do.

    My comment was more meant as advice. Apple definitely should be making this right, BUT this is also a good eye opener for the rest of us.

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  • [–] 0 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    Yeah, it's better to take Apple to the grand jury. That will fly for sure.

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  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    sure, there’s reason to be cynical, but i don’t think handing society to fascists out of bleak pessimism is the way i want to live my life.

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago*

    Of course not, but being a pragmatic can help. If people with money can sustain a legal battle against Apple, all power to them. For the rest of us, it is achievable to distribute the eggs in several baskets, or even keep the eggs at home (selfhost).

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