Apple introduced the M4 chip alongside the new iPad Pro series, a processor that greatly improves on power, performance, and efficiency, but is also optimal for AI tasks thanks to a Neural Engine that has also been improved. But what we didn’t know until now is that it holds a privacy-related secret.
It was only recently that it was discovered that the new iPad Pro with M4 have a new privacy feature. Do you hear the little green and orange dots on the top of your iPhone or iPad when you turn on the camera or microphone? Well, it’s directly related to them. Let’s see what it’s all about next.
This is the new security feature that the new iPad Pros have thanks to the M4 processor
As discovered by developer Guilherme Rambo, the new iPad Pros with M4 processor have a new feature related to camera and microphone privacy indicators. Rambo explains it this way in his Mastodon profile:
“Fun fact about the iPad Pro with M4: It’s the first device to support and use Apple’s new Safe Indicator Light mechanism. When using the microphone or camera, the corresponding indicator is effectively rendered on the hardware, so it’s much less likely that any malware application will be able to access those sensors without the user’s knowledge.”
These green indicators when the camera is activated and orange when the microphone is activated were released as part of iOS 14 in 2020 and are activated via software. However, the difference is that on the iPad Pro with an M4 processor they are activated when the hardware detects that there has been an access to one of those two components.
This new security feature is currently only found on the iPad Pro with M4, but it is possible that in the future it will reach other devices such as the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro, which will have an A18 and A18 Pro processor. With this new system, it is possible to prevent these indicators from being displayed, so it is very welcome.
Apple didn’t mention anything about this during the presentation. It is possible that he did not do so because it could have given the impression that the system used by the other devices, being via software, is not as secure as it is now, that it is the hardware that detects the accesses.
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