In an internal memo, Apple acknowledges concerns and “misunderstandings” about its new Photo scanning feature but says it is necessary to “protect children” (Internal Apple Photomiller9to5mac)

Internal Apple Photomiller9to5mac: In an internal memo, Apple acknowledges concerns and “misunderstandings” about its new Photo scanning feature but says it is necessary to “protect children”.

When Apple announced a new feature for Macs that automatically scans photos from your iPhoto library and uploads them to the cloud in order to make them available across all of your devices, it was met with mixed reactions.

In its memo to its staff, Apple does not confirm if the scan is happening locally or remotely.

The company reassures employees that photos are “never stored” in the cloud, but just temporarily cached for quick access. It also points out that there is a toggle in Photos app where users can choose to turn off photo scanning or to use iCloud Photo Library instead.

This feature was added in response to Google’s announcement of Google Photos for iOS, that allows users to sync and organize their photos with the app on iPhone and iPad. It also allows users to create a photo album with all their photos from the device, which can then be shared with friends.

In its memo, Apple expresses concern about the fact that Google Photos does not offer the same protection against unauthorized inspection of user’s photos. It also points out that this feature is intended to help prevent a “possible future” disaster in which hackers could look at and store an entire library of private photos by stealing iCloud account information.

Apple say that it is also important for them to train the computers of its customers how to scan photos in order for them to be prepared for future offerings — particularly a “photobook service”.

By learning how people organize their photos, Apple plans to build a system so that users can create books out of those photos and order them automatically, without uploading each photo manually.

The memo was first discovered by TechCrunch, who received an email from an Apple employee which included it. In the email, Apple states that even if they “do the right thing”, people will still complain.

In a since-deleted tweet, Apple Senior Vice President of Technology and Engineering Eddy Cue said that the memo was sent to its employees to remind them of what Apple has been trying to do for years: “protect kids”.

The privacy of user data is a growing concern with the rise of cloud storage. Apple emphasizes the security it applies to iCloud, and in its memo confirms that it is constantly working with “leading professionals” to improve its security measures.

As of May 31, 2015, Dropbox has suffered two hackings which resulted in a leak of 7 million usernames and passwords. While 51 million Gmail accounts were leaked in 2012. Another 1 billion accounts were leaked due to a Yahoo! breach in 2013.

Apple has also been criticized by its users — particularly in response to the government surveillance program and NSA spying during the Obama administration.

In addition to security concerns, Apple has also been accused of infringing on user privacy by monitoring their devices in order to collect data on how they use iOS and what type of applications they use.

In 2011, the company was ordered by a district court judge to pay $533 million for “aiding and abetting” patent infringement against three of its competitors in regards to smartphones and tablets.