Apple Private Relay

Tech Talk iOS
1

Don’t know if Micah’s comments about the iPhone’s Private Wi-Fi Address settings in terms of internet speed is opening a can of worms or opening Pandora’s box.

Further exploring came up with some other “surprises” being provided by Apple.

  1. Under Wi-Fi settings “i” is Private Wi-Fi Address on iPhone
  2. Under iCloud settings is Private Relay (Beta) on iPhone and Mac
  3. Under iCloud settings is Hide My Email on iPhone
  4. Under Network on Mac Preferences is Limit IP Address Tracking

Probably need Steve Gibson to weigh in, because it’s too complicated for me.

Use of these settings is hurting my head. Some result in ipv4 and ipv6 addresses related to server in large major city (Sydney), or just local ipv4 address located at home. Some affect Safari only, others affect all browsers. Some affect wi-fi only, others affect wi-fi and mobile data. And the Hide my Email is related to specific apps that I don’t remember configuring to something I have no idea about.

And, some affect data speed.

Found Private Relay being on results in Orbi app to not be able to connect.

2

It is in essence working like a VPN, so you don’t have access to the local network from the device, just the internet.

Private Relay and Hide my Email don’t work on my network, as I already have a lot of privacy related stuff at the network level and they can’t get out to enable themselves.

3

Seems like this could affect a lot of unsuspecting users.

4

I thought Private Relay only impacted Safari.