Governments spy on Apple, Google users through ‘push notifications’, alleges US Senator

Senator Ron Wyden has written an open letter to the US Department of Justice urging transparency reporting for Apple and Google regarding push notification information. Both companies confirmed that they were restricted by the US government from publicly releasing information. Wyden highlighted that Apple and Google have the ability to facilitate government surveillance of app usage through metadata received from push notifications. Apple stated their commitment to transparency and their plans to update their transparency reporting. End-to-end encrypted services like WhatsApp and iMessage are not affected by these surveillance practices.