With the launch of iOS 15, Apple has rolled out a brand new set of features that are totally worth exploring for any tech enthusiast. Some of them are already widely recognized by the Apple community and raved for it’s utility. However, some of the features are quite underrated even among the iPhone fanatics and one such feature is the Apple Private Relay. We will see what the new feature is about and how is it different from the other industry offerors.
What is Apple Private Relay?
As the name suggests, this feature is focused towards your privacy. When you avail this feature, your browsing activities are protected from other miscellaneous parties which may interrupt your connection. When this feature is enabled, your online behavior on Safari browser is totally hidden to the outside world and even Apple Inc. cannot see your activities.
This feature comes at a point where users around globe are opting for a VPN in order to improve their online privacy. With Apple bundling the solution within their ecosystem, millions of Apple users get an edge over other platform users, such as Android users without having to shed any additional bucks to a VPN.
What is the main purpose of Apple Private Relay?
The basic aim of the feature like any other privacy features is to limit the amount of data or metadata of your online behavior available to other parties. In a spied era of Facebook and Instagram, it becomes more and more difficult for users to cut down the aggressive tracking by advertisers. So to handle this, Apple promises to provide two simple solutions via this feature.
The first is to limit how much data advertising companies and your Internet Service Providers (ISPs) can see about your online behavior on Safari.
The second is that not even Apple can see what sites you are visiting.
How does it work?
Basically, when you browse from your device, two pieces of information are fetched from you and sent to servers across to get the page loaded. Those are your IP address (who and exactly where you are) and your DNS request (the address of the website you want, in numeric form). When Apple Private Relay is enabled, Apple splits this two information.
Once the two pieces of information are split, your IP address is retained by Apple, while your DNS request is passed on, encrypted, to a “trusted partner” (Apple is yet to name the trusted partner) that has the decryption key, along with a fake intermediary IP address that is based on your approximate location. So, with these two critical information split in the process, Apple can see only who you are and not what sites you’re visiting, while the “trusted partner” servers which get you to those sites can see where you’re going and your rough location but not who you are.
How to get Apple Private Relay feature for me?
Apple Private Relay is now a part of the iCloud+ package which is bundled within Apple One subscription for users all over the world (with some exceptions). The feature will be automatically available for existing and new Apple One subscribers. You can enable this feature by navigating to the Settings app > tapping your Apple ID > iCloud > and Private Relay (Beta) > enable it.
Note: Apple confirmed Private Relay won’t be available in China, Belarus, Colombia, Egypt, Kazakhstan, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkmenistan and Uganda.
How is it different from generic VPN providers?
Though it is very common to confuse the feature with that of a VPN service, it is not. To understand it, we’ve listed down the key differences between the Apple Private Relay and VPN below:
A VPN is designed to encrypt all of the information coming out of your device. However, Apple Private Relay is designed to encrypt only the data flowing out of your device via Safari browser. This means that, if you use the Google Chrome or any other browser from your Apple device, the privacy promised in Apple Private Relay will not be applicable.
Also, another important use case for VPN is to skip the geo-blocks. Apple Private Relay completely complies with the geo-blocking policies of your region and does not help you in accessing blocked content for your region.
