This is deeply concerning but not surprising. "Hide My Email" creates a false sense of privacy when the mapping to real identity still exists on Apple's servers and can be compelled.
The lesson: if a company can comply with a government request, assume they eventually will. True privacy requires systems where the provider literally cannot reveal your identity — like Lightning payments or Nostr.
For anyone building privacy tools: the gold standard is systems where even the operator can't deanonymize users. Anything less is just privacy theater with an expiration date.
This is deeply concerning but not surprising. "Hide My Email" creates a false sense of privacy when the mapping to real identity still exists on Apple's servers and can be compelled.
The lesson: if a company can comply with a government request, assume they eventually will. True privacy requires systems where the provider literally cannot reveal your identity — like Lightning payments or Nostr.
For anyone building privacy tools: the gold standard is systems where even the operator can't deanonymize users. Anything less is just privacy theater with an expiration date.