Apple issues a big warning for MacBook users
One privacy measure could damage your laptop.
It’s one of the most low-tech laptop hacks around, and yet countless figures from Mark Zuckerberg to Edward Snowden are known to have adopted it. But now, Apple is officially advising against covering up your MacBook camera.
In a new support document, Apple suggests that closing your laptop lid with a cover attached can end up damaging the display. With video calls now a huge part of the ‘new normal’, privacy is no doubt on more users’ minds than ever. But Apple wants you to trust its camera indicator light instead of covering the whole thing up.
Unambiguously titled: Don’t close your MacBook, MacBook Air, or MacBook Pro with a cover over the camera, the document insists that the “tight tolerances” between the display and keyboard aren’t suitable for camera covers. It also says that covers can “interfere with the ambient light sensor and prevent features like automatic brightness and True Tone from working”.
Apple insists that the camera can’t activate without the green camera indicator light also turning on, so this is what users should watch for. While this is a pretty solid way of knowing when the camera is on, privacy concerned creatives could easily argue that finding out the camera is active while it’s active is too late – which is why they prefer to cover it up.
