With the release of its iOS 8 platform,...

With the release of its iOS 8 platform, Apple unveiled a new privacy website Wednesday, saying the operating system won’t let the company comply with government national security requests (http://bit.ly/1uJqaWk). “On devices running iOS 8, your personal data ... is placed under the protection of your passcode,” the site said. “Unlike our competitors, Apple cannot bypass your passcode and therefore cannot access this data. So it’s not technically feasible for us to respond to government warrants for the extraction of this data from devices in their possession running iOS 8.” Apple took another jab at competitors: “We don’t build a profile based on your email content or web browsing habits to sell to advertisers,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook. “We don’t ‘monetize’ the information you store on your iPhone or in iCloud. And we don’t read your email or your messages to get information to market to you.” Apple’s advertising network, iAd, is only “one very small part of our business,” Cook said, doesn’t use personal data “and you can always just opt out altogether.” Google’s revenue, by contrast, is primarily ad-based (http://bit.ly/1upkim4). Google didn’t comment. Apple has been facing heightened privacy questions since the high-profile hacking of numerous celebrities’ iCloud accounts.