Consider that "compile-time memory safety" is still a reasonable concept, despite the fact that ptrace() means that anybody could technically read and write arb

Consider that "compile-time memory safety" is still a reasonable concept, despite the fact that ptrace() means that anybody could technically read and write arbitrary bits in your process. Or that rowhammer could cause memory-safety-violating bit flips. It's the same idea here. Obviously nothing can stop, say, faulty network hardware from causing protocol violations. But that doesn't stop us from meaningfully saying that, under the correct set of assumptions, protocol violations are statically prevented at compile time.