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>All the apps that Apple sells... I imagine from the point of view of Elizabeth Warren the problem is all of the apps that Apple doesn't sell - a maps app the

>All the apps that Apple sells... I imagine from the point of view of Elizabeth Warren the problem is all of the apps that Apple doesn't sell - a maps app the integrates as tightly as Apple Maps. A browser that doesn't use Safari as its backend. A messaging app that can read SMS and replace Messages.

bilbo0s 8y ago
>A messaging app that can read SMS and replace Messages... And now we've hit on the essential flaw in Warren's "break them up!" soundbite based policy. Her ideas do NOTHING to address the real problem, a lack of data privacy. If you tell apple they have to let people make apps that can access things like sms, boom, all of the users lose control of that data. The App developer takes it, and now it can go anywhere. It'd actually be worse than what we have now. Here's the really sad part about all of this: A law to make the sharing of data between companies explicitly illegal is actually EASIER to implement than the whole "break 'em up!" strategy. So you have to ask yourself, "Why won't they just make it illegal to share data?" And when you start brainstorming potential answers to that question, it can be a bit unsettling. It makes me think we need such a law even more.
- AnthonyMouse 8y ago
  That is a completely independent problem. Moreover, the privacy issue isn't solved by prohibiting what applications can do, it's solved by giving the user control over them. If a flashlight app wants to access your SMS messages, you should be able to say "no" and still use it as a flashlight. But if an actual messaging app wants to do that for actual messaging purposes, you should still be able to say "yes" and use that app instead of Apple's.
  - mikhailt 8y ago
    Unfortunately, that also won't solve anything. Let's say that I installed Telechat (fake chat app) and it asked for SMS, well yea, I'm going to approve it because it is a chat app. Okay, how does that prevent Telechat from collecting my data and selling it? I understand what you're trying to say but it is not solved by using app policies (controlling which piece of data they can access) because such policies does not prevent said apps from violating your privacy. That isn't to say that such app policies shouldn't be a thing, it's a great tool and limits the potential damage but it has nothing to do with privacy.
    - AnthonyMouse 8y ago
      > Unfortunately, that also won't solve anything. It solves the flashlight app accessing your SMS messages. > Let's say that I installed Telechat (fake chat app) and it asked for SMS, well yea, I'm going to approve it because it is a chat app. But then that's a different problem. It's no longer the app having permissions it shouldn't, it's the user explicitly choosing to trust a malicious app. The solution to that is to have a third party service to verify that apps aren't doing anything malicious. That is nominally what Apple does with the App Store, but there are two main problems with their implementation: (1) You can't choose someone else to trust to verify iOS apps for you, it has to be Apple and there is no alternative if they get it wrong or reject non-malicious apps because they don't want competition. (2) It's not enough to deny malicious apps from accessing SMS, they also need to allow non-malicious apps to do it. This would largely be solved by fixing (1) because then a provider that failed to do (2) would not have to be used.
newscracker 8y ago
> A messaging app that can read SMS and replace Messages. Oh, dear! No! One of the best decisions Apple took (among many) from the beginning from the privacy angle was/is not allowing any apps to access SMS or call logs. The way it implemented OTP entry from SMS is also brilliant (though it doesn't work for some message formats). We've seen this on Android over and over again. Most users don't understand app permissions well from the privacy angle, and will say yes to any request (we've known for a long time from usability studies that users will usually do whatever is easy to dismiss any dialog). If Apple gives access to SMS and call logs, then those will be abused by third party apps (like Facebook, Google and many others), just like it has been on Android. Apple could instead do a lot more to restrict the information that apps can collect and improve its app permission model. But it would be nice to allow default apps to be setup as a user likes and give users more freedom. That's something most users would vote for (if it could be achieved that way).
- Wowfunhappy 8y ago
  On the other hand, it is almost undoubtable that one of the reasons iMessage is so popular, is that it's the only messaging app that can integrate with SMS on the iPhone. Apple then, in turn, uses the existing network effect of iMessage as a way to sell more iPhones. That doesn't seem like fair competition at all.
  - crgwbr 8y ago
    iMessage is popular, but that has less to do with anything Apple has done and more to do with how badly Google has failed with a messaging strategy. iMessage is popular because it works ok-enough, is the default, and is consistent. Would you really rather have the Android situation, where you need SMS and umpteen other third-party messaging apps, including whichever 3 google is pushing this month?
    - Wowfunhappy 8y ago
      Personally? I really, really don't want to switch between two (or more) messaging apps depending on who I'm talking to. I have an iPhone and live in the iMessage-friendly United States, so this works out well enough for me. If I lived in Europe where everyone used Whatsapp, the inability to change the default would be a big point of frustration with iOS.

bilbo0s 8y ago

>A messaging app that can read SMS and replace Messages... And now we've hit on the essential flaw in Warren's "break them up!" soundbite based policy. Her ideas do NOTHING to address the real problem, a lack of data privacy. If you tell apple they have to let people make apps that can access things like sms, boom, all of the users lose control of that data. The App developer takes it, and now it can go anywhere. It'd actually be worse than what we have now. Here's the really sad part about all of this: A law to make the sharing of data between companies explicitly illegal is actually EASIER to implement than the whole "break 'em up!" strategy. So you have to ask yourself, "Why won't they just make it illegal to share data?" And when you start brainstorming potential answers to that question, it can be a bit unsettling. It makes me think we need such a law even more.

AnthonyMouse 8y ago
That is a completely independent problem. Moreover, the privacy issue isn't solved by prohibiting what applications can do, it's solved by giving the user control over them. If a flashlight app wants to access your SMS messages, you should be able to say "no" and still use it as a flashlight. But if an actual messaging app wants to do that for actual messaging purposes, you should still be able to say "yes" and use that app instead of Apple's.
- mikhailt 8y ago
  Unfortunately, that also won't solve anything. Let's say that I installed Telechat (fake chat app) and it asked for SMS, well yea, I'm going to approve it because it is a chat app. Okay, how does that prevent Telechat from collecting my data and selling it? I understand what you're trying to say but it is not solved by using app policies (controlling which piece of data they can access) because such policies does not prevent said apps from violating your privacy. That isn't to say that such app policies shouldn't be a thing, it's a great tool and limits the potential damage but it has nothing to do with privacy.
  - AnthonyMouse 8y ago
    > Unfortunately, that also won't solve anything. It solves the flashlight app accessing your SMS messages. > Let's say that I installed Telechat (fake chat app) and it asked for SMS, well yea, I'm going to approve it because it is a chat app. But then that's a different problem. It's no longer the app having permissions it shouldn't, it's the user explicitly choosing to trust a malicious app. The solution to that is to have a third party service to verify that apps aren't doing anything malicious. That is nominally what Apple does with the App Store, but there are two main problems with their implementation: (1) You can't choose someone else to trust to verify iOS apps for you, it has to be Apple and there is no alternative if they get it wrong or reject non-malicious apps because they don't want competition. (2) It's not enough to deny malicious apps from accessing SMS, they also need to allow non-malicious apps to do it. This would largely be solved by fixing (1) because then a provider that failed to do (2) would not have to be used.

newscracker 8y ago

> A messaging app that can read SMS and replace Messages. Oh, dear! No! One of the best decisions Apple took (among many) from the beginning from the privacy angle was/is not allowing any apps to access SMS or call logs. The way it implemented OTP entry from SMS is also brilliant (though it doesn't work for some message formats). We've seen this on Android over and over again. Most users don't understand app permissions well from the privacy angle, and will say yes to any request (we've known for a long time from usability studies that users will usually do whatever is easy to dismiss any dialog). If Apple gives access to SMS and call logs, then those will be abused by third party apps (like Facebook, Google and many others), just like it has been on Android. Apple could instead do a lot more to restrict the information that apps can collect and improve its app permission model. But it would be nice to allow default apps to be setup as a user likes and give users more freedom. That's something most users would vote for (if it could be achieved that way).

Wowfunhappy 8y ago
On the other hand, it is almost undoubtable that one of the reasons iMessage is so popular, is that it's the only messaging app that can integrate with SMS on the iPhone. Apple then, in turn, uses the existing network effect of iMessage as a way to sell more iPhones. That doesn't seem like fair competition at all.
- crgwbr 8y ago
  iMessage is popular, but that has less to do with anything Apple has done and more to do with how badly Google has failed with a messaging strategy. iMessage is popular because it works ok-enough, is the default, and is consistent. Would you really rather have the Android situation, where you need SMS and umpteen other third-party messaging apps, including whichever 3 google is pushing this month?
  - Wowfunhappy 8y ago
    Personally? I really, really don't want to switch between two (or more) messaging apps depending on who I'm talking to. I have an iPhone and live in the iMessage-friendly United States, so this works out well enough for me. If I lived in Europe where everyone used Whatsapp, the inability to change the default would be a big point of frustration with iOS.