9 ms·

I’m quite happy with it, as I don’t see millions of people removing some hidden directory. No more zoom for me.

userbinator 7y ago
The point is precisely NOT to think about only this one case like many others seem to be focusing (or Zoom-ing in...?) on, but to consider how far you are willing to let Apple exercise its power over your computer. Would you let it scan all your files and delete e.g. "suspected images of child abuse" (to use an old cliche)? Suspected copyrighted material or fragments thereof? "Extremist" content, or content which is contrary to current social norms? How authoritarian does it have to get before you start being creeped out?
- pvg 7y ago
  You can take any capability and stretch it out to some absurd extreme. What if apt-get whatnot trashed your entire computer? What if buses started hunting pedestrians for sport? It's a line of inquiry that prioritizes handwringing over insight.
  - lmm 7y ago
    No, it prioritizes thinking about clear boundaries ahead of time, while you're able to think clearly about the issues. "Hard cases make bad law" as the lawyers say. Ethicists do this sort of thing all the time. There's a line between the OS and third-party software. There's a line between malicious software and accidentally vulnerable. Apple has just shown that it is willing to cross both those lines. Where is the line at which Apple will stop?
    - pvg 7y ago
      In what way did Apple cross a line? Platform vendors have automatically removed malware for many years. In this particular case, Apple, in consultation with the vendor, removed a particularly nasty vulnerability. The software itself was left alone. In fact, because the software was written so poorly, the vendor didn't even have the ability to address the problem - only Apple could. It's even odder to bring up ethics - should Apple have knowingly left zillions of users exposed to this? To make this look scary, you have to misrepresent what Apple actually did and then extrapolate to some frightening hypothetical to end up at nothing more than a risk inherent in all self-updating software. If the position is 'all self-updating software is an unreasonable risk', fine. But at least argue that unvarnished, and I imagine to most people, extreme and impractical view instead of trying to dress it up as some novel and intricate argument about morality and creeping authoritarianism.
    - throwaway2048 7y ago
      Lets ask a reasonable question: who wants the zoom webserver running on their systems providing a backdoor.
      - lmm 7y ago
        I didn't want my window to be broken. I still wasn't happy when my landlord came in and fixed it without giving me any notice.
  - fauigerzigerk 7y ago
    Has anyone ever asked bus companies to start hunting pedestrians for sport? The answer is clearly no. Contrary to that, the demands from governments and others for tech companies to "take responsibility" and become enforcers of all sorts of perceived virtues is reaching a crescendo. And it's not just about clearly dangerous things like child porn or terrorism. The UK government seriously demands the takedown of "harmful but not illegal" content. Just think about that concept of "harmful but not illegal" for a moment and you'll see that the sort of overreach that userbinator is talking about is anything but "some absurd extreme".
    - pvg 7y ago
      I still have a lot of trouble seeing how Apple removing a critical vulnerability - a completely mundane act with plenty of precedent from both Apple and others - is some clarion call that, if left unheeded, will have Siri judging everyone's hentai collection next. Why this - preventing myriads of users from becoming campeople - of all things? Why not, say, every Chrome autoupdate ever?
      - Crinus 7y ago
        > I still have a lot of trouble seeing how Apple removing a critical vulnerability You have that trouble because you are focusing on the "critical vulnerability" part and ignoring the fact that Apple decided to uninstall a program they had nothing to do with from your computer without your consent. The intentions might be noble, the implications however are less so.
        pvg 7y ago
        But they didn't uninstall 'a program'. The product itself was unaffected. And, again, this was done in consultation with the makers of the 'program' who had screwed up badly enough to be unable to fix the problem themselves. Nothing happened here that doesn't regularly happen when all sorts of things update.
        Crinus 7y ago
- Kadin 7y ago
  This is a classic "parade of horribles" argument. I do not find them compelling, personally. If Apple starts being abusive, they'll get their hand slapped. If they don't, they don't. There's no better company positioned to do anti-malware than the vendor of the OS itself. Which is why Apple and Microsoft both do it. You can disable updates on both platforms if, for some reason, you don't want anything to change on your system without your explicit action (pros and cons to that, obviously). But for most end users, the tradeoff of control vs. security is a very easy one, since the average user is in no way qualified to secure their own system or audit the code that runs on it.
- dclowd9901 7y ago
  You have to extend some goodwill to a company that invested millions of dollars and absolutely critical space in its handheld tech simply for security (I'm referring, of course, to the secure enclave). Point to me any other manufacturer who has gone to those lengths to protect their users. There was no reason for Apple to develop that tech. No one else in that space, but they developed it anyway. Can they do all this stuff? Sure, but I don't think they will. It does not seem to be in their interest.
- jbverschoor 7y ago
  I'd rather put Apple in control of my computer than any other random software vendor. This is exatly why all windows systems are full of crapware and are grinding their disks out of the box
eeeeeeeeeeeee 7y ago
Exactly. What is the other option? Show my mom how to use terminal to delete hidden dot directories? I also purged Zoom. They’ve blown it in the trust department. They better start working on a web app because that is as much access they’ll get from me in the future.

The point is precisely NOT to think about only this one case like many others seem to be focusing (or Zoom-ing in...?) on, but to consider how far you are willing to let Apple exercise its power over your computer. Would you let it scan all your files and delete e.g. "suspected images of child abuse" (to use an old cliche)? Suspected copyrighted material or fragments thereof? "Extremist" content, or content which is contrary to current social norms? How authoritarian does it have to get before you start being creeped out?

pvg 7y ago
You can take any capability and stretch it out to some absurd extreme. What if apt-get whatnot trashed your entire computer? What if buses started hunting pedestrians for sport? It's a line of inquiry that prioritizes handwringing over insight.
- lmm 7y ago
  No, it prioritizes thinking about clear boundaries ahead of time, while you're able to think clearly about the issues. "Hard cases make bad law" as the lawyers say. Ethicists do this sort of thing all the time. There's a line between the OS and third-party software. There's a line between malicious software and accidentally vulnerable. Apple has just shown that it is willing to cross both those lines. Where is the line at which Apple will stop?
  - pvg 7y ago
    In what way did Apple cross a line? Platform vendors have automatically removed malware for many years. In this particular case, Apple, in consultation with the vendor, removed a particularly nasty vulnerability. The software itself was left alone. In fact, because the software was written so poorly, the vendor didn't even have the ability to address the problem - only Apple could. It's even odder to bring up ethics - should Apple have knowingly left zillions of users exposed to this? To make this look scary, you have to misrepresent what Apple actually did and then extrapolate to some frightening hypothetical to end up at nothing more than a risk inherent in all self-updating software. If the position is 'all self-updating software is an unreasonable risk', fine. But at least argue that unvarnished, and I imagine to most people, extreme and impractical view instead of trying to dress it up as some novel and intricate argument about morality and creeping authoritarianism.
  - throwaway2048 7y ago
    Lets ask a reasonable question: who wants the zoom webserver running on their systems providing a backdoor.
    - lmm 7y ago
      I didn't want my window to be broken. I still wasn't happy when my landlord came in and fixed it without giving me any notice.
- fauigerzigerk 7y ago
  Has anyone ever asked bus companies to start hunting pedestrians for sport? The answer is clearly no. Contrary to that, the demands from governments and others for tech companies to "take responsibility" and become enforcers of all sorts of perceived virtues is reaching a crescendo. And it's not just about clearly dangerous things like child porn or terrorism. The UK government seriously demands the takedown of "harmful but not illegal" content. Just think about that concept of "harmful but not illegal" for a moment and you'll see that the sort of overreach that userbinator is talking about is anything but "some absurd extreme".
  - pvg 7y ago
    I still have a lot of trouble seeing how Apple removing a critical vulnerability - a completely mundane act with plenty of precedent from both Apple and others - is some clarion call that, if left unheeded, will have Siri judging everyone's hentai collection next. Why this - preventing myriads of users from becoming campeople - of all things? Why not, say, every Chrome autoupdate ever?
    - Crinus 7y ago
      > I still have a lot of trouble seeing how Apple removing a critical vulnerability You have that trouble because you are focusing on the "critical vulnerability" part and ignoring the fact that Apple decided to uninstall a program they had nothing to do with from your computer without your consent. The intentions might be noble, the implications however are less so.
      - pvg 7y ago
        But they didn't uninstall 'a program'. The product itself was unaffected. And, again, this was done in consultation with the makers of the 'program' who had screwed up badly enough to be unable to fix the problem themselves. Nothing happened here that doesn't regularly happen when all sorts of things update.
        Crinus 7y ago
Kadin 7y ago
This is a classic "parade of horribles" argument. I do not find them compelling, personally. If Apple starts being abusive, they'll get their hand slapped. If they don't, they don't. There's no better company positioned to do anti-malware than the vendor of the OS itself. Which is why Apple and Microsoft both do it. You can disable updates on both platforms if, for some reason, you don't want anything to change on your system without your explicit action (pros and cons to that, obviously). But for most end users, the tradeoff of control vs. security is a very easy one, since the average user is in no way qualified to secure their own system or audit the code that runs on it.
dclowd9901 7y ago
You have to extend some goodwill to a company that invested millions of dollars and absolutely critical space in its handheld tech simply for security (I'm referring, of course, to the secure enclave). Point to me any other manufacturer who has gone to those lengths to protect their users. There was no reason for Apple to develop that tech. No one else in that space, but they developed it anyway. Can they do all this stuff? Sure, but I don't think they will. It does not seem to be in their interest.
jbverschoor 7y ago
I'd rather put Apple in control of my computer than any other random software vendor. This is exatly why all windows systems are full of crapware and are grinding their disks out of the box

eeeeeeeeeeeee 7y ago

Exactly. What is the other option? Show my mom how to use terminal to delete hidden dot directories? I also purged Zoom. They’ve blown it in the trust department. They better start working on a web app because that is as much access they’ll get from me in the future.