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When a Justice of the Peace notarises a piece of documentation, they are not vouching for authenticity they are only voicing for certain claims made: the docume

When a Justice of the Peace notarises a piece of documentation, they are not vouching for authenticity they are only voicing for certain claims made: the document was presented on a certain date, and/or that this copy is an accurate facsimile of the provided original. Notarisation for macOS similarly only means, “the developer presented us with their application and their certificate of authenticity and we signed it with the certificate that allows macOS to run it without complaining.” There’s no attempt by Apple to claim that the application is safe or does what it says on the tin. Scanning for malware is simply to avoid embarrassing situations me an author/publisher finding they’ve been compromised by some well known malware. The outcome of notarisation is that the app has been notarised. It’s like claiming that the outcome of toasting a sandwich is approval or rejection, no the outcome of toasting a sandwich is you have a sandwich that is toasted, aka “toasted sandwich.” You might reject a sandwich which isn’t built properly (eg: has mismatched bread slices, is missing contents or smells of dynamite). But toasting the sandwich provided by the customer doesn’t mean you actually like it.

rowanG077 6y ago
> There’s no attempt by Apple to claim that the application is safe or does what it says on the tin. So that isn't part of the notarization process. It still was approved by Apple and thus was notarised. > It’s like claiming that the outcome of toasting a sandwich is approval or rejection, no the outcome of toasting a sandwich is you have a sandwich that is toasted, aka “toasted sandwich.” That's disingenuous. If I send a Sandwich to be toasted by Apple and get it back toasted that means the Sandwich was indeed approved by Apple since it has been toasted.
- ziml77 6y ago
  If I set up a toasting service and you sent me a ham and cheese sandwich spread with Nutella, you're going to get it back toasted. That doesn't mean that I approve of that nasty sandwich filling though.
  - rowanG077 6y ago
    Then you should not toast it.
- manicdee 6y ago
  Notarising is only the act of a trusted third party verifying that the signature on a document is valid. Here's a grossly simplified version of what happens with Apple's notary service: 1. Developer writes program 2. Developer signs program to provide evidence to end-user that program has not been tampered with 3. Developer submits program and signature to Apple's notarising service 4. Apple signs program and developer's signature to tell macOS that this developer signature for this program has been seen by a trusted third party (the notary, in this case Apple) — the notary signature basically states that at this date and time the developer presented Apple with the program and the developer signature and that the developer signature is the correct one for that program 5. End user downloads program which includes signature by developer and signature by Apple 6. macOS compares program signature to developer signature 7. macOS compares checks that notary signature matches the program and developer signature 8. macOS now trusts that this program is what was published by the developer, and allows it to run At no point in this sequence has Apple provided any testimony or recommendation about this program. Notarising is only about ensuring that what you are trying to run is what the developer wrote for you. "Approval" on the other hand implies that Apple might "disapprove" something, which is not something that happens in the notarising service. A notarising request might be rejected if the applications contains known malware (because the presence of such is an exceptional circumstance which the developer needs to take urgent action to correct, not because Apple doesn't want to sign malware). It's like a Justice of the Peace recommending that you see a doctor if you turn up to ask for a witness to your signature while bleeding profusely from your ear. The JP is not refusing to witness your signature, they are simply suggesting that you have more urgent matters to attend to right now.
  - _qulr 6y ago
    You're just making up stuff. You have no idea what you're talking about. You're clearly not a Mac developer. Nobody should be listening to this long-winded fable spun out of yarn. I mean, I could go through that whole thing and refute it line-by-line, but I'm just astonished that you think you get to invent all this stuff out of thin air. It's totally wrong, and you don't even have first-hand knowledge of it.
    - 6y ago

rowanG077 6y ago

> There’s no attempt by Apple to claim that the application is safe or does what it says on the tin. So that isn't part of the notarization process. It still was approved by Apple and thus was notarised. > It’s like claiming that the outcome of toasting a sandwich is approval or rejection, no the outcome of toasting a sandwich is you have a sandwich that is toasted, aka “toasted sandwich.” That's disingenuous. If I send a Sandwich to be toasted by Apple and get it back toasted that means the Sandwich was indeed approved by Apple since it has been toasted.

ziml77 6y ago
If I set up a toasting service and you sent me a ham and cheese sandwich spread with Nutella, you're going to get it back toasted. That doesn't mean that I approve of that nasty sandwich filling though.
- rowanG077 6y ago
  Then you should not toast it.
manicdee 6y ago
Notarising is only the act of a trusted third party verifying that the signature on a document is valid. Here's a grossly simplified version of what happens with Apple's notary service: 1. Developer writes program 2. Developer signs program to provide evidence to end-user that program has not been tampered with 3. Developer submits program and signature to Apple's notarising service 4. Apple signs program and developer's signature to tell macOS that this developer signature for this program has been seen by a trusted third party (the notary, in this case Apple) — the notary signature basically states that at this date and time the developer presented Apple with the program and the developer signature and that the developer signature is the correct one for that program 5. End user downloads program which includes signature by developer and signature by Apple 6. macOS compares program signature to developer signature 7. macOS compares checks that notary signature matches the program and developer signature 8. macOS now trusts that this program is what was published by the developer, and allows it to run At no point in this sequence has Apple provided any testimony or recommendation about this program. Notarising is only about ensuring that what you are trying to run is what the developer wrote for you. "Approval" on the other hand implies that Apple might "disapprove" something, which is not something that happens in the notarising service. A notarising request might be rejected if the applications contains known malware (because the presence of such is an exceptional circumstance which the developer needs to take urgent action to correct, not because Apple doesn't want to sign malware). It's like a Justice of the Peace recommending that you see a doctor if you turn up to ask for a witness to your signature while bleeding profusely from your ear. The JP is not refusing to witness your signature, they are simply suggesting that you have more urgent matters to attend to right now.
- _qulr 6y ago
  You're just making up stuff. You have no idea what you're talking about. You're clearly not a Mac developer. Nobody should be listening to this long-winded fable spun out of yarn. I mean, I could go through that whole thing and refute it line-by-line, but I'm just astonished that you think you get to invent all this stuff out of thin air. It's totally wrong, and you don't even have first-hand knowledge of it.
  - 6y ago