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The article overestimates the novelty of ASLR (nothing new compared to Linux and Windows), and goes on to underestimate the importance of (iOS-like) sandboxing.
by danieldk 15y ago
The article overestimates the novelty of ASLR (nothing new compared to Linux and Windows), and goes on to underestimate the importance of (iOS-like) sandboxing.
Linux has sandboxing per SELinux. However, SELinux puts the burden of sandboxing on the administrator, or in the case of a desktop OS on the user. Apple, on the other hand puts the burden on the application developer.
Applications have to opt-in for Sandboxing [1]. Once an application opts-in, it has no access to anything but its own home directory. File opening/saving dialogs are handled through the pbox daemon, and are the only manner for the sandboxed process to get access to the 'outside world'. Some privileges like network access have to be retrieved through entitlements.
What we will see is the first, vendor-pushed attempt, to sandbox every application on a mainstream operating system. And it will probably work, because the burden is on the developers, not the users.
[1] Apple will probably make it mandatory in the future for new applications sold in the App Store.
- w1ntermute 15y ago> [1] Apple will probably make it mandatory in the future for new applications sold in the App Store. I think the most likely scenario is that Apple will use the steady stream of revenue from selling in the App Store as bait for the devs, then, after they're hooked, switch up the rules on them and require everything to be sandboxed. By that point they will be dependent on the App Store for the majority of their revenue and will have no choice but to comply.
- follower 15y ago"Apple has decreed that all applications submitted to the Mac App Store must be sandboxed, starting in November." -- http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/07/mac-os-x-10-7.ars/9#sandboxing http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/07/mac-os-x-10-7.a...
- lurch_mojoff 15y agoIt is actually much more than probable that Apple will require Mac App Store apps to be sandboxed, it is certain — Apple have notified developers that come Fall (I can't remember the exact month; October? November?) that requirement comes into action. And even if that was not the case sandboxing would still be understated — the system provided segregation of common attack vectors, e.g. WebKit2's separate HTML parsing processes, Quicktime's separate video decoding processes, the segregated PDF parser, etc., is one of the bigger security enhancements of any OS.
- danieldk 15y agoit is certain Isn't that NDA'ed information? ;) However, it seems it's out via Ars already.
- lurch_mojoff 15y agoYeah, I should stop hanging around iOS developers - I'm loosing sense of what is under NDA and what's not. :)
- mitchty 15y agoThey already said November is when Mac apps will be required to have sandboxing setup. Its not much stretch to see the lines in the sand shifting.
- masklinn 15y ago> October? November? Novermber according to Ars's review.