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User education is the only long-term solution that also retains the freedom to use general purpose computation. Otherwise the market will differentiate into hyp

User education is the only long-term solution that also retains the freedom to use general purpose computation. Otherwise the market will differentiate into hyper-locked down, curated devices like the iOS but even stricter, and customisable ones targetting tech folk. In the meantime browsers can include a list of all popular software vendor domains and flag users navigating to similar but different domains. This will not be the first or the last whitelist that browsers include.

tgv 5y ago
User education is not going to happen. Half of the population have an IQ of less than 100, and 100 isn't enough to understand half of the issues. A large majority of users needs extensive support; general purpose computing isn't for them. I don't think it automatically leads to "hyper lock-down". An environment like the browser can do almost anything users want, and can be made safer. But if the tech sector refuses to cooperate, or is inept, then we might head down lock-down road.
- tonetheman 5y ago
  This yes. Users are stupid. I count myself among them. You cannot educate your users. You need to solve this some other way.
  - bombcar 5y ago
    Users are NOT stupid. This perpetuates the myth that if you’re smart you’ll have no problem. It’s too easy to blame the users for not checking everything - but nobody has the time to check everything. Not everyone can be a domain expert in everything. Do you verify that the building claiming to be your bank is still your bank and wasn’t replaced overnight? I agree that it can’t be solved by “making people smart” - the solution has to be something else. Things like “sign in with Apple” that are engineered so that they sign in CANNOT work at a non Apple domain (because the username the phone sends is based on the certificate sent by the website or something) are things we’ll need.
- amelius 5y ago
  > Half of the population have an IQ of less than 100 IQ is normalized on averages, not medians. That makes quite a difference. E.g. you could have a massive number of people at 99.9 against a few of 150.
  - CorrectHorseBat 5y ago
    Isn't IQ normal distributed? Average and median are the same in a normal distribution.
    - tgv 5y ago
      It is. Average is 100, standard deviation 15.

tgv 5y ago

User education is not going to happen. Half of the population have an IQ of less than 100, and 100 isn't enough to understand half of the issues. A large majority of users needs extensive support; general purpose computing isn't for them. I don't think it automatically leads to "hyper lock-down". An environment like the browser can do almost anything users want, and can be made safer. But if the tech sector refuses to cooperate, or is inept, then we might head down lock-down road.

tonetheman 5y ago
This yes. Users are stupid. I count myself among them. You cannot educate your users. You need to solve this some other way.
- bombcar 5y ago
  Users are NOT stupid. This perpetuates the myth that if you’re smart you’ll have no problem. It’s too easy to blame the users for not checking everything - but nobody has the time to check everything. Not everyone can be a domain expert in everything. Do you verify that the building claiming to be your bank is still your bank and wasn’t replaced overnight? I agree that it can’t be solved by “making people smart” - the solution has to be something else. Things like “sign in with Apple” that are engineered so that they sign in CANNOT work at a non Apple domain (because the username the phone sends is based on the certificate sent by the website or something) are things we’ll need.
amelius 5y ago
> Half of the population have an IQ of less than 100 IQ is normalized on averages, not medians. That makes quite a difference. E.g. you could have a massive number of people at 99.9 against a few of 150.
- CorrectHorseBat 5y ago
  Isn't IQ normal distributed? Average and median are the same in a normal distribution.
  - tgv 5y ago
    It is. Average is 100, standard deviation 15.