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Hasn't Apple always said the reason they don't allow sideloading was that it'd be impossible without compromising security? So are they claiming their European
by josephcsible 4y ago
Hasn't Apple always said the reason they don't allow sideloading was that it'd be impossible without compromising security? So are they claiming their European iDevices won't be secure anymore, or are they admitting they were lying before and that the real reason was nothing but greed?
- AniseAbyss 4y agoiPhones been hacked for ages already.
- danielheath 4y agoPerhaps "has it ever been hacked" is not the best metric, unless you prefer to keep your devices under armed guard, encased in several meters of concrete, without an internet connection. IMO, https://zerodium.com/program.html https://zerodium.com/program.html is a good indication of "what would it cost to hack me using a never-before-seen exploit".
- 0xy 4y agoYou wrongly assumed that zero days are single-use. Pegasus used the same exploits in dozens or hundreds of targets.
- danielheath 4y agoI didn't assume that at all - that's why I specified a never-before-seen vulnerability.
- 0xy 4y ago"seen" could not be true until after thousands are hacked.
- ec109685 4y agoStill surprising to me that AWS has firecracker and iOS still runs things like Javascript along side every other app on the system.
- hammyhavoc 4y agoWhy couldn't both be true?
- nomel 4y agoHow would app review work?
- EMIRELADERO 4y agoThe whole point is that there would be no app review for independent apps. It's not a technical change in who distributes the software, it's a radical change that results in developers being able to give apps to users without being in a contractual relationship with Apple period.
- nomel 4y agoI'm not sure I follow the chain of comments here. It seems that not having a review would result in less security, which is the context to my comment.
- kaba0 4y agoAppStore pretty much only does a “grep -r porn” on every app, hardly meaningful “security”. If anything, it’s best at mysteriously flagging competitor apps.
- ulfw 4y agoThey are required by European law to allow it, wether they see it as compromising security or not. This isn't Apple's decision.
- neximo64 4y agoHow they will do it likely is they will charge to install the App store app and assign it a CA and require it to sign the apps downloaded from that app store. The sideloading of apps will technically be an apple approved app but enforced by another app store. To put it another way you would not be able to randomly download an unsigned app.
- amelius 4y agoThey will probably put all the side loaded apps in the same sandbox. Yikes ...
- syrrim 4y agoThey're presumably claiming that european devices will be less secure.
- AlfeG 4y agoOr usability of this feature would be so frustrating, that no one will use. Constant security popups on every start, very limited available API for apps, etc...
- kaba0 4y agoThat would just give them a huge fine.
- toyg 4y agoThere is law and there is the spirit of the law. The ECJ can be pretty fast when they feel someone is taking the piss.
- amelius 4y agoThe cookie popups can be very annoying and confusing and they didn't do anything about that.
- jeroenhd 4y agoThey have actually fined several large tracking providers for their shady cookie popups because opting out was harder than opting in. European DPAs aren't getting enough funding to take on this problem, but they haven't been sitting still either.
- kuschku 4y agoThey're slowly working through the backlog. Even Google gave in and put a single, working "deny all tracking" button front and center.
- phatfish 4y agoRecently I've noticed more sites providing a visible "Deny All" button, rather than the dark pattern of going through and unchecking 5, 10, 50 tracking cookies individually, or having to dig out a button hidden somewhere. I assume this was how it was intended to function, but the kind people that run internet websites intentionally made it more difficult.
- charcircuit 4y agoSecurity isn't binary. European iDevices will likely have more malware installed on them on average than US iDevices.
- awestroke 4y agoI thought iPhone apps were sandboxed, making malware impossible?
- charcircuit 4y agoThat limits what they can do, but it doesn't mean they can't do anything malicious. Someone could make a YouTube app which removes ads, but steals your session so that they can viewbot or spam comment sections with legit accounts.
- jakub_jo 4y agoThis is something which would also work using an app store app -- where's the app store benefit in your point?
- charcircuit 4y agoDistribution is centralized and Apple can end distribution if the app gets reported and add the malware to their malware scanning. While possible, it should be more rare. When working on massive platforms it is typically the goal to minimize metrics like malware installs as opposed to trying to make them 0. The relative probabilities are important.
- pxoe 4y agoScanning apps for malware, preventing them from being installed or run, and warning about malicious apps, doesn't actually require centralized distribution or limiting sideloading. This malware problem with sideloading has already been solved, by Google with Play Protect on mobile, by every other system that allows 'sideloading' and has some kind of antivirus, and by Apple themselves in macOS. Compared to an antivirus (macos, windows, android, all have protection built-in), that could detect a malicious app, or receive a report about a malicious app and then block it from being run, having an app store in the chain might not even be that much help or be at all different in that process. If anything, giving potential malware apps a chance to be published on an app store, get that scale, visibility and access to an audience outright, and hang there even if for a little bit before getting taken down, could be kinda worse than if malware apps were distributed across smaller venues. Where, through what channel could a malware app get access to biggest amount of people? Through a centralized app store. (especially if it's the only one on the platform, and the only way to install apps*, forcing all users of the platform to be there.) An app store gives potential malware makers access to an existing audience, ready to be exploited, and a centralized app store ensures that it's the biggest audience possible.
- asddubs 4y agoI suppose it's true in the same way that having knives in your kitchen makes it more likely that you might cut yourself. but a kitchen without knives kind of sucks so
- chronogram 4y agoI don't think kitchens should have knives. I want my parents to be able to eat, but with knives in the kitchen they occasionally cut their fingers and I don't want to have to deal with that. You could make it optional but before you know it they'll get knives anyway. Besides, most people eat processed food and don't want to make meals from scratch so this is only a problem for a handful of people. (yes yes this is satire)
- webmobdev 4y agoIf Apple's social media team is hiring, you should apply - this is exactly the irritating kind of replies I get when I criticise some Apple product. :)
- hsbauauvhabzb 4y agoMy parents want to cook dinner with knives. They have no interest in side loading custom applications though.
- solarkraft 4y agoMy parents want to install applications of their choosing on their devices, but have no interest in knife-cooked dinner.
- hsbauauvhabzb 4y agoI find this hard to believe. Don’t get me wrong, freedom to sideload apps is a thing I believe in, but saying ‘it’s because my parents want more freedom’ is certainly a stretch.
- wiseowise 4y agoYou know what's the most secure device? The one that doesn't work.
- alerighi 4y agoThe claim is nonsense. If it was true Android devices would be full of malware, that is clearly not the case.
- jb1991 4y ago> there’s a far greater chance that hackers can make it onto the [Android] platform to distribute malware through malicious apps [compared to iPhone]. https://nordvpn.com/blog/ios-vs-android-security/ https://nordvpn.com/blog/ios-vs-android-security/
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 4y agoIs MacOS insecure then?
- simooooo 4y agoYou could probably argue yes, since a 3rd party app isn’t validated in any way by apple
- heavyset_go 4y ago3rd party apps are validated via OCSP on macOS when the apps are launched. A few years ago this was an issue, when millions of macOS users found that they couldn't launch any apps at all on their Macs, because Apple's OCSP servers were down[1]. [1] https://blog.cryptohack.org/macos-ocsp-disaster https://blog.cryptohack.org/macos-ocsp-disaster
- wrasee 4y agoI think most would accept that iOS is more secure than macOS. But to flip the logic the other way around and put as you did is a little disingenuous.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- vbezhenar 4y agoIt's one thing to provide security in the kindergarden. It's another thing to provide security in the jail. So far Apple's track record is kindergarden security. They do have tech in place, but how that tech would resist big bad world outside the wall remains to be seen. My guess would be that there will be apps breaking the jails in the first years and 10 years later things will settle on and it'll become relatively safe to sideload untrusted apps. Of course if one's smart enough to only download apps from reputable websites, then the only worry will be privacy issues which are probably not important for most people
- fortuna86 4y ago[dead]