8 ms·

Walled Gardens Can Kill

149 points by steelbrain 2y ago

nativeit 1y ago
Insurance companies seem like the more dangerous entity in this story. Feels very much like they are missing the forest for the trees here.
steelbrain 2y ago
I was unopinionated about Apple's walled garden until the events of last week. Now I'm pro side-loading. If you've been on the fence, hope this changes your mind.
- alabastervlog 2y ago
  I must have missed this one among... you know, everything. What happened with Apple?
  - happytoexplain 2y ago
    You're replying to the author - they're referring to their blog post.
    - alabastervlog 2y ago
      Well, color me stupid. Thanks.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
  - patcon 2y ago
    Heh you're interacting with the author. The "last week" is the family emergency from the article (I had the same thought as you at first :)
    - scarface_74 2y ago
      And you couldn’t go to the website?
      - patcon 1y ago
        I'd read the link. It was the comment framing or maybe the understandable default assumption for readers living in this outpaced world, that one can't keep up with breaking news. Your response is kinda shitty toward the very part where I was trying to validate their misread as reasonable. Decent strangers sometimes do that for one another
  - moritzwarhier 2y ago
    Geofencing is not exclusive to Apple. Not even to native mobile apps. As you likely already known :) While the submission does make an important point, it seems a bit obfuscated by accusing Apple exclusively. Seems like main benefit of the side-loading was bypassing the geofence. And while native apps provide heavier geo-attribution (thus, probably harder to fake), I'm not sure if this is solely an Android vs Apple thing.
- moritzwarhier 2y ago
  Thanks for sharing this. I agree with others that this issue is primarily caused by the insurer (why does this need an app?) and dysfunctional healthcare governed by money and greed. Still it's a good reminder of what you're getting into with walled gardens. More broadly, it is a real shame how corporations have turned mobile internet into the complete opposite of what it could achieve. Ideally, the only thing tied to a specific hardware or software provider should be your identity. And imho, said provider should be controlled by state government, and be accessible from any device, given the proof of identity.
- 1659447091 2y ago
  If I am understanding, you were in United Arab Emirates (UAE), but your phone was logged into an account set to a different region? If that is the case I am surprised that is the first time you ran into a geo locked app and didn't already have another Apple account for that region that you could log into. This was one of the first things I quickly learned to do if I wanted my iPhone to be useful at all when I spent many months living in a (non-Western) country. (using apps for their services)
- hofrogs 2y ago
  "side-loading"? you surely mean "installing software that you want on a device that you own". don't use abusive corporate language.
  - BobaFloutist 2y ago
    "You can't get it from the app store? Have you tried installing software that you want on a device that you own it? Sometimes that works better"
- mrgoldenbrown 2y ago
  Isn't this more an issue with your insurance company not having a phone number or web site you could have used instead of the app?
theandrewbailey 2y ago
Is it just me, or is this blog's text a bit too low contrast and hard to read?
- steelbrain 2y ago
  Hello! Are you reading this on a phone/tablet? I tweaked it around a bit to make it soft/comfortable to read but may have gone too far. Edit: Made it a bit darker, hopefully its easier to read now.
  - theandrewbailey 2y ago
    Yes, tablet right now. Just checked again, much better, thanks!
damnitbuilds 2y ago
No, what "can kill" is being in a country where the health services do not treat seriously ill people without question. Sympathy will be limited when that country is also a repressive dictatorship, if you have gone there of your own accord. https://www.amnesty.org.uk/united-arab-emirates-uae-free-speech-repression-injustice-censorship https://www.amnesty.org.uk/united-arab-emirates-uae-free-spe...
- steelbrain 2y ago
  Mobility decisions are often dictated by visa-policies for people with weak passports (which is a big chunk of the world population). UAE, with all its flaws, is a lot more accessible than other countries may be
  - damnitbuilds 2y ago
    Yes. But if you chose to move to a horrible, evil country, then you cannot blame its awfulness on your phone. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_the_United_Arab_Emirates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_the_United_Ara...
    - -__---____-ZXyw 2y ago
      Your points here are quite shocking. You've no idea how or why the author of the blog post ended up in the country they were in in the position they were in; it's not stated in the blog post or here in the author's comments in this discussion. This apparent need to push the discussion away from the issue being presented and instead engage in some moral grandstanding on an irrelevant point comes across as suspect. If you were presented with an example of a walled garden causing distress to someone in a nice, white Western country, you'd presumably rush forward with your sympathy, would you?
      - damnitbuilds 1y ago
        Your comprehension here is quite shocking. You seem unable to parse my statement "Sympathy will be limited when that country is also a repressive dictatorship, if you have gone there of your own accord." You seem unable to comprehend that the OP complained about some policy choices of his phone's provider, when what actually "can kill" here is the health service of the evil, oppressive country he lives in. This apparent need to push the discussion away from the issue being presented and instead try and make it a race issue comes across as you being a demented defender of a disgusting regime. Suspect indeed. https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2024/country-chapters/united-arab-emirates https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2024/country-chapters/unite...
netsharc 2y ago
I went to a foreign country in 2019 and got a local SIM card, I couldn't install the ISP's app (I don't remember why I needed it, to make sure I got the quota that the seller promised?) because the app was region-locked.. huh, should I change my Google account's region just for the period I'm that country?
- CalRobert 2y ago
  Similarly it’s very annoying not being able to use banking apps on a phone I bought here in Europe, even when they work fine on the phone I brought from the US
- gear54rus 2y ago
  FWIW when sth like this happens, you can try to go to a place like APKPure and actually download the damn thing without anyone telling you that you can't. Also works for pinning versions of apps that ship some malware (like safetynet detection) with a new update. Apps installed from there are not linked to play store by default and so updates are not checked.
  - croemer 2y ago
    That's exactly what doesn't work for iOS though.
- croemer 2y ago
  Vodafone UK does this. It's infuriating.
rcMgD2BwE72F 2y ago
Why do you need an app for that? In what word does an insurer not provide such information on their mobile website?
- Sayrus 2y ago
  The same where a bank doesn't provide the same data and services on their website than on their phone application. And that application in addition to being region-locked requires a non-rooted phone with GApps installed.
  - gear54rus 2y ago
    I do wonder if there's something like RDP but for phones.. Like if you could keep a burner phone on somewhere at home maybe and RDP into it to use these crappy malware apps so that they don't complain. Would require transparent file and copy buffers I guess. In addition to remote desktop functions.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 2y ago
      It would be nice to have a more polished version, but haven't played around with it for 5 minutes I can tell you that just gluing together scrcpy and your choice of Xephyr+x11vnc / headless Wayland compositor + wayvnc works surprisingly well. I haven't tried yet since I just wanted to know if it would work at all, but I can't see any reason why you couldn't do the same thing with RDP or even noVNC or Apache Guacamole.
  - marcellus23 2y ago
    > The same where a bank doesn't provide the same data and services on their website than on their phone application. I'm sure this exists (and clearly so does the insurance company practice), but I've never run into it — bank websites always have the same or more functionality than the phone app. Except maybe something like mobile deposit.
    - graemep 2y ago
jimkleiber 2y ago
I hope one day we realize that the internet (and probably humanity) wants to be global and our region-based governance doesn't really make sense. Maybe one can hope.
- alnwlsn 2y ago
  It felt like we were closer to that 10+ years ago compared to now.
- lukan 2y ago
  Some things indeed make sense on a global scale. But if I would have a local problem, I would not like to have to deal with a obscure world government agency (partly or largely run by AI) somewhere far away.
  - jimkleiber 2y ago
    I agree. I don't think everything should be global, but that we should at least have an option for global. Just as here in the US, I don't think the federal (national) government should make all the decisions for my local town, but I'm glad to have them when it comes to interstate commerce and other national problems that need to be resolved.
scarface_74 2y ago
I find it hard to believe that the insurance provider didn’t have a website.
- 5- 2y ago
  plenty of mobile-only banks here in (former?) europe. losing access to a bank account might be as critical as to an insurance one.
  - JustExAWS 2y ago
    You mean with the way that the EU loves to regulate everything, they don’t regulate this? There isn’t a bank that I’m aware of that is app only in the US. The one thing you can’t do from some bank websites is deposit a check. Which makes no sense either since you have been able to capture photos from web pages in iOS forever.
- steelbrain 2y ago
  Here's the company (that manages the "frontend") for ours and a bunch of other insurance companies: https://www.nextcarehealth.com/ https://www.nextcarehealth.com/ I couldn't find their Lumi / web based login. Maybe you can help me find it!
  - JustExAWS 2y ago
    Hamburger menu -> Login
    - steelbrain 2y ago
      The login button redirects you to a page with a QR code for the application: https://www.nextcarehealth.com/download-lumi/ https://www.nextcarehealth.com/download-lumi/ Or maybe I'm missing something, did you actually find a Login form there?
      - JustExAWS 2y ago
photochemsyn 2y ago
Imagine if police and fire emergency services operated like this - you had to get private fire and police insurance, and if your home was on fire you would need to have an app on your phone telling you which fire departments were 'in-network' in order to ensure you weren't accidentally bankrupted (if the out-of-network service would even respond, once they checked your economic credit score). The real takeaway here should be that life-or-death outcomes should never depend on some buggy app installed on your phone and maintained by a for-profit company that's more interested in protecting shareholder profits and executive salaries than in providing the critical service in question.
photonthug 2y ago
I think it’s worth amending this to just “apps can kill”. I volunteer with search and rescue sometimes and have seen several people get into bad trouble due to reliance on phones for maps. Sometimes it’s dead batteries or just breakage without a backup plan, but no doubt other times it’s changing behavior in the app itself, OS decided to wipe cache, app has bad info, whatever. You can say that people should know better but sometimes dead tree maps are not available, and anyway there’s no doubt that they are on the way out. The “safe/reliable” way might even seem to be up for debate, since phones can be more waterproof than paper, less likely to blow away when you’re on top of a mountain, serve as a backup flashlight/emergency comms, etc. But all it takes is a company that decides to force auto update and a PM that decides feature churn increases engagement and creates job security, and who knows what will break? It is kind of like packaging that’s a choking or asphyxiation hazard.. if you’re doing anything that affects millions of people, it’s almost ALWAYS a safety issue even if you don’t usually think of it that way. No big audience or big user base without big responsibilities. Sure you’ll probably not be held liable in law suits, but on the other hand you should probably feel bad if you’re killing people due to indifference /negligence when thinking through edge cases.
- lubujackson 2y ago
  Very minor life hack, but when hiking with a phone map I always take a screenshot of the map to ensure I have at least that. Also a good habit to photo the map whenever starting a known trail with the big map at the start - I do that as a habit now.
  - boothby 2y ago
    One time, I dropped my phone in a parking lot and it landed face down on a pebble rendering my screen completely unusable. That's never happened with a paper map in a ziploc bag. Funny thing. I was in search and rescue as a teen, and I went though the courses with a friend. A decade or so later, we were hiking on a bright sunny day* and weren't properly prepared. We went off trail, and found ourselves in an unknown position. Our predominant emotion was shame, with the understanding that if we got S&R called on us we would be completely honest about our training (not that our spouses wouldn't be honest for us). We had a paper map but no compass, and were able to navigate to a marked trail with some educated guesswork. In the end, it was a fun adventure, but the shame stuck with us the whole way home. * note: "bright and sunny day" is the condition that search and rescue teaches one to be the most mindful of. It's where you and everybody else get the most confident, and prepare the least.
dahart 2y ago
A lot can be said about Apple and walled gardens for sure, but is it fair to mostly blame Apple for the region locked insurance app, rather than the app developer? That was the developer’s choice to do, not Apple’s. Hopefully Anees’ insurance also has an website and contact numbers for emergencies. Android supports region locking and has some region locked apps too, it appears, according to Google. Is the Android version of the app in question not region locked on Android? We don’t know since he used an emulator. Maybe region locking is easy to get around if you’re technical, but in an emergency for most non-technical people, the outcome will be the same on Android as it is on Apple, no?
- __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
  I agree that this is might not be the most-likely-to-kill-you aspect of using walled gardens, but since it's what the article is about... No, the vendor of your hardware should not be participating in schemes like region locking. You paid them for the device, they're supposed to be working for you, not against you. The fact that google does it also doesn't make it ok.
  - dahart 2y ago
    For apps, you pay the developer and Apple takes a cut, right? The developers are the ones demanding region locking functionality, and either way they are also paying Apple. Apple’s not working against you so much as serving multiple customers, and developers get more say in how apps work. I agree that Google also doing it doesn’t justify the practice, my main point was that moving to Android doesn’t actually fix the problem like the article implied.
    - __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
      And you were certainly right about that. I just couldn't resist the opportunity for a little rabble rousing. We shouldn't let them treat us like this (neither app nor platform).
    - swiftcoder 2y ago
      > The developers are the ones demanding region locking functionality For paid apps, maybe. For the free app that is the companion to a meat-space service you are already paying for (insurance, banking, etc), region locking is a liability all-round. I've spent countless hours working around this while travelling, and in some cases just haven't been able to use services I've paid for.
dzonga 2y ago
it's not just apple - with google once you change countries you've to wait a year to change again.
- steelbrain 2y ago
  With Google, as another posted has pointed out, you can use services like apkpure and grab the apk and install it directly, thereby bypassing such restrictions
bee_rider 2y ago
This is really the fault of the insurance company (they geo-locked the app, Apple is just respecting that). But really the idea of in-network hospitals for emergency services is nuts. Like, checkups, chronic issues—fine, your instance provider might have some preferences. But if it is an emergency (a situation in which you might die) and you have to figure out which hospital to go to first: Apple can not fix your malfunctioning society.
- gwern 2y ago
  > This is really the fault of the insurance company (they geo-locked the app, Apple is just respecting that). This sounds like a verbose way of saying "this is really the fault of Apple".
  - stackskipton 2y ago
    Why? Companies need to geo restrict apps for various legal reasons so Apple gave them a method to do so.
    - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
      That's exactly the criticism of Apple. Apple is giving them a method to do so, when that should not be provided because it causes this kind of problem and is otherwise a betrayal of the user.
      - bilbo0s 2y ago
        That's not how things should work. Apple should not be the arbiter of whether a business model you want to engage in is legal or not. That's what courts of law are for. I would strongly oppose Apple unilaterally deciding which apps can-, and which cannot-, use the geofencing feature. Go to the government, and have the government compel Apple to restrict certain apps if that is your desire, but for them to do that on their own is completely out of line.
        2y ago
teekert 2y ago
I guess, anything can kill? Is it unimaginable that a non-walled garden may kill? In some way?
touwer 2y ago
Shouldn't an insurance company have a (mobile) web interface? Strange that they don't
- BeetleB 2y ago
  Indeed. Avoid any critical service if it requires having an app (or even a cell phone for 2FA, although sadly it's becoming the norm). I got locked out of Google because my second number was not a cell phone. Back then, they had the option to call and read the code. Suddenly they took that option away and only allowed texting.
  - dayvigo 2y ago
    My bank only supports Zelle in the app, not on the web interface, and ever since an update a few months ago the Zelle part of the app suddenly won't load at all on GrapheneOS. There is no fix. So now I can't directly send and receive money through a bank without waiting days or paying a wire transfer fee, because in the United States this ability is monopolized by a private corporation's proprietary service, which can only be interfaced with through one's closed-source banking mobile app.
    - BeetleB 2y ago
      I don't use Zelle (or Venmo). One can have a decent life without these services :-) If I need to send money direct, I use ACH. Yes, it takes a few days. And yes, that's fine.
wiseowise 2y ago
I'm sure horde of Apple fanatics and useful idiots will gladly throw your wife under the bus, because: * Just buy an Android if you don't like it * This is not the Apple way * My grandma has much better experience this way, because I don't have to some made up reason why this is impossible on Android * Green bubble * Much more secure this way * I don't like when someone has different use case than I do * It would be even worse on Android * Think of the kids Did I forget something?
65 2y ago
Why wouldn't the insurance company have a web app with this information? The web solves nearly all of the problems Apple and Google have created with their ecosystems.
jmull 2y ago
I think you should be able to load whatever software you want on your phone (though technical speed bumps are good, imo). But this is far from the biggest problem in this story. e.g, if it’s important to be able to access the information available through the app, why is it locked? Why isn’t that important information available on a regular web site? Why do you need to install an app before getting emergency medical attention, anyway? While sideloading might let you work around a broken bureaucracy from time-to-time, that’s not a very effective way to improve the system.
pavel_lishin 2y ago
This headline reminded me to do my weekly log into Facebook to see if anyone on Marketplace has responded to me. I hate that it's functionally become the only way to sell things online.
systemswizard 2y ago
Imagine not trying to use their website… apps are cancer
amiantos 2y ago
Very weird 'article'. Apple has to provide the ability for app developers to lock their applications away from certain regions and countries where it may not be legal to provide the app or service. Whether the insurance company is using that functionality properly is not up to Apple. • The insurance company decided their information can only be accessed via an app, not Apple. • The insurance company decided their app should be region locked to UAE, not Apple. It seems like HN bait to turn this into an opportunity for an anti-Apple rant. Anyone who from the US travels abroad frequently will discover quickly that their banking apps are region locked, via the network, and you often have to use a VPN that looks like you are back home in the US to be able to access their apps or services. Apple has nothing to do with any of this. It doesn't matter if you're on iPhone or Android, it's network level. It's fine to be against this practice, but turning it into something directed to a single company as if it is their responsibility entirely is just... well, at worst, it doesn't seem honest, at best, it seems naive or ignorant.
itsanaccount 2y ago
Article: I didn't care about a corporation restricting people's freedom until it hurt me. Comments: Its not the corporation, its the government. Its not the corporation, its just the way things are. Its ok the corporation restricts freedom, everything is a tradeoff and everyone does this. Gollygee I hope this gets better. real elevating curious conversation here /s that never self reflects, is our culture of software making the world worse? will one day our intentional naivety around power fail to protect us from that truth?
- saturn8601 2y ago
  Software when done right is magical. What about the times that the software helped people?
  - itsanaccount 2y ago
    No thats not what we're talking about. Please elaborate on the times when a large institution restricted peoples freedom for their "own good." The history of this is extremely clear. Software being involved is just an obscuring detail.
    - tim333 1y ago
      Most corporate stuff is a mixed bad. They usually have to do some good things or they wouldn't exist. Apple for example.
- from-nibly 2y ago
  > Gollygee I hope this gets better It's not. I'm not a history buff so I won't speak for the past. But right now there is a huge accountability problem. Government literally can't exist without ignoring accountability. Corporations are incentivised to ignore accountability. Individuals want to ignore accountability. You only have control over yourself. If you want your life to go better then you have to take the accountability. Don't put all your eggs in one basket, have backups, understand how the things you participate in work. Ask questions like "why would this be free". It's a long road for everyone but if you want to be safe and happy you gotta take the solutions into your own hands.
dariosalvi78 2y ago
Why not calling a phone number to ask the insurance directly? Apps should NEVER be relied upon for life-critical stuff, there are just too many risks. Phone is widely accessible, mobile or not.
geor9e 2y ago
The author never names the insurance company. I can't help but wonder if it's because they later realized there was a web app the whole time, and the ios/android apps were entirely optional.
- hyperman1 2y ago
  Possibly. But people, in an emergency, do what they know best. You can prepare for some emergencies, but not all. I know about someone having a heart attack, and people around him panicking and not knowing the emergency phone number 112
  - geor9e 1y ago
    I'd never criticize someone's reaction during an emergency. I act dumb all the time, but I admit it later. My issue is this author is riding their viral headline about an anonymous evil insurer in cahoots with apple to kill, but won't name them for the factcheckers. You can rack your brain for all the possible reasons for this, but the Occam's Razor obvious one is that the insurer is actually innocent. But that would cause the torch-wielding mob to lose all interest in this story, if they found out there was a website the whole time. So the author will never name the insurer. I don't respect incomplete stories. Lie by omission. For attention.
smallerfish 2y ago
I've been trying to sign up for Apple TV for the past several days, as we wanted to catch up on some of the Apple shows. There is an Android app, and that installs smoothly enough, but trying to start a subscription initially errored out on both my & my wife's phones. I then tried to create a new user through the Apple website, and got stuck on this screen, which was throwing 500s every time I clicked on the continue button: https://www.reddit.com/r/applehelp/comments/17zawel/continue_button_not_working_on_apple_id_privacy/ https://www.reddit.com/r/applehelp/comments/17zawel/continue.... After a couple of days that screen cleared, but then I found that their website won't take payment from me (I'm based outside of the US, but have a US billing address, so that's likely the cause of that.) I did find that their app at this point allowed me to subscribe through Google Play subscriptions (once I had gotten this account fully setup), so that almost got me to the finish line (except for some reason I got blocked and decided to start again with a new account, so back to square 1). I'll also note that (of course) they don't support chromecast (as I think all or most other streaming apps available on Android do); the workaround is apparently to open the Apple TV site in chrome and cast from there. Kind of a shitshow, overall.
Liftyee 2y ago
I've always been conflicted on Apple. On the one hand, the attention to detail in the hardware and software is generally unmatched, and everything in the ecosystem works seamlessly. On the other hand, I think my personal values make me ideologically opposed to locked-down hardware/software that you don't get full control over (with associated freedom/repairability implications) and Apple products are some of the most restricted in that regard. The current compromise? I'll buy all Apple devices for convenience... once I have enough money to not care.
mrangle 2y ago
The author wants us to believe that their insurance provider reduces their customer service success to the single factor of whether or not someone has an Android phone? Unmitigated bs. Use your web browser and find an in-network hospital via the website. Like a person. This article stretches the limits of credibility. Garbage premise and clickbait title. I could continue on to talk about the "walled garden" issue, but I don't think that step is even warranted given the facts.
TZubiri 2y ago
Not sure what the proposal is exactly, that all there should be no international restrictions on commumications? It feels like how a minor problem (in the sense that the app is poorly planned) is escalated into a device/os and then a country + international problem If your goal were to fix this issue for other people on your situation, you would push for your insurance to disable geolocation instead of complaining about the existence of geolocation which is opening a can of worms you have no bearing in and don't understand. Fix your garden before you fix the world.
mcv 2y ago
Yes, walled gardens are bad, but in this case it was the combination of walled garden, region restrictions for vital health info, conflicting region restrictions, health info not being available outside the app, and a healthcare system that itself is completely broken. Each of these is stupid and dangerous, and if even one of them hadn't been the case, the author wouldn't have had this problem. It's a whole ecosystem of enshittification.
LinAGKar 2y ago
Seems like the real problem in this case is being required to go to a specific hospital because of insurance.

149 points by steelbrain 2y ago

Insurance companies seem like the more dangerous entity in this story. Feels very much like they are missing the forest for the trees here.

steelbrain 2y ago

I was unopinionated about Apple's walled garden until the events of last week. Now I'm pro side-loading. If you've been on the fence, hope this changes your mind.

alabastervlog 2y ago
I must have missed this one among... you know, everything. What happened with Apple?
- happytoexplain 2y ago
  You're replying to the author - they're referring to their blog post.
  - alabastervlog 2y ago
    Well, color me stupid. Thanks.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
- patcon 2y ago
  Heh you're interacting with the author. The "last week" is the family emergency from the article (I had the same thought as you at first :)
  - scarface_74 2y ago
    And you couldn’t go to the website?
    - patcon 1y ago
      I'd read the link. It was the comment framing or maybe the understandable default assumption for readers living in this outpaced world, that one can't keep up with breaking news. Your response is kinda shitty toward the very part where I was trying to validate their misread as reasonable. Decent strangers sometimes do that for one another
- moritzwarhier 2y ago
  Geofencing is not exclusive to Apple. Not even to native mobile apps. As you likely already known :) While the submission does make an important point, it seems a bit obfuscated by accusing Apple exclusively. Seems like main benefit of the side-loading was bypassing the geofence. And while native apps provide heavier geo-attribution (thus, probably harder to fake), I'm not sure if this is solely an Android vs Apple thing.
moritzwarhier 2y ago
Thanks for sharing this. I agree with others that this issue is primarily caused by the insurer (why does this need an app?) and dysfunctional healthcare governed by money and greed. Still it's a good reminder of what you're getting into with walled gardens. More broadly, it is a real shame how corporations have turned mobile internet into the complete opposite of what it could achieve. Ideally, the only thing tied to a specific hardware or software provider should be your identity. And imho, said provider should be controlled by state government, and be accessible from any device, given the proof of identity.
1659447091 2y ago
If I am understanding, you were in United Arab Emirates (UAE), but your phone was logged into an account set to a different region? If that is the case I am surprised that is the first time you ran into a geo locked app and didn't already have another Apple account for that region that you could log into. This was one of the first things I quickly learned to do if I wanted my iPhone to be useful at all when I spent many months living in a (non-Western) country. (using apps for their services)
hofrogs 2y ago
"side-loading"? you surely mean "installing software that you want on a device that you own". don't use abusive corporate language.
- BobaFloutist 2y ago
  "You can't get it from the app store? Have you tried installing software that you want on a device that you own it? Sometimes that works better"
mrgoldenbrown 2y ago
Isn't this more an issue with your insurance company not having a phone number or web site you could have used instead of the app?

theandrewbailey 2y ago

Is it just me, or is this blog's text a bit too low contrast and hard to read?

steelbrain 2y ago
Hello! Are you reading this on a phone/tablet? I tweaked it around a bit to make it soft/comfortable to read but may have gone too far. Edit: Made it a bit darker, hopefully its easier to read now.
- theandrewbailey 2y ago
  Yes, tablet right now. Just checked again, much better, thanks!

damnitbuilds 2y ago

No, what "can kill" is being in a country where the health services do not treat seriously ill people without question. Sympathy will be limited when that country is also a repressive dictatorship, if you have gone there of your own accord. https://www.amnesty.org.uk/united-arab-emirates-uae-free-speech-repression-injustice-censorship https://www.amnesty.org.uk/united-arab-emirates-uae-free-spe...

steelbrain 2y ago
Mobility decisions are often dictated by visa-policies for people with weak passports (which is a big chunk of the world population). UAE, with all its flaws, is a lot more accessible than other countries may be
- damnitbuilds 2y ago
  Yes. But if you chose to move to a horrible, evil country, then you cannot blame its awfulness on your phone. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_the_United_Arab_Emirates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_the_United_Ara...
  - -__---____-ZXyw 2y ago
    Your points here are quite shocking. You've no idea how or why the author of the blog post ended up in the country they were in in the position they were in; it's not stated in the blog post or here in the author's comments in this discussion. This apparent need to push the discussion away from the issue being presented and instead engage in some moral grandstanding on an irrelevant point comes across as suspect. If you were presented with an example of a walled garden causing distress to someone in a nice, white Western country, you'd presumably rush forward with your sympathy, would you?
    - damnitbuilds 1y ago
      Your comprehension here is quite shocking. You seem unable to parse my statement "Sympathy will be limited when that country is also a repressive dictatorship, if you have gone there of your own accord." You seem unable to comprehend that the OP complained about some policy choices of his phone's provider, when what actually "can kill" here is the health service of the evil, oppressive country he lives in. This apparent need to push the discussion away from the issue being presented and instead try and make it a race issue comes across as you being a demented defender of a disgusting regime. Suspect indeed. https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2024/country-chapters/united-arab-emirates https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2024/country-chapters/unite...

netsharc 2y ago

I went to a foreign country in 2019 and got a local SIM card, I couldn't install the ISP's app (I don't remember why I needed it, to make sure I got the quota that the seller promised?) because the app was region-locked.. huh, should I change my Google account's region just for the period I'm that country?

CalRobert 2y ago
Similarly it’s very annoying not being able to use banking apps on a phone I bought here in Europe, even when they work fine on the phone I brought from the US
gear54rus 2y ago
FWIW when sth like this happens, you can try to go to a place like APKPure and actually download the damn thing without anyone telling you that you can't. Also works for pinning versions of apps that ship some malware (like safetynet detection) with a new update. Apps installed from there are not linked to play store by default and so updates are not checked.
- croemer 2y ago
  That's exactly what doesn't work for iOS though.
croemer 2y ago
Vodafone UK does this. It's infuriating.

rcMgD2BwE72F 2y ago

Why do you need an app for that? In what word does an insurer not provide such information on their mobile website?

Sayrus 2y ago
The same where a bank doesn't provide the same data and services on their website than on their phone application. And that application in addition to being region-locked requires a non-rooted phone with GApps installed.
- gear54rus 2y ago
  I do wonder if there's something like RDP but for phones.. Like if you could keep a burner phone on somewhere at home maybe and RDP into it to use these crappy malware apps so that they don't complain. Would require transparent file and copy buffers I guess. In addition to remote desktop functions.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 2y ago
    It would be nice to have a more polished version, but haven't played around with it for 5 minutes I can tell you that just gluing together scrcpy and your choice of Xephyr+x11vnc / headless Wayland compositor + wayvnc works surprisingly well. I haven't tried yet since I just wanted to know if it would work at all, but I can't see any reason why you couldn't do the same thing with RDP or even noVNC or Apache Guacamole.
- marcellus23 2y ago
  > The same where a bank doesn't provide the same data and services on their website than on their phone application. I'm sure this exists (and clearly so does the insurance company practice), but I've never run into it — bank websites always have the same or more functionality than the phone app. Except maybe something like mobile deposit.
  - graemep 2y ago

jimkleiber 2y ago

I hope one day we realize that the internet (and probably humanity) wants to be global and our region-based governance doesn't really make sense. Maybe one can hope.

alnwlsn 2y ago
It felt like we were closer to that 10+ years ago compared to now.
lukan 2y ago
Some things indeed make sense on a global scale. But if I would have a local problem, I would not like to have to deal with a obscure world government agency (partly or largely run by AI) somewhere far away.
- jimkleiber 2y ago
  I agree. I don't think everything should be global, but that we should at least have an option for global. Just as here in the US, I don't think the federal (national) government should make all the decisions for my local town, but I'm glad to have them when it comes to interstate commerce and other national problems that need to be resolved.

scarface_74 2y ago

I find it hard to believe that the insurance provider didn’t have a website.

5- 2y ago
plenty of mobile-only banks here in (former?) europe. losing access to a bank account might be as critical as to an insurance one.
- JustExAWS 2y ago
  You mean with the way that the EU loves to regulate everything, they don’t regulate this? There isn’t a bank that I’m aware of that is app only in the US. The one thing you can’t do from some bank websites is deposit a check. Which makes no sense either since you have been able to capture photos from web pages in iOS forever.
steelbrain 2y ago
Here's the company (that manages the "frontend") for ours and a bunch of other insurance companies: https://www.nextcarehealth.com/ https://www.nextcarehealth.com/ I couldn't find their Lumi / web based login. Maybe you can help me find it!
- JustExAWS 2y ago
  Hamburger menu -> Login
  - steelbrain 2y ago
    The login button redirects you to a page with a QR code for the application: https://www.nextcarehealth.com/download-lumi/ https://www.nextcarehealth.com/download-lumi/ Or maybe I'm missing something, did you actually find a Login form there?
    - JustExAWS 2y ago

photochemsyn 2y ago

Imagine if police and fire emergency services operated like this - you had to get private fire and police insurance, and if your home was on fire you would need to have an app on your phone telling you which fire departments were 'in-network' in order to ensure you weren't accidentally bankrupted (if the out-of-network service would even respond, once they checked your economic credit score). The real takeaway here should be that life-or-death outcomes should never depend on some buggy app installed on your phone and maintained by a for-profit company that's more interested in protecting shareholder profits and executive salaries than in providing the critical service in question.

photonthug 2y ago

I think it’s worth amending this to just “apps can kill”. I volunteer with search and rescue sometimes and have seen several people get into bad trouble due to reliance on phones for maps. Sometimes it’s dead batteries or just breakage without a backup plan, but no doubt other times it’s changing behavior in the app itself, OS decided to wipe cache, app has bad info, whatever. You can say that people should know better but sometimes dead tree maps are not available, and anyway there’s no doubt that they are on the way out. The “safe/reliable” way might even seem to be up for debate, since phones can be more waterproof than paper, less likely to blow away when you’re on top of a mountain, serve as a backup flashlight/emergency comms, etc. But all it takes is a company that decides to force auto update and a PM that decides feature churn increases engagement and creates job security, and who knows what will break? It is kind of like packaging that’s a choking or asphyxiation hazard.. if you’re doing anything that affects millions of people, it’s almost ALWAYS a safety issue even if you don’t usually think of it that way. No big audience or big user base without big responsibilities. Sure you’ll probably not be held liable in law suits, but on the other hand you should probably feel bad if you’re killing people due to indifference /negligence when thinking through edge cases.

lubujackson 2y ago
Very minor life hack, but when hiking with a phone map I always take a screenshot of the map to ensure I have at least that. Also a good habit to photo the map whenever starting a known trail with the big map at the start - I do that as a habit now.
- boothby 2y ago
  One time, I dropped my phone in a parking lot and it landed face down on a pebble rendering my screen completely unusable. That's never happened with a paper map in a ziploc bag. Funny thing. I was in search and rescue as a teen, and I went though the courses with a friend. A decade or so later, we were hiking on a bright sunny day* and weren't properly prepared. We went off trail, and found ourselves in an unknown position. Our predominant emotion was shame, with the understanding that if we got S&R called on us we would be completely honest about our training (not that our spouses wouldn't be honest for us). We had a paper map but no compass, and were able to navigate to a marked trail with some educated guesswork. In the end, it was a fun adventure, but the shame stuck with us the whole way home. * note: "bright and sunny day" is the condition that search and rescue teaches one to be the most mindful of. It's where you and everybody else get the most confident, and prepare the least.

dahart 2y ago

A lot can be said about Apple and walled gardens for sure, but is it fair to mostly blame Apple for the region locked insurance app, rather than the app developer? That was the developer’s choice to do, not Apple’s. Hopefully Anees’ insurance also has an website and contact numbers for emergencies. Android supports region locking and has some region locked apps too, it appears, according to Google. Is the Android version of the app in question not region locked on Android? We don’t know since he used an emulator. Maybe region locking is easy to get around if you’re technical, but in an emergency for most non-technical people, the outcome will be the same on Android as it is on Apple, no?

__MatrixMan__ 2y ago
I agree that this is might not be the most-likely-to-kill-you aspect of using walled gardens, but since it's what the article is about... No, the vendor of your hardware should not be participating in schemes like region locking. You paid them for the device, they're supposed to be working for you, not against you. The fact that google does it also doesn't make it ok.
- dahart 2y ago
  For apps, you pay the developer and Apple takes a cut, right? The developers are the ones demanding region locking functionality, and either way they are also paying Apple. Apple’s not working against you so much as serving multiple customers, and developers get more say in how apps work. I agree that Google also doing it doesn’t justify the practice, my main point was that moving to Android doesn’t actually fix the problem like the article implied.
  - __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
    And you were certainly right about that. I just couldn't resist the opportunity for a little rabble rousing. We shouldn't let them treat us like this (neither app nor platform).
  - swiftcoder 2y ago
    > The developers are the ones demanding region locking functionality For paid apps, maybe. For the free app that is the companion to a meat-space service you are already paying for (insurance, banking, etc), region locking is a liability all-round. I've spent countless hours working around this while travelling, and in some cases just haven't been able to use services I've paid for.

dzonga 2y ago

it's not just apple - with google once you change countries you've to wait a year to change again.

steelbrain 2y ago
With Google, as another posted has pointed out, you can use services like apkpure and grab the apk and install it directly, thereby bypassing such restrictions

bee_rider 2y ago

This is really the fault of the insurance company (they geo-locked the app, Apple is just respecting that). But really the idea of in-network hospitals for emergency services is nuts. Like, checkups, chronic issues—fine, your instance provider might have some preferences. But if it is an emergency (a situation in which you might die) and you have to figure out which hospital to go to first: Apple can not fix your malfunctioning society.

gwern 2y ago
> This is really the fault of the insurance company (they geo-locked the app, Apple is just respecting that). This sounds like a verbose way of saying "this is really the fault of Apple".
- stackskipton 2y ago
  Why? Companies need to geo restrict apps for various legal reasons so Apple gave them a method to do so.
  - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
    That's exactly the criticism of Apple. Apple is giving them a method to do so, when that should not be provided because it causes this kind of problem and is otherwise a betrayal of the user.
    - bilbo0s 2y ago
      That's not how things should work. Apple should not be the arbiter of whether a business model you want to engage in is legal or not. That's what courts of law are for. I would strongly oppose Apple unilaterally deciding which apps can-, and which cannot-, use the geofencing feature. Go to the government, and have the government compel Apple to restrict certain apps if that is your desire, but for them to do that on their own is completely out of line.
      - 2y ago

teekert 2y ago

I guess, anything can kill? Is it unimaginable that a non-walled garden may kill? In some way?

touwer 2y ago

Shouldn't an insurance company have a (mobile) web interface? Strange that they don't

BeetleB 2y ago
Indeed. Avoid any critical service if it requires having an app (or even a cell phone for 2FA, although sadly it's becoming the norm). I got locked out of Google because my second number was not a cell phone. Back then, they had the option to call and read the code. Suddenly they took that option away and only allowed texting.
- dayvigo 2y ago
  My bank only supports Zelle in the app, not on the web interface, and ever since an update a few months ago the Zelle part of the app suddenly won't load at all on GrapheneOS. There is no fix. So now I can't directly send and receive money through a bank without waiting days or paying a wire transfer fee, because in the United States this ability is monopolized by a private corporation's proprietary service, which can only be interfaced with through one's closed-source banking mobile app.
  - BeetleB 2y ago
    I don't use Zelle (or Venmo). One can have a decent life without these services :-) If I need to send money direct, I use ACH. Yes, it takes a few days. And yes, that's fine.

wiseowise 2y ago

I'm sure horde of Apple fanatics and useful idiots will gladly throw your wife under the bus, because: * Just buy an Android if you don't like it * This is not the Apple way * My grandma has much better experience this way, because I don't have to some made up reason why this is impossible on Android * Green bubble * Much more secure this way * I don't like when someone has different use case than I do * It would be even worse on Android * Think of the kids Did I forget something?

65 2y ago

Why wouldn't the insurance company have a web app with this information? The web solves nearly all of the problems Apple and Google have created with their ecosystems.

jmull 2y ago

I think you should be able to load whatever software you want on your phone (though technical speed bumps are good, imo). But this is far from the biggest problem in this story. e.g, if it’s important to be able to access the information available through the app, why is it locked? Why isn’t that important information available on a regular web site? Why do you need to install an app before getting emergency medical attention, anyway? While sideloading might let you work around a broken bureaucracy from time-to-time, that’s not a very effective way to improve the system.

pavel_lishin 2y ago

This headline reminded me to do my weekly log into Facebook to see if anyone on Marketplace has responded to me. I hate that it's functionally become the only way to sell things online.

systemswizard 2y ago

Imagine not trying to use their website… apps are cancer

amiantos 2y ago

Very weird 'article'. Apple has to provide the ability for app developers to lock their applications away from certain regions and countries where it may not be legal to provide the app or service. Whether the insurance company is using that functionality properly is not up to Apple. • The insurance company decided their information can only be accessed via an app, not Apple. • The insurance company decided their app should be region locked to UAE, not Apple. It seems like HN bait to turn this into an opportunity for an anti-Apple rant. Anyone who from the US travels abroad frequently will discover quickly that their banking apps are region locked, via the network, and you often have to use a VPN that looks like you are back home in the US to be able to access their apps or services. Apple has nothing to do with any of this. It doesn't matter if you're on iPhone or Android, it's network level. It's fine to be against this practice, but turning it into something directed to a single company as if it is their responsibility entirely is just... well, at worst, it doesn't seem honest, at best, it seems naive or ignorant.

itsanaccount 2y ago

Article: I didn't care about a corporation restricting people's freedom until it hurt me. Comments: Its not the corporation, its the government. Its not the corporation, its just the way things are. Its ok the corporation restricts freedom, everything is a tradeoff and everyone does this. Gollygee I hope this gets better. real elevating curious conversation here /s that never self reflects, is our culture of software making the world worse? will one day our intentional naivety around power fail to protect us from that truth?

saturn8601 2y ago
Software when done right is magical. What about the times that the software helped people?
- itsanaccount 2y ago
  No thats not what we're talking about. Please elaborate on the times when a large institution restricted peoples freedom for their "own good." The history of this is extremely clear. Software being involved is just an obscuring detail.
  - tim333 1y ago
    Most corporate stuff is a mixed bad. They usually have to do some good things or they wouldn't exist. Apple for example.
from-nibly 2y ago
> Gollygee I hope this gets better It's not. I'm not a history buff so I won't speak for the past. But right now there is a huge accountability problem. Government literally can't exist without ignoring accountability. Corporations are incentivised to ignore accountability. Individuals want to ignore accountability. You only have control over yourself. If you want your life to go better then you have to take the accountability. Don't put all your eggs in one basket, have backups, understand how the things you participate in work. Ask questions like "why would this be free". It's a long road for everyone but if you want to be safe and happy you gotta take the solutions into your own hands.

dariosalvi78 2y ago

Why not calling a phone number to ask the insurance directly? Apps should NEVER be relied upon for life-critical stuff, there are just too many risks. Phone is widely accessible, mobile or not.

geor9e 2y ago

The author never names the insurance company. I can't help but wonder if it's because they later realized there was a web app the whole time, and the ios/android apps were entirely optional.

hyperman1 2y ago
Possibly. But people, in an emergency, do what they know best. You can prepare for some emergencies, but not all. I know about someone having a heart attack, and people around him panicking and not knowing the emergency phone number 112
- geor9e 1y ago
  I'd never criticize someone's reaction during an emergency. I act dumb all the time, but I admit it later. My issue is this author is riding their viral headline about an anonymous evil insurer in cahoots with apple to kill, but won't name them for the factcheckers. You can rack your brain for all the possible reasons for this, but the Occam's Razor obvious one is that the insurer is actually innocent. But that would cause the torch-wielding mob to lose all interest in this story, if they found out there was a website the whole time. So the author will never name the insurer. I don't respect incomplete stories. Lie by omission. For attention.

smallerfish 2y ago

I've been trying to sign up for Apple TV for the past several days, as we wanted to catch up on some of the Apple shows. There is an Android app, and that installs smoothly enough, but trying to start a subscription initially errored out on both my & my wife's phones. I then tried to create a new user through the Apple website, and got stuck on this screen, which was throwing 500s every time I clicked on the continue button: https://www.reddit.com/r/applehelp/comments/17zawel/continue_button_not_working_on_apple_id_privacy/ https://www.reddit.com/r/applehelp/comments/17zawel/continue.... After a couple of days that screen cleared, but then I found that their website won't take payment from me (I'm based outside of the US, but have a US billing address, so that's likely the cause of that.) I did find that their app at this point allowed me to subscribe through Google Play subscriptions (once I had gotten this account fully setup), so that almost got me to the finish line (except for some reason I got blocked and decided to start again with a new account, so back to square 1). I'll also note that (of course) they don't support chromecast (as I think all or most other streaming apps available on Android do); the workaround is apparently to open the Apple TV site in chrome and cast from there. Kind of a shitshow, overall.

Liftyee 2y ago

I've always been conflicted on Apple. On the one hand, the attention to detail in the hardware and software is generally unmatched, and everything in the ecosystem works seamlessly. On the other hand, I think my personal values make me ideologically opposed to locked-down hardware/software that you don't get full control over (with associated freedom/repairability implications) and Apple products are some of the most restricted in that regard. The current compromise? I'll buy all Apple devices for convenience... once I have enough money to not care.

mrangle 2y ago

The author wants us to believe that their insurance provider reduces their customer service success to the single factor of whether or not someone has an Android phone? Unmitigated bs. Use your web browser and find an in-network hospital via the website. Like a person. This article stretches the limits of credibility. Garbage premise and clickbait title. I could continue on to talk about the "walled garden" issue, but I don't think that step is even warranted given the facts.

TZubiri 2y ago

Not sure what the proposal is exactly, that all there should be no international restrictions on commumications? It feels like how a minor problem (in the sense that the app is poorly planned) is escalated into a device/os and then a country + international problem If your goal were to fix this issue for other people on your situation, you would push for your insurance to disable geolocation instead of complaining about the existence of geolocation which is opening a can of worms you have no bearing in and don't understand. Fix your garden before you fix the world.

mcv 2y ago

Yes, walled gardens are bad, but in this case it was the combination of walled garden, region restrictions for vital health info, conflicting region restrictions, health info not being available outside the app, and a healthcare system that itself is completely broken. Each of these is stupid and dangerous, and if even one of them hadn't been the case, the author wouldn't have had this problem. It's a whole ecosystem of enshittification.

LinAGKar 2y ago

Seems like the real problem in this case is being required to go to a specific hospital because of insurance.