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Apple's "notarisation" – blocking software freedom of developers and users
- moi2388 11mo agoI still don’t see why you would want your parents to run untrusted software on their devices, but you do you I guess.
- Propelloni 11mo agoI still don't see why you would want Apple to have a say in what you run on your device, but you do you, I guess.
- MagicMoonlight 11mo agoBecause they have thousands of employees who have the time to look at the source code and determine whether it is malicious. Nobody else would bother. That’s why meme language repositories continuously lead to hacks and vulnerabilities.
- rkomorn 11mo agoApple employees have access to the source code of apps on the App Store?
- deleted 11mo ago[deleted]
- BoredPositron 11mo agoTechnically yes, if they want it you have to give it to them. The dev agreement and TOS is pretty broad.
- rkomorn 11mo agoIs that (Apple asking for source) a frequent thing?
- BoredPositron 11mo agoWe don't know.
- aeonfox 11mo agoApp developers do know. I can't say that I've ever worked on an app where this request has been made. Neither the App Store Connect Agreement[0] nor the Apple Developer Agreement[1] stipulates that the developer can be compelled to surrender their source code. [0] https://appstoreconnect.apple.com/WebObjects/iTunesConnect.woa/wa/termsOfService/ https://appstoreconnect.apple.com/WebObjects/iTunesConnect.w... [1] https://developer.apple.com/support/downloads/terms/apple-developer-agreement/Apple-Developer-Agreement-20250318-English.pdf https://developer.apple.com/support/downloads/terms/apple-de... All the relevant agreements can be found here, so if there's something that specifies this kind of overreach, I'd both be very surprised and interested. https://developer.apple.com/support/terms/ https://developer.apple.com/support/terms/
- BoredPositron 11mo ago“If you are required by law, regulation, or court order to disclose any Apple Confidential Information (which can include requests related to legal investigations or audits), you agree to give Apple prompt notice and to cooperate in seeking a protective order or confidential treatment of such information”
- rkomorn 11mo agoWhat part of this says Apple can compel developers to share their apps' source with Apple? Edit: oh, are you saying that such requests would be "Apple confidential information" so nobody would say if it happened?
- lapcat 11mo agoNo.
- robertclaus 11mo agoApple absolutely does not manually read all the source code they notarized.
- lapcat 11mo agoThey don't notarize source code at all. They notarize compiled app binaries. Many or even most App Store apps are closed source.
- realusername 11mo agoYou are mixing up with Fdroid, Apple doesn't do any source code reading and the tests they do are very basic. Right now you have a lot of piracy apps which are disguised as a "note taking app" and they passed the appstore review without any issues.
- heinternets 11mo agoDo you have any examples? Asking for a friend.
- moi2388 11mo agoThey don’t. You can still run any software you’d like. You just get warnings, so people like parents don’t just randomly open malicious programs from the internet. Which is exactly as it should be
- whatsupdog 11mo agoTell me how I can side load apps on iphone? Even with warnings and stuff.
- owisd 11mo agoIf you compile it from source yourself using Xcode you can deploy to your own device without an Apple developer subscription.
- lanyard-textile 11mo agoIt unfortunately goes away. Last I checked you get 7 days before the app expires. The subscription makes it last much longer, but not forever.
- whatsupdog 11mo agoI want to install YouPorn app. They are not going to hand me their source code.
- djantje 11mo agoIt should be a setting (like macos) otherwise full control of all the devices is always at the mercy of Apple.
- deleted 11mo ago[deleted]
- realusername 11mo agoImplying the software in the appstore is ""trusted""
- wiseowise 11mo agoWho said anything about parents?
- noir_lord 11mo agoThey are using it as a proxy for "people with low technical skills" (which is a specious argument since it was a friend of my parents who got me into programming and he remains one of the best I've ever known) and making the usual argument that we should limit control of our devices to make it safe for them. I actually don't have (much) of an issue with walled garden approaches as long as the wall has a gate that is easily opened, give me an OS level toggle with a warning of "Here be dragons" and I can live with it - it's not ideal but it's not a terrible trade off. It's something Android has had previously (but they seem to be trying to lock that gate) and iOS less so.
- graemep 11mo agoWhich is something I find very annoying, because I know a lot of people who are parents (or adults) or grandparents which have greater technical skills than their children.
- brabel 11mo agoI can run anything on my Mac the way you described: go to security settings and tell it know what I am doing. Is that changing somehow?
- CuriousSkeptic 11mo agoHow about instead of a single os level toggle you get a trillion dollar company, renowned for their high quality design, invested in providing the best possible UX while respecting the user as the owner of the device?
- gumby271 11mo agoTell me more about this mythical mobile device and I'll buy one immediately!
- rogual 11mo agoIt's funny how "think of the parents" is the new "think of the children".
- owisd 11mo agoIt’s tragic how many are baffled by the idea someone might genuinely accept a minor inconvenience to benefit their community.
- gumby271 11mo agoRight, if we could educate users on the tools they use, and if the trillion dollar companies could provide tools to help community members protect each other, we wouldn't be here. Apple doesn't have to be a dictator if they would help the community support each other. Instead they took the easy way out of stripping freedoms from everyone so they can control every device out there. It's a minor inconvenience to be involved in protecting vulnerable people in our community, it's tragic that people just said Apple should take that role.
- orangecat 11mo agoI strongly dispute that giving megacorporations total control of how we're allowed to use our computing devices is beneficial to any community.
- saubeidl 11mo agoBecause they're adults that can make their own decisions and not mentally challenged patients under a megacorps guardianship?
- gregoriol 11mo agoSadly about 98% of real world users are going to fall into scams, ransomwares and stuff. They are not mentally challenged, there are just so many traps/fakes/tempting stuff that we as IT people are more aware of (but even we still fall into some). We also can't count on every person being able to check every single thing they do: how do you check if some food or drug you get is good or not? you can't really, you have to trust someone who knows.
- saubeidl 11mo ago> how do you check if some food or drug you get is good or not? you can't really, you have to trust someone who knows. Yes - the democratically elected government, not a monopolistic entity with capital interest.
- userbinator 11mo agoThen that's their own fault and responsibility. You can't build up immunity without exposure.
- owisd 11mo agoIt’s a bit like the Elizabeth Warren toaster analogy. If you bought a toaster with shoddy wiring and it caught fire and burned down your house, everyone would blame the manufacturer and not sneer at you online for not learning electrical engineering and not checking the wiring yourself before using it.
- beeflet 11mo agoI don't buy this in the first place. It is reasonable to expect consumers to do some background research into the products they buy. In fact, it is the only way capitalism can function as a meritocracy. Society should be more dangerous as a means to force people to learn more about technology they rely on.
- tacker2000 11mo agoThis argument is in the same vein as “chat control because of child safety”. Its a smokescreen. You want less liberty because of the “least competent” user?
- tgv 11mo agoSoftware freedom, at least for end users, is a smokescreen, too. I can revert your argument: "you want more ransomware because of a few OSS enthousiasts?" What we need is a way to curb the excesses, such as high entrance barriers to the store. A phone/tablet is a tool, with very intense usage, and huge privacy value, not an engineer's toy.
- idle_zealot 11mo agoThe real smokescreen is this freedom vs security false dichotomy. If you give up freedom for the promise of security, you get neither. Look at the App Store. It's full of harmful garbage designed to extract value and waste your time by any trick necessary. It's one step short of ransomware. Oh, unless you use an app for your important documents, then it comes under new management and demands you start paying monthly or lose your stuff. Suddenly that lack of freedom to continue using an old version of the app or to dig around its internals and pull out your data becomes a loss of security. It's fine though, because this type of ransomware is totally legal and inline with your benevolent platform dictator's policies.
- Ray20 11mo agoYour argument falls apart when you consider iPhones' 60% market share. People have spoken out about whether they want dangerous, uncontrolled third-party apps on their phones.
- beeflet 11mo agoI don't care about what the riff-raff think, it is morally wrong and defies human freedom and dignity to require everyone walk around with a locked-down surveilance device in their pocket in order to function in the economy. 60% of society could be raptured tomorrow and the world would be better off.
- rpdillon 11mo agoThe point is that they trust it, whether or not Apple trusts it is completely orthogonal, and irrelevant. Apple doesn't own the phone.
- sys_64738 11mo agoWhat do your kids say to this?
- lapcat 11mo ago> I still don’t see why you would want your parents to run untrusted software on their devices, but you do you I guess. I don't trust Apple's App Store review. They've approved countless scams that have tricked Apple users out of a lot of money, perhaps $billions in total.
- charcircuit 11mo agoDMA is about increasing competition of app stores. It is not about giving "freedom" to people. Notorization is an independent process from running an app store on Apple's platform.
- mort96 11mo agoWell, it gives Apple editorial control over non-Apple app stores.
- drysart 11mo agoNotarization doesn't involve any sort of editorial control. It's just a virus scanner that's run up front and then stapling an attestation to your application that it passed the scan. It does not involve looking at the content of your app and making any value judgements about it; it's purely an automated static analysis system checking your application for known malicious code.
- mort96 11mo agoThis is just factually incorrect. See: https://9to5mac.com/2024/06/09/apple-blocks-pc-emulator-utm-app-store/ https://9to5mac.com/2024/06/09/apple-blocks-pc-emulator-utm-... UTM wasn't denied notarization because some virus scanner found that it was a virus, but because it violated App Store guidelines. That's editorial control.
- lapcat 11mo agoYou're talking about notarization on macOS. Notarization on iOS is vastly different. On iOS, notarization is more or less App Store review but with fewer rules.
- mort96 11mo agoHonestly, iOS notarization really muddied the waters. IMO, because Apple decided to name them the same and thus presumably considers them the same, we should be just as critical of and worried about notarization on the Mac as we are of notarization on iOS.
- invaliduser 11mo agoThe same thing exists on Windows, developers have to code sign their binaries. It's even worse in my experience because you have to use a token (usb key with cryptographic signing keys in it) and that's impractical if you want your ci/cd to run in a datacenter. At my company we had a mac mini with a windows VM and a code signing token plugged in just for the purpose of signing our macos and windows binaries. Another solution that is not mentioned in the article is that users of both macos and windows should be able to easily integrate the certificate of a third-party editor, with a process integrated in their OS explaining the risks, but also making it a process that can be understood and trusted, so that editors can self-sign their own binaries at no cost without needing the approval of the OS editor. Such a tool should ideally be integrated in the OS, but ultimately it could also be provided by a trusted third-party.
- tumult 11mo agoNope. Notarization is not code signing. It’s an extra step, after code signing, where you upload your software to Apple’s servers and wait for their system to approve it. It’s more onerous than code signing alone and, with hindsight, doesn’t seem to have been offering any extra protection.
- jeroenhd 11mo agoIt's not the same, but in practice it's also not so different. Microsoft keeps track of how many times a certain executable has been run and only after a certain threshold does the executable become openable without hunting for tiny buttons. The kicker: this also applies for signed binaries. Microsoft will upload these executables to the cloud by default if you use their antivirus engine ("sample collection"). In a way, Microsoft is building the same "notarisarion database", but it's doing so after executables have been released rather than before it. Many vendors and developers will likely add their executables to that "database" by simply running it on a test system. On the other hand, SmartScreen can be disabled pretty easily, whereas macOS doesn't offer a button to disable notarisarion.
- makeitdouble 11mo ago
- fmajid 11mo agoYou can see it in action. I have a M1 Ultra Mac Studio, an insanely powerful machine, and when building open source software, actual compilation flies but the autonomy step crawls because IIT has to build test binaries to test OS features and notarization slows that down dramatically.
- scosman 11mo agoNotarization is completely optional when building any OSS software on a Mac, and not part of any default build process I know. A Mac can sign builds for running locally, a process which is fast, completely local, and does require building test binaries or anything like that. Even a Mac building for an iPhone in developer mode has a local cert it can use, and doesn't require notarization. Notarization is only needed when distributing binaries to others. Personally I do it once a month for the Mac app I distribute.
- kkfx 11mo agoMandatory FLOSS and open hardware is SERIOUSLY the sole way we can evolve positively.
- scosman 11mo agoMandatory != free/libre
- idle_zealot 11mo agoFree/libre refers to user freedom. Mandatory licensing would restrict developer freedom in favor of user freedom, a common feature of consumer protection laws.
- amelius 11mo agoFreedom always comes at a cost. Absolute freedom does not exist. Etc.
- donatj 11mo agoI stopped releasing binaries for a number of my tools because I didn't want to pay the $100 a year for the right to do so, and I got tired of explaining how to run them without signing. The post I wrote to point people at anyway: https://donatstudios.com/mac-terminal-run-unsigned-binaries https://donatstudios.com/mac-terminal-run-unsigned-binaries
- deleted 11mo ago[deleted]
- lapcat 11mo agoNote that the submitted article is about iOS, not macOS. The "notarization" process on iOS shares practically nothing with macOS except the name: https://developer.apple.com/help/app-store-connect/managing-alternative-distribution/submit-for-notarization/ https://developer.apple.com/help/app-store-connect/managing-... iOS notarization is just app review with fewer rules.
- SurceBeats 11mo agoSuffered that back in the day with an Electron desktop app. Not to mention that the notarization and signing integration itself is completely broken. The first time you submit a binary it can take DAYS to process, and setting everything up to work properly with GitHub Actions CI/CD is absurdly time-consuming. It's ridiculous, and if you add this new notarial verification policy on top of that... In the end it's just Apple being Apple.
- sys_64738 11mo agoHow can we trust software anymore? Open source projects are being sold to bad actors. Python default repos are full of malware. Originally blessed and trusted apps are being bought by software companies is dodgy countries. It seems like we can only trust big software companies like Microsoft and Oracle.
- nflekkhnnn 11mo agoOracle has made several open source softwares closed source. Do not trust. At all.
- sys_64738 11mo agoWhy?
- loloquwowndueo 11mo agoI think you missed a /s marker. Big companies, trustworthy? And your examples are Oracle and Microsoft?
- yunnpp 11mo agoIn Larry we trust. Only he can deliver salvation to his people.
- stackedinserter 11mo agoThe only way is to run everything is strict sandboxes. E.g. for a photo editor there's absolutely no reason to open any network connections.
- 13415 11mo agoI'm building an application that allows you to send a file to your colleagues. That's hardly a revolutionary or unusual use case, and it definitely requires network access and full access to the local file system. I also need the ability to lock files, writing file locks anywhere on the system, and I need to be able to index the contents of files. Not only are all of these functions and corresponding permissions completely standard for all kinds of applications, they belong to the core of what any system that calls itself an "operating system" should deliver to developers and end users.
- greatgib 11mo agoCan the fsfe also sur Google to try to prevent them to force the registration of all developer than want to install app on any Android phone outside of the play store? Again, I would happily donate to such an initiative before it is too late!
- amelius 11mo agoI stopped prostituting myself for Apple a long time ago. Glad more developers are seeing the light now.
- stackedinserter 11mo agoSame thing, I jumped off iOS/macos development long time ago, it was probably the best career decision.
- Someone 11mo agoFTA: “Apple’s complete review of apps – known as “notarisation” process - a mandatory step for distributing any software on its platforms, represents the very gatekeeping behaviour the DMA was written to prevent.” Notarization doesn’t involve a complete review (https://developer.apple.com/documentation/security/notarizing-macos-software-before-distribution https://developer.apple.com/documentation/security/notarizin...: “Notarization of macOS software is not App Review. The Apple notary service is an automated system that scans your software for malicious content, checks for code-signing issues, and returns the results to you quickly.” I also expect Apple will argue that requiring code to be notarized is explicitly allowed under the DMA, based on section 6.7: “The gatekeeper shall not be prevented from taking strictly necessary and proportionate measures to ensure that interoperability does not compromise the integrity of the operating system, virtual assistant, hardware or software features provided by the gatekeeper, provided that such measures are duly justified by the gatekeeper.” So, the discussion would have to be on whether this is strictly necessary and proportionate, and whether Apple duly justified that. I think “strictly necessary” is a bit at odds with defense in depth (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_in_depth_(computing) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_in_depth_(computing)), where you explicitly add redundancy to improve security, so we’ll see how a judge rules that, but I can see them accepting it if Apple argues they’ll implement a similar feature on-device instead if they have to.
- lapcat 11mo ago> “Notarization of macOS software The submitted article is about notarization on iOS, which is vastly different from notarization on macOS. It's a shame that Apple used the same word for both platforms, because it appears to be confusing everyone. Maybe that was deliberate...
- lapcat 11mo agoThe submitted article is about iOS, not macOS. Apple unfortunately used the same word "notarization" on both platforms, but the processes are not even remotely similar. Perhaps the confusion was deliberate, but in any case, many commenters here are confused and mistakenly believe that iOS notarization is like macOS notarization. iOS notarization is still manual review by Apple, but with fewer rules and restrictions. https://developer.apple.com/help/app-store-connect/managing-alternative-distribution/submit-for-notarization/ https://developer.apple.com/help/app-store-connect/managing-... > If you’ve opted into alternative distribution for customers in the European Union, you can choose to make your app version eligible for distribution on alternative app marketplaces or websites only by selecting to have it evaluated based on the Notarization Review Guidelines (a subset of the App Review Guidelines). Otherwise, App Review uses App Review Guidelines to evaluate your app version to make it eligible for distribution on the App Store, alternative app marketplaces, and websites if approved.
- realo 11mo agoI suppose this kind of notarization across all digital platforms will have even more importance once the EU CRA (Cybersecurity Resiliency Act) takes full effect end of 2027.
- stackedinserter 11mo agoWhere are all these "Apple can do whatever they want on their platform" bootlickers?
- rasengan 11mo agoIn the end, it's the same for Windows too since you need to pay for a cert.
- dmitrygr 11mo agoAs an iOS user, I love this and you are free to hate me for it. It keeps my grandma safer from scams. This is why I bought her an iPhone. I don't want to hear any of the usual "don't use sideloading if you don't like it". I don't want it to exist so nobody can talk my grandma into installing a fake bank app over the phone, like they did to her once when she had an android phone and stole all her money. Yes this is not foolproof still, some scam apps might make it past notarization. Just like cover fees in clubs and gates in gated communities -- it does not keep all the riff-raff away, but it helps.
- kelthuzad 11mo ago[flagged]
- doug_durham 11mo ago"Fabricated hypotheticals"??? How did you like living through the 1990s and early 2000's when Windows was an unfettered vector for viruses. Your position is elitist at best. Only the anointed few who know how to make keep their systems safe from exploits shall have access to computing. Ask your friends in who are not in the software business how they like checking the cryptographic signatures of the binaries that are about to install from the command line. What they don't know how? Well no compute for them.
- kelthuzad 11mo agoIt's not "elitist", it's principled. The only question that matters is if a business practice is violating fair market principles and relevant laws or not. "What about my grandma" is not an argument and not relevant to the judges' judgement. The world doesn't revolve around OP's grandma. Furthermore, the most potent attack vector was, is and will always be social engineering, which is much more likely on smartphones than on dumb phones. So if it's not concern trolling, then the obvious move is to buy a dumb phone for grandma instead of depriving everybody else of their freedoms and rights.
- 11mo ago
- musicale 11mo agoIt is certainly shocking news that Apple has secretly developed a locked-down smartphone that only runs Apple-approved software, and that Apple is charging developer fees. Next we'll hear that Nintendo has secretly developed a locked-down game console that only runs Nintendo-approved software, and Nintendo is charging developer fees. It is surely a coincidence that 70% of Apple's iOS App Store revenue is from games.