4 ms·

Oh great, so is this how Apple forces me to downgrade from iOS 18 to iOS 26?

by jl6 8mo ago

Towaway69 8mo ago
That was my first thought. No backports for older devices? So left to update to 26.3, device slows, battery life deteriorates and a new device needs to be ~~purchased~~ … errr rented. Good that apple has a monopole else consumers would have a choice.
- fsflover 8mo ago
  There is a choice. Sent from my GNU/Linux phone Librem 5.
  - Towaway69 8mo ago
    That does universal copy and paste with my linux laptop? Airdrop with my android tablet? I can copy something on my macbook and paste that on my iphone - nice feature. Or to my iPad. I’m a sucker for interconnected technology, no hassle with transferring data between my devices. Sure there are alternatives, but none that provide such integration amongst diverse class of devices. That’s the true monopole they have - unfortunately.
    - armadyl 8mo ago
      > That does universal copy and paste with my linux laptop? Airdrop with my android tablet? To be fair this can be replicated with LocalSend, albeit not as slick UX wise.
    - dundundundun 8mo ago
      That's a tradeoff you make yourself and in no way a monopoly.
    - fsflover 8mo ago
      > That does universal copy and paste with my linux laptop? Airdrop with my android tablet? I didn't try, but yes: https://linuxphoneapps.org/services/kde-connect/ https://linuxphoneapps.org/services/kde-connect/
    - alt227 8mo ago
      Sounds like you value 'features' over privacy and security.
    - digiown 8mo ago
      KDEconnect over a VPN works extremely well for clipboard and file and notification sharing. You don't have to use KDE for it. It works with Linux and Android. It also doesn't require an account and accepting terms, so it is strictly superior.
      - Towaway69 8mo ago
        Thanks for explaining that, I didn’t know. So there is a definite alternative. Why doesn’t anyone start Orange Inc. to provide a one-stop hardware solution using Linux. I mean a place where phones, laptops, tablets are sold that are setup to work together? Why doesn’t Ubuntu (for example) move into selling integrated hardware solutions based on Linux - for the consumer market.
        fsflover 8mo ago
        One company is trying that, https://puri.sm https://puri.sm.
  - armadyl 8mo ago
    Ironically this is a security focused thread. The solution here isn’t to switch to a Linux phone, a platform that has absolutely atrocious security, especially compared to even stock iOS/Android. The only alternative that actually increases privacy and security is GrapheneOS. If one doesn’t want to buy a Pixel in order to have it, they can wait and see what the new OEM that will support GOS will be later this year before deciding if it’s worth waiting for in 2027.
    - LtWorf 8mo ago
      Why do linux phones have worse security than android?
      - microtonal 8mo ago
        No good application sandboxing, far fewer security mitigations.
        LtWorf 8mo ago
        Is sandboxing needed when your applications aren't the store crapware though? I mean it would be nice but it's not quite the same threats.
        armadyl 8mo ago
        Like what the person you replied to said. Sandboxing on Linux phones is incredibly weak outside of non-Flatpak Chromium browsers. And even Flatpak itself is a pretty weak sandbox compared to iOS/Android sandboxing. Part of this stems from Android and iOS being developed as sandbox-first OSes, so this could be said for any desktop operating system really aside from ChromeOS. Also sure you could avoid crapware from Meta, Google and the likes but you will still could be exposed to nefarious programs via things like supply chain attacks (i.e. npm), or the developer turning coat or not realizing their app has an exploit, etc. Linux also lacks a thorough permissions system unlike iOS/Android and the even more granular GrapheneOS. Linux phones lack verified boot meaning persistent malware is trivial on linux devices. There is no MTE/MIE on Linux phones and even Google themselves say like 70% of malware spawns from memory exploits[1]. Also linux only really has block level encryption, not file based encryption like iOS/Android. It would be trivial for LEO to access your device unless it was totally powered off and then the only protection is LUKS. Or really even if you lose your phone and someone was so inclined to they could just extract all the data if it was powered on but on the “lock screen,” as most if not all desktop (and I’d imagine linux phone) environments do not actually do any encryption or anything when the system is locked, it’s just a cosmetic lock for all intents and purposes. It would maybe be possible to somewhat mitigate that with cryptomator or somehow using fscrypt since that’s what Android uses but I dont know Also even for basic things like clipboard protection, even with Wayland there are ways around it so that an app can read anything from the clipboard (not usually done for nefarious means in my experience, but it’s possible — see an app like Vicinae’s clipboard history and clipboard-centric features running on Wayland). There’s more but this is like a short overview. This doesn’t even get into people preferring Firefox on Linux which is light years behind Chromium based browsers in terms of security. While it’s not a huge issue on desktop depending on how you view it, I would imagine phones see way more of people’s private data than their computers do and so I think it’s more beneficial to have higher security here than give that up for Linux. —- [1] https://security.googleblog.com/2024/10/safer-with-google-advancing-memory.html https://security.googleblog.com/2024/10/safer-with-google-ad...
deleted 8mo ago
[deleted]
- walterbell 8mo ago
  Only for a handful of devices.

Oh great, so is this how Apple forces me to downgrade from iOS 18 to iOS 26?

by jl6 8mo ago

Oh great, so is this how Apple forces me to downgrade from iOS 18 to iOS 26?

That was my first thought. No backports for older devices? So left to update to 26.3, device slows, battery life deteriorates and a new device needs to be ~~purchased~~ … errr rented. Good that apple has a monopole else consumers would have a choice.

fsflover 8mo ago
There is a choice. Sent from my GNU/Linux phone Librem 5.
- Towaway69 8mo ago
  That does universal copy and paste with my linux laptop? Airdrop with my android tablet? I can copy something on my macbook and paste that on my iphone - nice feature. Or to my iPad. I’m a sucker for interconnected technology, no hassle with transferring data between my devices. Sure there are alternatives, but none that provide such integration amongst diverse class of devices. That’s the true monopole they have - unfortunately.
  - armadyl 8mo ago
    > That does universal copy and paste with my linux laptop? Airdrop with my android tablet? To be fair this can be replicated with LocalSend, albeit not as slick UX wise.
  - dundundundun 8mo ago
    That's a tradeoff you make yourself and in no way a monopoly.
  - fsflover 8mo ago
    > That does universal copy and paste with my linux laptop? Airdrop with my android tablet? I didn't try, but yes: https://linuxphoneapps.org/services/kde-connect/ https://linuxphoneapps.org/services/kde-connect/
  - alt227 8mo ago
    Sounds like you value 'features' over privacy and security.
  - digiown 8mo ago
    KDEconnect over a VPN works extremely well for clipboard and file and notification sharing. You don't have to use KDE for it. It works with Linux and Android. It also doesn't require an account and accepting terms, so it is strictly superior.
    - Towaway69 8mo ago
      Thanks for explaining that, I didn’t know. So there is a definite alternative. Why doesn’t anyone start Orange Inc. to provide a one-stop hardware solution using Linux. I mean a place where phones, laptops, tablets are sold that are setup to work together? Why doesn’t Ubuntu (for example) move into selling integrated hardware solutions based on Linux - for the consumer market.
      - fsflover 8mo ago
        One company is trying that, https://puri.sm https://puri.sm.
- armadyl 8mo ago
  Ironically this is a security focused thread. The solution here isn’t to switch to a Linux phone, a platform that has absolutely atrocious security, especially compared to even stock iOS/Android. The only alternative that actually increases privacy and security is GrapheneOS. If one doesn’t want to buy a Pixel in order to have it, they can wait and see what the new OEM that will support GOS will be later this year before deciding if it’s worth waiting for in 2027.
  - LtWorf 8mo ago
    Why do linux phones have worse security than android?
    - microtonal 8mo ago
      No good application sandboxing, far fewer security mitigations.
      - LtWorf 8mo ago
        Is sandboxing needed when your applications aren't the store crapware though? I mean it would be nice but it's not quite the same threats.
        armadyl 8mo ago
        Like what the person you replied to said. Sandboxing on Linux phones is incredibly weak outside of non-Flatpak Chromium browsers. And even Flatpak itself is a pretty weak sandbox compared to iOS/Android sandboxing. Part of this stems from Android and iOS being developed as sandbox-first OSes, so this could be said for any desktop operating system really aside from ChromeOS. Also sure you could avoid crapware from Meta, Google and the likes but you will still could be exposed to nefarious programs via things like supply chain attacks (i.e. npm), or the developer turning coat or not realizing their app has an exploit, etc. Linux also lacks a thorough permissions system unlike iOS/Android and the even more granular GrapheneOS. Linux phones lack verified boot meaning persistent malware is trivial on linux devices. There is no MTE/MIE on Linux phones and even Google themselves say like 70% of malware spawns from memory exploits[1]. Also linux only really has block level encryption, not file based encryption like iOS/Android. It would be trivial for LEO to access your device unless it was totally powered off and then the only protection is LUKS. Or really even if you lose your phone and someone was so inclined to they could just extract all the data if it was powered on but on the “lock screen,” as most if not all desktop (and I’d imagine linux phone) environments do not actually do any encryption or anything when the system is locked, it’s just a cosmetic lock for all intents and purposes. It would maybe be possible to somewhat mitigate that with cryptomator or somehow using fscrypt since that’s what Android uses but I dont know Also even for basic things like clipboard protection, even with Wayland there are ways around it so that an app can read anything from the clipboard (not usually done for nefarious means in my experience, but it’s possible — see an app like Vicinae’s clipboard history and clipboard-centric features running on Wayland). There’s more but this is like a short overview. This doesn’t even get into people preferring Firefox on Linux which is light years behind Chromium based browsers in terms of security. While it’s not a huge issue on desktop depending on how you view it, I would imagine phones see way more of people’s private data than their computers do and so I think it’s more beneficial to have higher security here than give that up for Linux. —- [1] https://security.googleblog.com/2024/10/safer-with-google-advancing-memory.html https://security.googleblog.com/2024/10/safer-with-google-ad...

deleted 8mo ago

[deleted]

walterbell 8mo ago
Only for a handful of devices.