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| ▲ | MostlyStable a day ago | parent | next [-] | | There is an easy solution to this: Allow the user to decide whether they want to allow for apps from outside a particular ecosystem. Then Johnny can set up Grandma's phone and (in a deep byzantine menu where she will never accidentally stumble on it, maybe locked behind a pin), Johnny can set it so that Granny's phone can only install software from "Super premium, high class, curated, guaranteed not to hack your phone" walled garden app store. And Johnny, on his own phone, can choose what to download himself, including from the "Buyer Beware, half our shit is malware" dark web app store. In my opinion, the Apple app store should actually be FAR more curated than it is, and far less curated options should be equally available. The Apple App store (and the Google app store for that matter), should be a relatively small list of apps that have extremely high standards and guarantees. It should essentially be impossible for spammy bullshit to get into these places. User-controlled, parental control like options should determine whether or not other app sources can be installed from (including allowing for specific other sources, so that app source control can be granular and detailed. I should be allowed to add FDroid but nothing else for example). Done. Problem solved. Everyone is happy. Grandma is safe and Johnny has control over his phone. But of course, that assumes that keeping Granny safe is actually the reason. Facially obviously, it is not, and is in fact entirely pretextual. | | |
| ▲ | zbentley a day ago | parent [-] | | There are two big problems with this (not that Apple’s caprice is the only alternative): 1. The vast majority of people are Grandma, and they do not have a Johnny available to administer their tech. Most people are not technical. 2. The vast majority of Grandmas will follow instructions on a “how do I share cute photo” website even when that website directs them to dig deep into configuration settings and ignore six “are you sure you want to allow this app to fully remotely control your device?” warnings. Even if Grandma has a healthy suspicion of scams, when she is instead trying to accomplish a goal she will suddenly prove quite adept at giving software with questionable provenance root access to her life. | | |
| ▲ | CamperBob2 a day ago | parent | next [-] | | And what if my grandma is Admiral Hopper. I wonder if there's a way to argue for or against paternalistic corporate gatekeepers without invoking sexism, ageism, or both? | | |
| ▲ | zbentley a day ago | parent [-] | | I used the terms from the grandparent post with tongue firmly in cheek. I didn’t intend to be sexist or ageist and agree with your criticism. |
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| ▲ | preg_match 20 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I think the bigger question is whether this is even worth solving. If people really want to give someone root access and do it willingly, maybe we just say this is out of our purview and allow it. And then, slowly, people will learn. They will be hard lessons but evidently baby proofing the entire world is not really working, so we might just abandon ship on that idea. | | |
| ▲ | zbentley 16 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > And then, slowly, people will learn I hope you're right, but I'm not sure they will. The less locked-down WinXP and early Android era was ... really really bad in terms of nontechnical people getting hacked/scammed. And bad actors are also innovating, so the target of what people have to learn is moving: now we have synthetic AI voice scams, easy-to-create full clones of popular websites that harvest credentials, an explosion of 0days that let people run RATs that hassle elders for their MFA codes, and so on. Like, I'm 100% with you that baby-proofing the world is an unattainable, patronizing, and negative-externality-laden goal. We shouldn't do that. But we shouldn't go full libertarian "you're on your own; toughen up" either; I think we have a lot of data that indicates that the harms of that approach are both high-magnitude and high-volume. | |
| ▲ | NetMageSCW 15 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Tell me that when it’s your relative that is out thousands of dollars because they were scammed. |
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| ▲ | ceejayoz 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | There's a saying about how hard it can be to design bear-resistant containers: > There is considerable overlap between the intelligence of the smartest bears and the dumbest tourists. The same is true for computers. Solutions that "allow competent individuals" to do something are also typically solutions scammers can convince Grandma to perform without understanding what they do. (Case in point: I saw a fake captcha that told you to open Terminal and paste a command to "prove" you're human; https://www.reddit.com/r/mac/comments/1rq4bh6/warning_suspic...) | | |
| ▲ | Rohansi 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | Scammers will manage to manipulate people into giving away all of their savings just fine no matter what restrictions are put in place. The excuse is just another "think of the children" to maintain control and profit. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 2 days ago | parent [-] | | People will murder people, too. We don't have to make it trivially easy. | | |
| ▲ | Timon3 a day ago | parent [-] | | So your solution is to ban the sale of any kind of knife. Sucks that people can't really cook at home anymore, but do we have to make it trivially easy for murderers? | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent [-] | | > So your solution is to ban the sale of any kind of knife. If you give a toddler a butcher's knife to play with and they get hurt, you'll likely get in trouble for child endangerment. Using my car requires it be registered, pass my state's safety standards, and that I possess a valid license and follow a wide variety of rules. Maybe a certain level of protection is, at times, acceptable? | | |
| ▲ | Rohansi a day ago | parent | next [-] | | Those are very different scenarios because your "protection" is the threat of consequences. You can freely buy and use knives, you can drive your own car, but you can only use your phone to do what Apple approves of? Sure, banning knives, replacing cars with public transport, and locking down all computers should be safer in theory... but murderers will still murder and scammers will still scam. Social engineering is the weakest link even if your grandma is doing all her banking on Windows XP. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent | next [-] | | > You can freely buy and use knives… No, not necessarily. Quite a few countries have restrictions on knives, including some parts of the US - a switchblade will get you in trouble in NYC. > you can drive your own car Only in approved ways! Hell, you'll get in trouble if your gasoline is the wrong color. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_dye#Fuel_dye_in_North_Ame... "Detection of red-dyed fuel in the fuel system of an on-road vehicle will incur substantial penalties." > murderers will still murder and scammers will still scam Do we not take steps to try and reduce murder? | | |
| ▲ | Rohansi a day ago | parent [-] | | > Hell, you'll get in trouble if your gasoline is the wrong color. You've missed my point even though it's right in front of you. You won't get in trouble for using your Apple device in non-approved ways because it doesn't let you. Would you ban cars for everyone because it's not safe for grandma to drive anymore? Probably not - so why lock down devices for everyone? > Do we not take steps to try and reduce murder? Not directly? Gun/knife control probably helps but people willing to risk the consequences of murder are not going to care about breaking more laws to get illegal weapons. Or just use a weapon that's easy to get. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent [-] | | > You won't get in trouble for using your Apple device in non-approved ways because it doesn't let you. The government won't let me use my car in non-approved ways. They will, in fact, stop me with guns at times. I'm not even allowed to purchase some items, let alone use as I please. I'm allowed to buy (or sell) a https://www.fairphone.com/ style device! But no one really wants them. | | |
| ▲ | Rohansi a day ago | parent [-] | | > But no one really wants them. Not relevant. Most people don't choose their phone/platform based on how much freedom it gives you. An iPhone is a very good phone overall but the restrictions are unfortunately bundled in. You're obviously fine with it but it is only going to get worse in the future. The whole Android developer verification thing is a step in the same direction from Google's side. Eventually macOS will be locked down or even phased out - most young people just do everything on their phone now so why not? I don't want to accept that future so I'm not supporting platforms that restrict it. |
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| ▲ | NetMageSCW 15 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | When did Apple hold a gun to your head and make you buy an iPhone? | | |
| ▲ | Rohansi 11 hours ago | parent [-] | | They didn't, and I don't have one, but it's looking like Android phones are going to be locked down in the future too. Everything else will slowly lose compatibility with the apps you need. |
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| ▲ | preg_match 20 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > If you give a toddler a butcher's knife to play with and they get hurt, you'll likely get in trouble for child endangerment. Right but granny is not a child, she is kind of the opposite of a child. You're essentially saying we should child proof the entire world, right. Appeal to the lowest common denominator and DO NOT offer back doors. But that's a plainly ridiculous notion and everyone knows it. This argument only works on smartphones right now because it's the status-quo. As soon as you extend it to literally any other domain, it immediately crumbles and falls between your fingers. Yes, there IS a certain level of protection that is acceptable at all times. But that level is absolutely not "maximum protection, no other options sorry". Which is what Apple is trying to do. This really is "no sale of knives" type stuff. That sounds ridiculous, right? Because it is, and we let Apple get away with murder. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 17 hours ago | parent [-] | | > Right but granny is not a child, she is kind of the opposite of a child. The failure modes are often quite similar - cognitive/motor issues and lack of experience with the tools offered. > Appeal to the lowest common denominator and DO NOT offer back doors. Back doors accessible by scammers are bad for the same reasons back doors accessible by governments are. > This really is "no sale of knives" type stuff. That sounds ridiculous, right? Because it is, and we let Apple get away with murder. Apple's more like a shop that declines to sell knives. There are other shops that will sell you one. | | |
| ▲ | Rohansi 11 hours ago | parent [-] | | > The failure modes are often quite similar - cognitive/motor issues and lack of experience with the tools offered. Children are either not allowed to have devices, or they have them but locked down with parental controls (hopefully). Apple could easily have a separate mode for this. Maybe there's some overlap with lockdown mode where it can be bundled together. There is no reason to force it on everyone except to benefit Apple. |
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| ▲ | iamnothere 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Exactly, computers should only be allowed to do what expert gatekeepers deem safe. There is no possible way to allow competent users to bypass this. Even if they had to go submit a blood sample and sign a document in front of a judge, grandma would just do it anyway! Lock it all down and make sure that compilers require a government license. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 2 days ago | parent [-] | | The flip side of this is: Pro: I can use a convoluted process to install an astronomy app Apple didn't like. Con: Billions of dollars of life savings siphoned off with devastating consequences. I'm by no means a maximalist on either side of this, but technologists aren't the only ones who get a say here. | | |
| ▲ | iamnothere a day ago | parent [-] | | Correct. As a side benefit we can restrict users from installing applications that go against other societal interests, like apps that allow unrestricted communications. The framework is complete for mobile devices, we just need to tackle PCs now. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent [-] | | Loudly dismissing genuine and legitimate concerns may feel good, but it’s not likely to get you what you want, especially at a societal level. I agree with you on the risks of this sort of protection! But I understand what it’s like for non-technical folks in a technical society. Their needs do matter. | | |
| ▲ | iamnothere a day ago | parent [-] | | You’re precisely right, and of course there’s no possible way on Earth that we could create a safe way to allow users to install apps outside of the blessed path. No matter how many steps people have to go through, even if they have to pass a special exam to prove their competence, even if they have to sign something that says they could lose their life savings and submit it to a court to document this fact. There’s just not a single possible way to protect people to an adequate degree. That the gatekeeper and government benefit from this arrangement is just a happy accident. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent [-] | | There isn’t a way for everyone to be able to do what they want with computing devices and be safe from this shit. That’s the reality. As with most things in society, it’s left to people to negotiate the balance. | | |
| ▲ | iamnothere a day ago | parent [-] | | Glad you agree that it’s simply impossible to protect most people and have freedom. Hopefully we can extend this approach to other areas of life soon. “Freedom” is overrated anyways! | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent [-] | | What freedom on the planet isn't restricted in some way for societal benefit? | | |
| ▲ | iamnothere a day ago | parent [-] | | I know, right! Here’s hoping we have many more restrictions in the future. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent [-] | | Why comment on a site with zero interest in actually interacting with people? | | |
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| ▲ | grishka 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | The society should change such that grandmas could decide for themselves whether they want tech or not, and still have a comfortable life if they choose to not use it. In our current society, smartphones and the internet are forced on everyone. It's not really a choice any more. Which is quite sad. | | |
| ▲ | lazyasciiart 2 days ago | parent [-] | | My grandma does want tech because she loves sharing pictures with her grandchildren throughout the day. That doesn’t mean she wants to send money to Nigeria through a fake banking app? | | |
| ▲ | dgellow a day ago | parent | next [-] | | You grandma can keep the „restricted“ flag on then. I will be happy to disable it on my device | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent | next [-] | | Grandma will also be happy to disable it when the nice man from Microsoft phone support calls in to remotely fix the viruses she has. | | |
| ▲ | grishka a day ago | parent [-] | | Then maybe everyone needs to be educated to never ever trust incoming calls from unknown numbers? Or maybe these need to be blocked at the carriers? We have all this AI crap now but for some reason we can't deploy it to detect scam calls. We instead use it to automate the work that doesn't need automation, like software engineering or copywriting or art. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent [-] | | The average layperson doesn't even know caller ID can be trivially spoofed. Or they accept the push notification dialog on some random site and start getting "COMPUTER HACKED, CALL MICROSOFT AT FAKE NUMBER" notifications that look like they come from the OS. |
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| ▲ | macintux a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | My concern has been that companies with a huge install base (hi, Meta) would take advantage of this: "in order to provide you with the best experience, you have to turn off the restricted flag to install the next release of our app". And then, billions of users cry out in pain as their private data is hoovered into the panopticon in the cloud. | | |
| ▲ | Terr_ a day ago | parent | next [-] | | One thing we could do is abolish the "anti-circumvention" laws, where the government goes after you with criminal penalties for "contempt of business-model" for interfering with how a company wishes it's code would run on your computer. Then it would be legal for someone to develop and give-away a patch for the Meta app... | |
| ▲ | bigyabai a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | > And then, billions of users cry out in pain as their private data is hoovered into the panopticon in the cloud. That's not how data collection works? It's Apple's responsibility to prevent their application runtime from exposing private data or unnecessary entitlements. Enabling sideloading does not prevent Apple from protecting user data any more than the App Store does. | |
| ▲ | iamnothere a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | Exactly, and it’s impossible to regulate those business practices! Don’t even try! Better to limit what people can do on their own computing devices, or better yet remove that ownership entirely. |
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| ▲ | zimpenfish a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | That's great until your device is weaponised against others (see: open HTTP proxies, open DNS resolvers, open SMTP servers, several billion IoT devices, and countless other examples) | | |
| ▲ | kalleboo a day ago | parent | next [-] | | Those issues could be diminished if ISPs actually handled abuse requests and shut down people's connections until they removed their malware. | |
| ▲ | iamnothere a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | Exactly, which is why we shouldn’t be allowing user “software installs” on any device, not just phones. The world would be a lot better if all tech were fully locked down, “freedom” be damned. | | |
| ▲ | bigyabai a day ago | parent [-] | | Ideally we should just let the government write the software, and they'd be able to verify that there's no dangers to grandma anywhere in the system. It would be foolproof, maybe the most trustworthy system ever conceived. | | |
| ▲ | grishka a day ago | parent [-] | | While we're at it, let's also mandate the destruction of every general-purpose computing device incapable of secure boot or allowing it to be deactivated. And if someone dares to build a homebrew CPU out of relays, transistors, or logic ICs, they should expect the FBI to break down their door. |
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| ▲ | grishka a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | Then how about her not having online banking? | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent [-] | | You did the meme. https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/we-should-improve-society-som... Last time I was in a bank branch they told me to go to the website for my issue. | | |
| ▲ | grishka a day ago | parent [-] | | > they told me to go to the website for my issue. And this sort of attitude is exactly what needs to change. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz a day ago | parent [-] | | I agree! But what's Grandma supposed to do in the meantime? | | |
| ▲ | grishka a day ago | parent [-] | | Tell them she doesn't own any devices that could connect to the internet. I'm sure they'll figure something out. They have to have procedures for this sort of thing. | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 21 hours ago | parent [-] | | > They have to have procedures for this sort of thing. "Sorry, try somewhere else" is the procedure. | | |
| ▲ | iamnothere 19 hours ago | parent [-] | | Exactly. Rather than passing laws to require a non-digital option for these things, we should make sure that devices are locked down and controlled against users (aka hapless idiots). | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 17 hours ago | parent [-] | | > Rather than passing laws to require a non-digital option for these things... Do you think I oppose this? | | |
| ▲ | iamnothere 16 hours ago | parent [-] | | Seems like you’re pushing for control over user tech here over any sort of other regulation. Other regulation which would be much simpler to coordinate and which wouldn’t infringe on end user freedoms! Removing end user control, repairability, and hackability/repurposing (all related) should be the very last resort, not the first! | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 14 hours ago | parent [-] | | > Seems like you’re pushing for control over user tech here over any sort of other regulation. That fits your pattern elsewhere in this thread of not actually engaging with what others are saying to slay strawmen. Over? No. Regulation and some controls work hand in hand as mitigations. | | |
| ▲ | iamnothere 14 hours ago | parent [-] | | While we’re at it, let’s stop crime by adding more officers, reforming the bail system, oh and also installing cameras in everyone’s bedroom. Last resorts are last resorts because they infringe on core freedoms. And your “controls” are equivalent to removing individual ownership of devices. This is a step too far towards a post-ownership society and joint corporate-state control of the individual’s means of communication and participation in society. |
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