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Comment by nemothekid | Hacker News Reader

>and yea i know you can sideload on android, but the unwashed masses don’t know that so it doesn’t matter.

Then what is your solution? The unwashed masses tried the wild wild west of digital software delivery back in the 2000s. It ended with tears, viruses, UAC and SaaS. Even today, most sideloading, for general consumers, begins with trying to pirate apps and ends with even more invasive spyware.

The locked in store model is better than than what we had before for the general consumer (at least iOS's, unequivocally is, IMO). The App Store might be bad for developers, but it's way better for consumers.

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The problem with early 2000's-style software delivery wasn't that you could choose which software to install, it was that there was no separation between programs, so that any random program you installed could add toolbars to your browser, steal all your passwords, etc. If iOS or Android made it easier to install apps outside the store, I highly doubt you'd see anywhere near the same level of problems, since everything is so isolated from each other.

I would find it acceptable if side loading apps was allowed by default but sideloaded apps are blocked from the dangerous permissions like device admin and draw over screen. Apps that really do require this have to be checked by a maintainer or require the device to be in developer mode.

This way almost everyone is happy because most apps don't really require anything other than internet, camera and GPS which can be denied by the user.

Isn’t that what native web apps are for, where you Share > Home Screen and they store themselves in local storage in the browser cache?

Web apps can't use GPS like an app can

Im generally not a fan of web apps but this is incorrect.

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Geolocation

can't see anywhere mentioned geofencing.

That also applies to the comment I replied to.

fair enough :D

The comment you replied to mentioned :

> use GPS like an app can

that means high resolution location, background updates, geofencing, etc ...

Geofencing is just conditionally acting depending on a location. All you need for it is a location.

If we want to show users permission dialogs and that let them make good decisions, there's a need for finer grain APIs to allow finer-grain permissions.

For example, for a smart home app asking 'precise location constantly even when not using the app' is sufficient to perform geofencing - but asking for a more limited 'know when you arrive home' is much more likely to get user approval.

The correct time to ask for the permission is when the user attempts to set up geofencing, at which point the phone OS should present a geofence picker that stores the fence in the OS and notified the app on entry/exit. The app itself has no need to know what the geofence coordinates and radius are, so by implementing the geofence at the OS level you can optionally as app author decline to care what its coordinates are — and thus have no need to request location access at all.

You also need to be able to run in the background

I should have been more specific but my app needs to record GPS with the screen off and with the app not focused which web apps can't do.

I don’t trust sideloaded apps with background access to both my location and the Internet, so it gives me no sadness to hear this.

I guess your app is Android only - I can't imagine this working well on any iOS device, regardless of being a native app.

Hm, I'm not sure how iOS apps do it. My app is a fitness app that records activities, the app has to remain running in the background so the recording isn't interrupted.

It's the background part im not sure about. You can e.g. start Runtastic on an iPhone and it won't close if you switch to Music or messages or whatever but I don't know for sure that it'll be allowed to run in the background for extended periods of time.

This. Google and Apple should make it easy for computer literate people to use something more advanced. Have the unwashed massed version sure, but then let us override it in a graceful manner instead of having to jump through hoops. Would lead to all kinds of free innovation etc. that they could then take over and profit from. Use the computer literate! WE WILL FIX IT FOR YOU

The problem with this is that waaaay too many people consider themselves computer-literate.

What? It's already possible for the "computer literate" to sideload apps on Android. That's literally what this whole thread is about?

And everyone says they are an above average driver.

> it was that there was no separation between programs, so that any random program you installed could add toolbars to your browser, steal all your passwords, etc.

And for Linux or Windows this is still true.

I believe it's not true for UWP Windows Store apps?

True, but nobody uses them and there are few examples of useful UWP programs. App-Store on macOS isn't a success story and rightly so.

macOS = useful; iOS = nope

The solution is what has been suggested earlier: allow users to choose their own 'store', don't lock them to a single vendor. This is already possible with Android where F-Droid is a good example of a 'store' where the chance of being exposed to these shenanigans is close to zero.

Currently iOS users lack this option so for them the only way out is to change platform.

Another nice thing about F-Droid is that it uses Linux style "repositories" meaning that individuals/companies can setup repos for apps without needing to build their own custom app store. There are also multiple independent implementations of the F-droid client:

https://gitlab.com/gdroid/gdroidclient/

https://github.com/SkyzohKey/M-Droid

I am told thses software repos are super useful for the 3rd world because phone stores can run a local app repo and people can download apps without using their very limited internet data. Fdroid also allows local app transfers to people near you.

That doesn’t seem like much of an improvement: if it became popular, you’d see the same social attacks switch from getting people to install apps to enabling a new store. F-Droid is safer because it’s much smaller and mostly free software: that’s good for people who don’t want anything else but it seems unlikely to satisfy mainstream demand or survive a motivated attack.

Linux survived these attacks. Debian survived them. Ubuntu did. More or less all Linux distributions have been attacked but survived, many of them thrive.

Yes, this is free software. Being less susceptible to these problems has been one of the stated advantages of using such for a long time. Alternative 'stores' carrying 'pirated' non-free software do not have this advantage and can easily turn into dark places so the solution does not lie there.

Will people choose a 'boring' free software 'store' over a 'cool pirate store' (Arrrrr!)? Some will, some won't. Those who will will end up being mostly silent as the thing just works. Those who won't will be susceptible to the whims of those who put up those 'stores' and are likely to come home with a bit more than they asked for.

Some 'stores' will get a good reputation along the lines of that of F-Droid, some will get the reputation of being the place to go to get the latest craze but also the latest infection. Users will start making conscious decisions based on those reputations, just like they already do elsewhere.

Will opening up closed platforms like iOS for third-party software repositories get rid of these problems? No, it won't, it will even raise the average level of problematic software on that platform. The difference between closed systems and more open ones is not that the closed ones are inferior, it is that they limit the user's choice to get something which is better as well as worse than what the walled garden offers. In this context better can mean software which does not come with tracking, analytics, profiling and other such privacy-invading nonsense. I can get the source code and build it myself, I can host my own repository, only time limits where I can go. This is not true for the Google Play Store or the Apple Appstore, nor is it true for the Amazon equivalent or any of those Chinese alternatives. That is why I chose to use something like F-Droid.

By the way, there is nothing keeping e.g. Facebook or Twitter from releasing a free software version of their apps. Their value - and most of their profiling proficiency - lies in their platforms, not in the apps used to access them. They might lose any additional venues for leaching the user of data but they would gain some believability when they state that they're not up to no good. Of course there are plenty of alternative apps for these services so they don't really need to but they could if they wanted to.

> Linux survived these attacks. Debian survived them. Ubuntu did. More or less all Linux distributions have been attacked but survived, many of them thrive.

Really? Is there a huge market of mainstream consumer Linux software which I've missed in the past 3 decades of using it?

The answer is, of course, no. Linux distributions have mostly been used by developers and other IT people and there's never been the equivalent of the mainstream mobile app ecosystem used by people who are asked to make critical security decisions which they don't know how to answer. If there was an equivalent, there would be the same sleazy sites pushing free porn, games, taking successful apps and repackaging them, etc. that we see in the mobile/Windows desktop world, and normal people would routinely be socially-engineered to get access to free stuff, just as Linux users have for years been fooled into running binaries or installing packages. This isn't more widespread because there's not much money in it but if that were to change it would immediately require the same kind of hardening which every other consumer OS has had to make.

Well, there is Android, that uses Linux and is as mainstream consumer as it gets. Do mind that I specifically said 'Linux survived' as in 'the Linux kernel project', followed by a number of Linux distributions.

Also, where are those Linux users [who] have for years been fooled into running binaries or installing packages? The majority of Linux users get their software from repositories maintained by whichever distribution they use. This fact is one of the reasons why Linux users are far less likely to install 'random' software. It is that aspect of Linux distributions which 'stores' like F-Droid bring to Android.

Last, what kind of 'hardening' do you deem every other consumer OS has had to make which Linux distributions have yet to accomplish? I'd go so far as saying that the likes of Windows and MacOS are playing catch-up here in finally getting around to implementing a sane repository infrastructure from which users can install and update software instead of having them hunting around the web for some SETUP.EXE to download and click on - which then proceeds to install not only the requested program but also a host of toolbars and 'shopping assistants'.

That both Apple as well as Microsoft took one step further in making these software repositories single-source to the detriment of their user's freedom of choice is what started this discussion in the first place.

You still have fragmentation though, which creates surfaces for security and privacy issues that the 'wild west' of the 2000s had. OS providers could enforce standards for these 'stores' as a fix, but then they'll be accused of unfairly regulating competition.

Part of one of the antitrust suits against Google was that it required Play Services to be preinstalled by manufacturers on Android phones before the Play Store could be preinstalled - but the latter needs the former to work.

Anything that became popular would be targeted just the same. The solution is more secure OSes, not distribution filtering. I should be able to put a gelatinous abomination from hell on my phone and be okay. Mobile OS sandboxing is better than older PC OSes but it's still not perfect.

The problem is that nobody except end users wants more secure OS. And end users do not matter.

> This is already possible with Android where F-Droid is a good example of a 'store' where the chance of being exposed to these shenanigans is close to zero.

There are many other stores where the chance of being exposed to these shenanigans is close to 1. Think of the article recently about super-shady app stores for iOS that misused enterprise certificates to sideload apps [0].

If alternate app stores were to be allowed on iOS, all that would happen is a great proliferation of these scumware stores, full of knockoffs, fakes and outright malware.

It's going to be almost impossible for a lot of people to distinguish between legit good quality, legit crap quality and non-legit harmful app stores, resulting in waves of malware and privacy theft that will make the old Windows XP days look like a panacea.

While it has its problems, the curated nature of iOS' App Store is a distinct positive for users.

[0] https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/20/18232583/apple-ios-develo...

I don't think people using Android are different from those using iOS and recognise that that most popular alternative 'store' for Android does not seem to fall victim to these problems. This is very much related to the fact that F-Droid only hosts free software but the same thing could be done for iOS if Apple lifted its heavy control over the platform and its users. I see no reason why a similar free software store for iOS would turn into a scumware-infested hell hole.

It is amazing that we can fly aircrafts to space but cannot solve software installations, in't it? Maybe the software industry as a whole needs a kick in the butt.

Flying to the moon isn’t filled with profit motivated bad actors.

I'd say that the sandboxing introduced by mobile OSes today solves the vast majority of the problem.

By isolating applications and introducing permissions, malware that can steal or encrypt user data isn't possible even for people installing those pirated APKs.

But the type of malware described in the article obviously is possible, given that it’s possible even on the Play Store. The OP posed switching to a decentralized model as a solution to that, and it’s hard to see how that makes any sense.

I'd argue the type of malware described in this article is fairly to completely harmless to the user. Harm to ad networks and a bit of wasted bandwidth is basically the worst case scenario.

The wasted bandwidth would be made clear by the OS to the user too, so it'd be trivial to identify if it was a significant consumer.

But in the end the software running on our phones is mostly crap.

I doubt user data being protected by these mechanisms helped people to guard their data.

Don't trust Android or iOS or macOS sandbox. Google invests huge amounts of development time and research into Google Chrome JavaScript sandbox. It is the real wild west, there are malicious actors who want to break that sandbox. There are multiple layers of protection. Yet there are successful attacks. Much less people trying to break Android or iOS sandbox, because you can just ask for permission from Android and because Apple can kick bad app from the store and prevent infestation. It means that security of those sandboxes is worse, there are many undiscovered (or undisclosed) holes.

Check out history of Java sandbox with its numerous vulnerabilities. I have no reasons to expect anything different from built-in sandboxes. It's like relying on unix user permissions and allow to run anything under untrusted user. Works in theory, but you'll be owned pretty soon, because local root escalation vulnerabilities are not that rare.

In those days the only sandbox I would trust is JavaScript one. It's battle tested.

> because you can just ask for permission from Android

You cannot ask for permission to bypass sandbox restrictions on Android. You need root access, which means physical access to do things like unlock the bootloader or an exploit.

iOS sandbox seems slightly weaker here due to the use of hidden/private functions to protect certain things, sideloaded apps would likely be a bigger risk on iOS than Android at the moment, but that's not something unresolvable.

In any case, the things you're discussing aren't really so problematic - isolation systems are only getting better, OS level ones are improving every day. We could easily have sandboxes at this level just as secure as the javascript ones.

The single source has many advantages but also many negatives.

Android apps run the risk of becoming facebook apps. A rising platform that had a lot going for it. Little by little more restrictions pushed many away and turned into what it is today.

The locked in store model in iOS also forces you in to a specific and rather puritanical morality when it comes to the apps you can choose from.

Funny thing is the pirated apps often remove spyware and other crap.

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