Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

eff.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 342 posts

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#161

Post by hesarenu »

MBCook wrote: post #16
Perceptes wrote: post #10

This has bugged me too since upgrading to iOS 11. I understand the motivation for the change, but it was not necessary to make the UI misleading. It should very clearly indicate between "off" and "off-ish," and allow switching to a true off state, perhaps by long-pressing the icon to get additional options, like how several other control center panels work.

The messages the display at the top of the screen when you tap the icons were the labels below the icons if you expand the panel clearly show whether the radios are off or just disconnected.

If you are explaining too much then it would mean that its not communicated properly.

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#162

Post by jachee »

davb wrote: post #39

In general, iOS isn’t very friendly to users who favour 3G/4G over WiFi. I’ve got unlimited data on my LTE plan but very shaky WiFi at home. I can’t start an iCloud backup without WiFi and can’t download apps or updates over a certain size. And now WiFi miraculously turns itself back on after I turn it off in Control Center (as I’ve done for some time). If I want it off I’ve got to dig through Settings. Changing defa…

> If I want it off I’ve got to dig through Settings.

Or just say "Hey Siri, turn off WiFi."

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#163

Post by jachee »

neotek wrote: post #129
trowawee wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I...don't want my phone to automatically connect to random open access points? I live in a city where there are at least 5 separate open networks available at nearly all times if you're just walking around, most of which I do not want to connect to.

Turning off "ask to join networks" also stops your phone from connecting to open networks automatically. It will still autoconnect to networks that you have previously connected to, though, unless you explicitly tell it to forget that network.

Exactly. Also: auto-joining open WiFi networks—especially generically-named ones—is a pretty serious security risk. So easy to spoof an SSID and capture everything that's traversing it.

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#164

Post by josteink »

ClassyJacket wrote: post #142
addicted wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So all these years when Apple showed basically the same visual cues triggered by the same action they were miscommunications to us? You can’t have it both ways. Apple either miscommunicated this ever since Control center was added till today or they are miscommunication pang today. I would lean in the direction of miscommunicating today because Apple has spent years teaching its customers that this behavior means X a…

I believe when they changed the behaviour from turning off WiFi to disconnecting from WiFi, they added the text "Disconnected from networkname". But I don't entirely disagree they should communicate the change better

That only tells me I'm no longer connected to the wifi-network I used to be.

And that's the expected outcome of me turning off wifi. Something I deliberately tried to do through clicking the on/off toggle.

I agree with parent poster: Either apple has been miscommunication the whole time, or they are miscommunication now. You can't have it both ways.

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#165

Post by jachee »

trowawee wrote: post #111
neotek wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So why not just actually turn your wifi off? They didn't remove your ability to do so, just changed the way you do it.

I mean, I can. It's just an annoying pain in the ass, now, rather than a simple toggle. Which was a stupid decision on Apple's part.

Try "Hey Siri, turn off WiFi."

Five words isn't much beyond a simple toggle. :)

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#166

Post by josteink »

morganvachon wrote: post #74
jonahx wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No. It is in an attempt to resolve the real loss of money... Naked apologism. So unthoughtful, and delivered with such a righteous tone. If this was their intention, they could have implemented the feature honestly, informing users about what was happening, and offering a clear choice, such as an immediate popup, between "turn off for this location" and "turn off completely." That would have been fine. But the exis…

"offering the option to actually turn the services off." I'm not getting into the rest of your discussion, but I think you completely missed that you can indeed actually turn them off via 3D touch. Even on non-3D touch devices like the iPad mini, you can get to the "actually off" toggles by long-pressing the icons. Sure, it's somewhat of an extra step, but it's misleading to claim that the option doesn't exist when i…

> I think you completely missed that you can indeed actually turn them off via 3D touch

My iPhone SE doesn't have 3D touch, or if it does, I have no idea what it is.

So as far as I know, no, I don't have that option.

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#167

Post by jonahx »

IBM wrote: post #154
jonahx wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The UI informs the user directly that they're disconnecting from a network. I'm honestly confused... Do you really believe that most users have distinct concepts in their mental model for "wifi off" and "disconnected from a network"? They look at the button, it's not blue anymore, it's off. Then later they think... "Wait how did this randomly turn on again?" I believe this will be the experience even of the majorit…

Most users when turning "off" Wi-Fi, particularly from the control center, are doing so to get them off whatever network they're on. What their mental model is for what "Wi-Fi off" is doesn't matter because the user shouldn't be responsible for managing the radios in their phone. And any of them that do try to are probably under the impression that it saves them battery life, when it actually doesn't (unless connecte…

> What their mental model is for what "Wi-Fi off" is doesn't matter

It always matters if you're trying to minimize user frustration and confusion. The mental model determines what the user expects their actions to do.

> because the user shouldn't be responsible for managing the radios in their phone. > The new control center behaves in the way that most people actually use the buttons. More importantly it solves a major problem in that it no longer requires the user to know what radios need to be on for various features they use to work.

I don't think anyone (certainly not me) is arguing that this isn't a useful feature for the phone to have and is what many people want, at least some of the time. The argument is that the feature's behavior should be clear rather than misleading.

> Apple probably has all the support call stats they need to decide this was a better behavior.

Again, fine, but don't suggest one thing and silently do the "better" thing. Either allow the user to confirm the behavior, or create a UI that clarifies the behavior so people aren't misled into believing that "off until 5am" or "off until you move" means "off."

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#168

Post by cassowary »

lathiat wrote: post #156
siculars wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s straight garbage town. There are other ways to remind users that their WiFi is off than tricking users into thinking it is off when it really isn’t. Standard “engineers know best” mentality. Off means off. As in the opposite of on. This nonsense feeds into people (rightful) distrust of technology.

I'm a generally well educated person in both security, radios, etc. I can tell you that the control Centre Wi-Fi is basically always used by me to disconnect from the current network. And it persistently infuriated me when I would later forget and was on mobile data. I can also see users frequently being confused by things like their Apple Pencil not working. I love this change. You can still turn it off properly in…

Hi Lathiat. Why do you need to disconnect from the current network? I can think of many alternatively implementations which would meet most requirements that have been proposed, like turning the wifi back on when the battery is charging or at 5am. All the proposals involve compromises, but it seems much easier to make a notice that clearly says "Wifi will reconnect at 5am" then to say "Wifi is still using your battery, but we've disconnected from the current network". I mean, the message itself fits in the same space as the current message, and the icon itself could have a timer band counting down till 5am so you know that it's only temporarily disabled. (I too have accidentally used up all my month's data because I left the wifi off for a few days. It's not nice. I'd appreciate a feature which deals with it. But this one is unpredictable, unreadable and confusing.)

Also, are you proposing that low power mode with wifi uses the same amount of power as lower power mode without wifi? If I know I'm not going to see a power point for many hours, I turn my phone onto low power mode and turn wifi off (and the brightness right down and some other things). I might do it as I leave the house in the morning when I still have 95% battery. In these cases, I very often need my phone most in precisely when the battery will be weakest.

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#169

Post by astronautjones »

Terretta wrote: post #6

> In an attempt to keep you connected to Apple devices and services, iOS 11 compromises users' security. No. It is in an attempt to resolve the real loss of money experienced by everyday users who turn off WiFi when it’s flakey and then forget to turn it back on, costing them cash on their cellular data plan. (And the very real frustration when things don’t work they expect to work, and they don’t know why.) Meanwhil…

This is such a backwards approach to security in an age where the average user is only less and less informed

Re: iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security

#170

Post by r00fus »

dvcrn wrote: post #23

I hate this. I have a ton of wifi hotspots setup in the city, some of them require authentication, some of them don't. I leave work, mount my phone on my bike, "turn off" WiFi and cycle before realizing that nothing (like maps) is updating because I connected to a wifi point that needs authentication, or a point that is now far away because I already cycled by. While cycling, I reach to my phone and switch it "off" a…

Can't you just turn off wifi's promiscuous mode?

I forget all wifi points except for any place I regularly go. LTE is good enough for cafes and the like.

Post reply on HN