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iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

techradar.com

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Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#11

Good. I personally agree with Apple’s stance. I don’t want developers of popular apps to be able to bypass Apple’s reviews and push dark patterns on users. Before anyone talks about choice, I see this as akin to minimum wages and union memberships. There are some limitations of choices that often end up being beneficial to the average person. From the point of view of the user (if not the app developer) Apple’s walle…

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It kind of makes sense. Both are closed systems that place rules what is good or bad for their members. If we cannot trust a person to choose whether a certain salary is good or bad for them, why would we trust them to decide what apps are good or bad for them?

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#12

Hasn't Apple always said the reason they don't allow sideloading was that it'd be impossible without compromising security? So are they claiming their European iDevices won't be secure anymore, or are they admitting they were lying before and that the real reason was nothing but greed?

How they will do it likely is they will charge to install the App store app and assign it a CA and require it to sign the apps downloaded from that app store.

The sideloading of apps will technically be an apple approved app but enforced by another app store. To put it another way you would not be able to randomly download an unsigned app.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#13
Sons of beaches! I'm moving to Europe across the pond. Swims faster

I would expect it to be piloted in one region first and then phase across regions. It's not exactly something you want to YOLO and deploy to the entire world fleet all at once with customer devices and server infrastructure.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#14
Even if this is small progress the headlines and framing of the story are still doublespeak. Installing applications on your computer is the normal state of things. Walled gardens and not having control of your computer is the new weird thing. The word "sideloading" is a feudal concept and it's unquestioned use is dangerous for society.

Properly stated this story title is, "Installing applications on iOS 17 might be allowed Europe" which highlights the absurdity intrinsic in the practice of users not being able to install applications on their own computers as a default.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#16
"It's for your safety and security"

Words that should send a chill down every spine. It's obviously just a monopoly. They could easily have an 'allow sideloading' option in the OS, and those that are happy with Apple's curation can leave it off, and everyone else can turn it on.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#18

Hasn't Apple always said the reason they don't allow sideloading was that it'd be impossible without compromising security? So are they claiming their European iDevices won't be secure anymore, or are they admitting they were lying before and that the real reason was nothing but greed?

They're presumably claiming that european devices will be less secure.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#19
post #15

I anticipate a huge market developing for unlocked second hand European iPhones in the US.

The feature will be tied to your apple id, obviously.

Oh that would suck. I've had an iPhone since the week they were first released, but never associated an Apple ID with one. My whole beef with the App Store is it requires telling Apple who I am. If you have to associate your phone with an Apple ID to get sideloading then this is hardly progress for me.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#20

Even if this is small progress the headlines and framing of the story are still doublespeak. Installing applications on your computer is the normal state of things. Walled gardens and not having control of your computer is the new weird thing. The word "sideloading" is a feudal concept and it's unquestioned use is dangerous for society. Properly stated this story title is, "Installing applications on iOS 17 might be…

Even on Windows if I send an EXE or MSI of my software to someone they get a scary security warning that prevents them from running it. The only guaranteed way around that is to be a big company (or a big open-source project).

If security really mattered, every OS would run applications in a proper sandbox, but why bother with that when you can just point your Web browser at a program running on someone else's server? Oh, but consent to these tracking cookies first.

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