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Apple's whitelist of the 250k auto-completable domains in iOS

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Re: Apple's whitelist of the 250k auto-completable domains in iOS

#151

Post by mulmen »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #136
BlueTemplar wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you make a curated list, you become responsible for it ?

So I guess the question is, what is the alternative? The only realistic option I can think of is some combination of: • Make autocomplete operate on a blacklist instead of whitelist, with a more limited goal of only removing e.g. known porn sites. • Make the list of potential matches machine-generated, without human intervention. (Aside, are we sure the current list isn't just the 250K most-visited sites on the inter…

Why should Apple avoid autocompletion of porn site domains? That’s an area rampant with scam sites, especially similar domains. Plus “everyone” looks at porn so the benefits would be widespread.

If Apple wants to protect users then autocompleting porn site domains seems like the place to start, not avoid.

The absence of porn domains raises the question of Apple’s intent.

Re: Apple's whitelist of the 250k auto-completable domains in iOS

#152

Post by kayodelycaon »

Interesting.

There are several furry art communities listed, but Fur Affinity is not. Fur Affinity is the largest and most popular of these by a fair margin.

Unrelated to the furry websites the above, there are some nsfw websites listed but other, more popular ones are strangely missing. (The word "porn" does not appear in the list.)

redditenhancementsuite.com is also listed... which I did not expect.

I suspect this list is run through a keyword filter and a blacklist before anything is added.

Re: Apple's whitelist of the 250k auto-completable domains in iOS

#155

Post by sodality2 »

kayodelycaon wrote: post #152

Interesting. There are several furry art communities listed, but Fur Affinity is not. Fur Affinity is the largest and most popular of these by a fair margin. Unrelated to the furry websites the above, there are some nsfw websites listed but other, more popular ones are strangely missing. (The word "porn" does not appear in the list.) redditenhancementsuite.com is also listed... which I did not expect. I suspect this…

There is however several sites that redirect to "erotic film" and blatant porn sites (the domain name also references porn, so it's not like someone scooped up another random domain here). So, probably not manually curated...

Re: Apple's whitelist of the 250k auto-completable domains in iOS

#156

Post by Wowfunhappy »

mulmen wrote: post #151
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I guess the question is, what is the alternative? The only realistic option I can think of is some combination of: • Make autocomplete operate on a blacklist instead of whitelist, with a more limited goal of only removing e.g. known porn sites. • Make the list of potential matches machine-generated, without human intervention. (Aside, are we sure the current list isn't just the 250K most-visited sites on the inter…

Why should Apple avoid autocompletion of porn site domains? That’s an area rampant with scam sites, especially similar domains. Plus “everyone” looks at porn so the benefits would be widespread. If Apple wants to protect users then autocompleting porn site domains seems like the place to start , not avoid. The absence of porn domains raises the question of Apple’s intent.

> Why should Apple avoid autocompletion of porn site domains?

Because if I’m sharing my screen on a business call, and I start typing something into my browsers’s address bar, I don’t want it to autocomplete something nsfw which just happened to share the same first letter.

Re: Apple's whitelist of the 250k auto-completable domains in iOS

#157

Post by varenc »

dangero wrote: post #3

Anyone know how this list was created or how often it gets updated?

My guess actually is that iOS/Apple no longer uses this particular list. I found this by intercepting traffic on an older jailbroken iOS 13 device. Given how old some of the domains in the list are, I'd guess that iOS 15 no longer uses it. I also never actually saw my phone fetch this list, I just saw this URL in another configuration response.

tl;dr; I bet it'll never get updated. (but some similar list at a more hidden/protected location likely will be)

p.s. this list of common spelling corrections is interesting too: https://cdn.smoot.apple.com/static/static_corrections_dict/2...

Re: Apple's whitelist of the 250k auto-completable domains in iOS

#158

Post by zymhan »

blenderdt wrote: post #94
dalbasal wrote: post #57

This is an interesting little example of how "systemic" happens, or can happen. The list exists initially to support a feature, a utilitarian reason. Then, being in the list has SEO value or some such. The list becomes a legitimacy or authority test. It affects traffic, sales. Maybe other stuff piggybacks this list. Anyone who needs a list of important domain names uses it. Ordering search results, caching, testing,…

Ok, maybe I am missing something here. The link points to a list Apple is hosting without any context. Does anyone know why this list is hosted and what it is used for? Is it even used? Edit: some 7 year old posts suggest it was used by Spotlight. I also am a little amazed it loaded and scrolls smooth on Firefox mobile...

Can't say the same for Firefox on Windows, on a powerful PC :/

Re: Apple's whitelist of the 250k auto-completable domains in iOS

#159

Post by varenc »

blenderdt wrote: post #94
dalbasal wrote: post #57

This is an interesting little example of how "systemic" happens, or can happen. The list exists initially to support a feature, a utilitarian reason. Then, being in the list has SEO value or some such. The list becomes a legitimacy or authority test. It affects traffic, sales. Maybe other stuff piggybacks this list. Anyone who needs a list of important domain names uses it. Ordering search results, caching, testing,…

Ok, maybe I am missing something here. The link points to a list Apple is hosting without any context. Does anyone know why this list is hosted and what it is used for? Is it even used? Edit: some 7 year old posts suggest it was used by Spotlight. I also am a little amazed it loaded and scrolls smooth on Firefox mobile...

For context, see my buried comment explaining how I found this here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30906482

In summary: I don't have any indication it's in current use. I saw this URL in intercepted traffic from an iOS 13 device. I suspect it was used at some point but not anymore. I bet iOS 15 still uses something similar but doesn't use this particular URL (perhaps one with more obscurity/protection).

p.s. I also found this list of spelling corrections/autocompletes: https://cdn.smoot.apple.com/static/static_corrections_dict/2...

Some examples:

   {"q":"hackernews","c":{"hackerneww":0,"hackernees":0,"hackernee":0}}
   {"q":"ycombinator","c":{"ycomi":0,"ycombinatir":0}}
   {"q":"apple store","c":{"apple stire":0,"apple stoe":0,"apple stoee":0,"aple st":0,"aplle":0,"aple":0}}

Re: Apple's whitelist of the 250k auto-completable domains in iOS

#160

Post by [deleted] »

jjoonathan wrote: post #147
blenderdt wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, maybe I am missing something here. The link points to a list Apple is hosting without any context. Does anyone know why this list is hosted and what it is used for? Is it even used? Edit: some 7 year old posts suggest it was used by Spotlight. I also am a little amazed it loaded and scrolls smooth on Firefox mobile...

When I type "analog.com" into the search bar, I can imagine a way for autocomplete to go wrong. This list would prevent it from going wrong.

[deleted]
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