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How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

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Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#191

Post by pilif »

riobard wrote: post #147
newhouseb wrote: post #121

Hi HN — Ben from Dropbox here on the desktop client team. Wanted to clarify a few things — - Clearly we need to do a better job communicating about Dropbox’s OS integration. We ask for permissions once but don’t describe what we’re doing or why. We’ll fix that. - We only ask for privileges we actively use -- but unfortunately some of the permissions aren’t as granular as we would like. - We use accessibility APIs for…

At this point you need to follow up with convincing technical details of why Dropbox needs the circumvention to counter the accusation and rebuild the damaged trust. The reason for needing Accessibility API listed in your response is pretty vague, especially for those Mac users not having Microsoft products tainting their systems. I've deleted Dropbox from my Mac for now. I'm not installing it back till there's reaso…

> why Dropbox needs the circumvention

I'm not affiliated with Dropbox, but compare the UX of Dropbox (type in your admin-password and that's it) with the one of Steam (opens the System preferences and forces you to make manual changes). Both need to be allowed accessibility access for one feature or another, but only one of them provides convincing UX.

For us power users, the "official" way is better, sure, but what's the percentage of power-users compared to normal users who actually enjoy the office intrgration and other things made possible by the accessibility API?

I would be happiest if it didn't do the dirty thing and also didn't offer office integration. Maybe that's the change they need to make. But if they insist on doing the things that need accessibility, then the current solution is so much more convenient than the steam dance.

Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#192

Post by newhouseb »

0x0 wrote: post #140
yyyuuu wrote: post #138

Hi HN — Ben from Dropbox here on the desktop client team. Wanted to clarify a few things — - Clearly we need to do a better job communicating about Dropbox’s OS integration. We ask for permissions once but don’t describe what we’re doing or why. We’ll fix that. - We only ask for privileges we actively use -- but unfortunately some of the permissions aren’t as granular as we would like. - We use accessibility APIs for…

Ben, do you have two HN accounts? This one and that one too: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12464730 ?

Nope, I have no idea why someone reposted this.

Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#193

Post by ThomPete »

Dropbox trying to find ways to push the platform is a good thing not a bad thing.

If anything Apple have put so many restrictions on OSX and isn't pushing for much innovation on their side to allow people to build ever more powerful apps.

I understand general security concerns but I don't understand the critique of a company like Dropbox. They are doing the user er service not a disservice by finding a balance between pushing the platform forward while still taking your security concerns into account.

I would personally be more concerned with the fact that Apple haven't done anything fundamental for the osx platform in quite a while which is the exact opposite of what they have done for iOS.

Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#194

Post by acdha »

xenadu02 wrote: post #136
newhouseb wrote: post #121

Hi HN — Ben from Dropbox here on the desktop client team. Wanted to clarify a few things — - Clearly we need to do a better job communicating about Dropbox’s OS integration. We ask for permissions once but don’t describe what we’re doing or why. We’ll fix that. - We only ask for privileges we actively use -- but unfortunately some of the permissions aren’t as granular as we would like. - We use accessibility APIs for…

Can you also tell us why Dropbox eats lots of CPU cycles anytime there is any filesystem activity? If I unzip a large archive in /tmp, Dropbox is eating 60% of my CPU. If I open the new Xcode for the first time (and the system verifies all the signatures) Dropbox is eating 100% of one CPU. It really seems like the Dropbox client is monitoring the entire filesystem (all FSEvents) instead of just the dropbox syncing fo…

Have you checked the version of the Dropbox client you're running? The auto-updater broke and silently failed many months ago (n=5 Macs) and I found a number of problems like that one had already been fixed but effectively never shipped.

(Support was prompt but basically “let us know if it happens again”)

Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#195

Post by DINKDINK »

newhouseb wrote: post #121

Hi HN — Ben from Dropbox here on the desktop client team. Wanted to clarify a few things — - Clearly we need to do a better job communicating about Dropbox’s OS integration. We ask for permissions once but don’t describe what we’re doing or why. We’ll fix that. - We only ask for privileges we actively use -- but unfortunately some of the permissions aren’t as granular as we would like. - We use accessibility APIs for…

>We never see or store your admin password. The dialog box you see is a native OS X API (i.e. made by Apple).

If that's the case, How is it that the accessibility preferences are changed without root authorization?

Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#196

Post by jimmaswell »

xenadu02 wrote: post #136
newhouseb wrote: post #121

Hi HN — Ben from Dropbox here on the desktop client team. Wanted to clarify a few things — - Clearly we need to do a better job communicating about Dropbox’s OS integration. We ask for permissions once but don’t describe what we’re doing or why. We’ll fix that. - We only ask for privileges we actively use -- but unfortunately some of the permissions aren’t as granular as we would like. - We use accessibility APIs for…

Can you also tell us why Dropbox eats lots of CPU cycles anytime there is any filesystem activity? If I unzip a large archive in /tmp, Dropbox is eating 60% of my CPU. If I open the new Xcode for the first time (and the system verifies all the signatures) Dropbox is eating 100% of one CPU. It really seems like the Dropbox client is monitoring the entire filesystem (all FSEvents) instead of just the dropbox syncing fo…

Could this be a consequence of the built in FS APIs coming up short, as Ben put it, and forcing DropBox to do things in less efficient ways to work around the limitations?

Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#197

Post by moosemilkie »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #171
seanhunter wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's very strange that after I remove Dropbox from the accessibility list you think it's ok to add it back in again. That's the reason I'll be closing my account.

Most programs don't consider that you might try to explicitly revoke permissions. It's a very understandable bug/behavior. I think it's worth giving them a chance to amend that code.

It didn't even ask for permission the first time.

Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#198

Post by kinkdr »

Myrth wrote: post #26
Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't use a Mac, either :)

And if you're using Ubuntu, you're trusting package managers, and if you're using Gentoo, you're trusting original developers (how often do you audit source code?)

That's exactly right and what people complain about. That Dropbox betrayed the trust they(users) were giving to them(Dropbox).

I don't necessarily agree with them, but that's the sentiment here.

Edit: by the way, regarding open source projects, it doesn't matter if you don't look at the code personally. Somebody else does, and if there is problem with it, it becomes a huge public scandal sooner or later.

Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#199

Post by pilif »

DINKDINK wrote: post #195
newhouseb wrote: post #121

Hi HN — Ben from Dropbox here on the desktop client team. Wanted to clarify a few things — - Clearly we need to do a better job communicating about Dropbox’s OS integration. We ask for permissions once but don’t describe what we’re doing or why. We’ll fix that. - We only ask for privileges we actively use -- but unfortunately some of the permissions aren’t as granular as we would like. - We use accessibility APIs for…

>We never see or store your admin password. The dialog box you see is a native OS X API (i.e. made by Apple). If that's the case, How is it that the accessibility preferences are changed without root authorization?

Once you type your password into the Apple dialog, you grant Dropbox root access. That's the purpose of this dialog in all cases.

Re: How Dropbox Hacks Your Mac

#200

Post by jimmaswell »

seanhunter wrote: post #124
newhouseb wrote: post #121

Hi HN — Ben from Dropbox here on the desktop client team. Wanted to clarify a few things — - Clearly we need to do a better job communicating about Dropbox’s OS integration. We ask for permissions once but don’t describe what we’re doing or why. We’ll fix that. - We only ask for privileges we actively use -- but unfortunately some of the permissions aren’t as granular as we would like. - We use accessibility APIs for…

It's very strange that after I remove Dropbox from the accessibility list you think it's ok to add it back in again. That's the reason I'll be closing my account.

Why would you even do that? What nefarious and yet undiscovered things did you think DropBox was likely to do specifically with the accessibility permission?

Permission systems in general seem like a solution without a problem to me. Nobody but a minority of people very concerned about theoretical security problems wanted them on platforms that didn't have them, almost nobody cares what permissions programs use on platforms that have them now, and people get along perfectly fine and with less inconvenience shoved in their face running programs without permissions systems aside from a simple admin rights/no admin rights today on Windows and Linux.

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