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Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

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Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#191

Post by conradev »

adavies42 wrote: post #177
conradev wrote: post #93

I was going to write a tweak for iOS to do something like this, with behavior similar to that of the built in Camera shortcut from the lockscreen. 1. You are using an app 2. You activate 'Guest mode' using a button press, swipe, tap, etc. (configurable) 3. If the user hits the home button, it redirects to the lockscreen instead of the homescreen (much like the Camera application does in lock-mode) 4. Instead of the c…

> So, when a friend asks "Hey can I check my email?", you can open Safari, enable this guest mode, and hand the phone to him, no worries. can you provide a sandboxed environment? he can't have access to any of my persistent Safari data (autofill/bookmarks/history/cookies/dbs/etc.), and any he creates should be wiped, probably on return to the lockscreen. all other forms of app switching (e.g. open a pdf url, then "op…

That would be the only issue with something like this. The number of system features is finite and they can be disabled each in their own respect, but partitioning a guest from a user's data in an arbitrary application would prove challenging.

Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#192

Post by hsshah »

Seems like Apple is planning to implement multi-user mode in iOS with face recognition based login ie a user just enter his PIN, however, the camera detects which account to load. (IMHO, more secure than the current Android implementation) Article talking about related patent: http://www.cultofmac.com/137393/apple-patent-details-facial-...

I would imagine at that time, they might support Guest logins.

EDIT: the implementation detail of Face recognition talked above is my own take on how it should be done. Not suggested by the referenced article.

Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#193

Post by cheald »

lparry wrote: post #64
cheald wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking as a father of a 3-year-old, a separate profile for him would save me an immeasurable amount of frustration. "Figure out which folder the program I want is in" becomes really tiring after about the 600th time.

Spotlight could save you that frustration already.

If that were the right solution, why does iOS have homescreen icons at all?

Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#194

Post by ZeroGravitas »

cheald wrote: post #39
ams6110 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But if the whole family could share it, they might only buy one instead of four.

Speaking as a father of a 3-year-old, a separate profile for him would save me an immeasurable amount of frustration. "Figure out which folder the program I want is in" becomes really tiring after about the 600th time.

If you're on Android then Famigo Sandbox sort-of solves this.

It only lists a subset of apps (automatically adding child-friendly ones it finds, but then editable) and prevents access to the phone functionality, redirects ad links etc.

Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#195

Post by etcet »

Jabbles wrote: post #153
etcet wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the interested: enforcing no palindromes and unique digits reduces the number of possible PINs by about a factor of 2, bringing it down to 5040 4-digit combinations. [JS code] http://pastebin.com/3A46BP1C

If the digits are unique then there are no palindromes. Therefore there are 10 9 8*7 = 5040 combinations.

The formatting ate your *'s but I understand. That's definitely the better way to reason the problem. In my defense it was late (after a trip to the bar) and my code is basically stream of consciousness.

Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#196

Post by jxi »

yock wrote: post #20
forrestthewoods wrote: post #9

"Why Don’t Smartphones Have A Guest Mode?" Because dealing with multiple profiles and/or different profile types is a fucking huge giant pain the ass and a monumental amount of work! Xbox has local, guest, live silver, and live gold accounts. Dealing with all the different profiles and switching between is a nightmare. Urgh, no thanks.

At least two of the three most prominent smart phone roms are backed by operating systems that have long histories of (more or less successful) profile switching. It might in fact be a difficult problem, but it's one that has serviceable solutions and has for some time.

What's the third? Blackberry or wp7?

Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#197

Post by jxi »

jiggy2011 wrote: post #143

Smartphones seem to have mostly sacrificed some of their security for convenience. Take Windows for example, sure you can setup multiple user accounts with different levels of privilege , access to website and apps etc but how many people outside of a corporate or academic setting actually use this? Whenever I borrow someones laptop they just use their own login, sometimes I find porn in their Internet history but at…

It doesn't work for Windows because you wouldn't have an account on someone else's computer. Chrome OS solves this though since your account is in the cloud and you can login to your account with your settings/history/etc.. from any computer.

Android should be able to support this feature down the line too.

Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#198

Post by tzury »

eneveu wrote: post #129
tzury wrote: post #118

Ironically, Arrington still "writes" for Techcrunch https://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/27763718700

The tweet seems quite old, though: "9:43 PM - 18 Oct 10"

that was my point, he tweeted this long ago, while he was in TC, and yet, his voice is echoed...

Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#199

Post by kaybe »

tjoff wrote: post #139
kaybe wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but the answer shows that you were aware of it before, which means you have already come in contact with the concept, leading to a higher probability for you to actually use it.

Then again, a tech savvy user that encrypts his drive and claims he/she haven't a slightest idea what the officer is talking about is probably in many cases way more suspicious. At least to an officer that is informed enough to bring that up.

Depends. How closely linked are the concepts of simple encryption and plausible deniability encryption? If you start researching the topic a bit you will stumble upon both, but if, say, a friend installed it?

Re: Why Don’t Smartphones Have A “Guest Mode”?

#200

Post by kaybe »

burgerbrain wrote: post #166
kaybe wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but the answer shows that you were aware of it before, which means you have already come in contact with the concept, leading to a higher probability for you to actually use it.

I don't think that it does. I think the most it can be said to demonstrate is that you are aware of how the burden of proof is supposed to work in the United States. In other words, it's his job to prove things, not yours.

Yes, but it implies much more than just that; defiance for example. You don't want to egg them on, do you?
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