Earlier quoted context omitted.
We don't entirely trust Apple. We just trust them more than other vendors.
Who is "we"?
Probably the folk upvoting my comment.
Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
191–200 of 829 posts
Re: Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
#192Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't see how this matters to the GP's argument. Windows was a virus hotbed for decades and that does not appear to have affected its reputation in a meaningful way.
That’s because Windows’ reputation was already mud. Microsoft made their business on corporate users anyway. Apple is a consumer brand. A data breach on iOS is like nudity in a Disney movie: utterly brand-destroying.
Windows was both. If you were buying a computer in the early 2000s, it was almost certainly a Windows PC.
Re: Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
#193Earlier quoted context omitted.
The “low usage” comment is going to be more ammo against Apple unfortunately. The whole reason they are low usage on PWAs is because of a lack of investment from Apple and a lack of parity, yet for the longest time Apple has played both sides by saying PWAs are a viable alternative to the App Store, all while channeling people to App Store for actual app downloads and not providing similar marketing or anything for P…
Are you sure this isn't a tech industry viewpoint? I don't know anyone who knows what the difference between an app and a PWA is. I don't think I've seen anyone outside of the tech industry with a PWA active. In context 99% of the users I meet don't even know what USB-C is.
Correct on it being a tech industry viewpoint— people think "apps come from the App Store" and therefore anything else that's clunky requires a fair amount of education and payoff for users to adopt.
It's off balance, and it shows now that the tech has to be removed since it wasn't actually at parity despite it being an argument for it unfortunately.
The worst part? This has been the case for 15 years. It's not like there wasn't enough time to fix it. That's plenty of time to hire and develop solutions, yet now look at the reasons for it being taken away.
Re: Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
#194Earlier quoted context omitted.
That assumes that Apple would be blamed for Edge/Brave/Firefox's security oversight.
If you add a PWA (with Safari) a year ago to your Home Screen and then change your browser to Firefox, and that PWA breaks out and steals some other application data... Will you blame the software maker that you used to install the icon on the screen? or the one that is seemingly unrelated to the icon on your Home Screen?
I would probably blame the "the software maker" for silently switching the engine used by previously installed PWAs. Why do that?
Re: Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not one additional prompt, it's a class of prompts that could be exploited over and over again. A single site could trigger hundreds by sites popping up in the background each which trigger it, and then the user's home screen is full of fake PWAs with names like 'save money' 'in debt?' 'casino cash bucks' etc. Next you're developing mitigations, spam cleanup, etc. We've gone through this kind of thing before.
The user would get rid of the app/browser that is doing this, no? The same way they would have to for any malicious app that persistently requests a special permission?
Yeah ideally. Given there are nearly 1.5 billion active iPhones tho, a lot (100s of millions) of users aren't going to understand the relationship between the prompts and the browser and/or know (/know how) to uninstall the browser and/or have desire to do it at the moment they experience the problem, especially if the browser has other qualities they like. Many more would just blame it on themselves, ignore the problem, etc. These users may make up a plurality or majority of iOS users, and have a totally different experience from a technical user working on a desktop OS (HN crowd).
Re: Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
#196Earlier quoted context omitted.
But the plain browser already can request camera permissions, in a bad security situation a site that didn't request it still receives it from the browser's system level request. This is just Apple wanting to avoid people being able to develop a platform on top of their platform without paying a tax.
Browsers can still do that. It's more that PWAs look like entirely separate apps which the user would expect to be sandboxed. While a tab in a browser is clearly part of the browser app.
This is not a meaningful distinction. Users ALSO expect ordinary websites’ data to be sandboxed. Users trust that pornhub.com won’t be allowed to read data entered into irs.gov.
Re: Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
#197Earlier quoted context omitted.
That assumes that Apple would be blamed for Edge/Brave/Firefox's security oversight.
If you add a PWA (with Safari) a year ago to your Home Screen and then change your browser to Firefox, and that PWA breaks out and steals some other application data... Will you blame the software maker that you used to install the icon on the screen? or the one that is seemingly unrelated to the icon on your Home Screen?
You think this uneducated me would know that this was a PWA and no app and also remember that it was installed by Safari, an app I apparently don't own anymore at this stage...?
Why wouldn't Safari remove all its PWA icons when I uninstall it, considering that it anyway cannot transfer the data to another browser...?
Re: Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
#198Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well to correct you, my position is more “Apple might re-enable this” more than “will”, which from their perspective I’m guessing is even worse and they will be more unsympathetic to it. Personally I think Apple will, but I have enough doubts that I don’t want to make that claim. > Most importantly, the EU may feel the same way. That’s the rub. The EU has been arbitrarily writing new laws which mostly target foreign…
The arbitrary laws that the EU has been writing are the one of the last bulwarks consumers have against the creeping power of tech giants and these companies are making more money than ever in spite of regulation, so it doesn't seem to be affecting them too adversely.
The biggest abuses in tech come down on the adtech side of things where in order for them to make money, they need to know who you are, and they will do everything within their power to make sure that they do with or without your consent.
Telecoms companies (in which I am including carriers) also often fall within this because they are often envious of adtech companies and want what they have and can theoretically make better guarantees about who somebody is.
Not supporting PWAs isn’t in the same league, but I would also add to that: running a popular messenger, running a popular search engine, and controlling distribution of software on a popular phone platform. Spinning up new laws around terminology designed to have bad PR (“gatekeepers”) is pretty damn arbitrary as far as lawmaking goes.
Re: Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have to agree (disclaimer, haven't been an iPhone user since the 4). Suddenly allowing all browsers to have those kinds of native permissions, even with massive testing, sounds like a security nightmare. You're introducing an entire extra dimension for security holes, given how much trust people place in their phones. This doesn't sound at all the same as allowing other engines for use inside browsers, based on both…
Browsers support PWAs on the desktop platforms without there being a security nightmare, and while I'm sure there are some permissions that could be a problem, things like the camera and microphone are managed on the desktop without issue. Is there some flaw in iOS that makes it harder to secure than the desktop?
They know that giving too powerful apis to other browsers will kill their marketshare and competitors will build a better product in free environment.
Re: Apple confirms it's breaking iPhone web apps in the EU on purpose
#200Earlier quoted context omitted.
> For Apple, ownership of the "trust problem" is an intrinsic part of "making good products". Yes, this might be true. And the majority of elected officials in EU fundamentally disagrees with that statement.
> And the majority of elected officials in EU fundamentally disagrees with that statement. Well, EU can and will force, fine, or ban US companies as they see fit but there is not some fundamental correctness to their viewpoint
Any fundamental correctness of their viewpoint is by virtue of them representing more people (EU citizens) than Apple's CEO represents (himself and, I guess, the Apple corporation, if you count that). On moral issues, the fundamentally "correct" viewpoint (if there is one) is, by definition, the one that more people say is the fundamentally "correct" viewpoint.