Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

551–560 of 667 posts

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#551

Post by jn4 »

FB, G clearly violated the ToS of the Enterprise Acc (no public distribution of such Apps) and Apple has rightly suspended their enterprise distribution cert.

But Apple has been selective in enforcing this rule. If I recall, for many years Uber's driver App was distributed as an enterprise app. Uber has always claimed that drivers are not employees and so this was in clear violation of the ToS.

Imo, Uber's use case was legit. During early days Uber probably did not wish to have 2 Apps in the App Store to avoid customer confusion. Or maybe they were actively updating the Driver App and did not want to add days of App review holding up every update.

Apple should change their ToS and allow such use cases in some form. At times this would get misused (like FB/G) but opening up the walled garden to enable such "private" apps to be easily distributed can make iOS a more interesting platform. In any case they always have the final kill switch of revoking an Enterprise Cert for malicious use.

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#552

Post by morpheuskafka »

curt15 wrote: post #278
mjw1007 wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the story, Apple have stopped Google employees running Google's "Gbus app for transportation". So yes, it's about what Apple allows people to run on their own devices.

Since Gbus is presumably developed internally, what prevents the employees from installing the program via Xcode?

The employees would each have to spend $100 on a developer membership (sharing them is a good way to get more revokes).

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#553

Post by zepto »

mrep wrote: post #394
hk__2 wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who want to run their own code on their smartphone are probably already a very limited subset of all users.

If it were possible, many more companies would sidestep the app store like how Fortnite did that with the android play store. The only reason Fortnite used Apple's app store is because Apple has made it practically impossible to side load apps.

Not only is it possible, it’s trivially easy to sideload apps.

What’s difficult is to distribute commercially, or maliciously without going through Apple.

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#554

Post by asdf333 »

mistercow wrote: post #529
asdf333 wrote: post #491

So Does that mean that you currently cannot write an app for yourself on iOS without first getting it approved by apple?

No, why would it mean that?

Ah ok. I don't do iOS development so I don't know how it works.

So if I just write an app for myself I can run it for my own phone indefinitely without going through the app store is that right? Seems like if you could do that, Facebook and Google could just do that for their internal apps?

I am genuinely just curious how it works.

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#555

Post by gigatexal »

nostrademons wrote: post #178
gigatexal wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something like 90%+ of the profit from smartphones goes to Apple — if that’s not the upper hand then I don’t know what is. Apple makes profit. Google has a legion of devices with incentives to keep insecure so they can monitor and harvest the data to both serve and sell ads.

That's not the upper hand. The upper hand is having the installed base needed to be able to push through product changes that undermine your competitors' strategic position. Things like being able to continuously track the location of each of your ~2B customers so that you know who is hanging out with whom and can build the social graph that another one of your primary competitors spent a decade curating - or, for th…

If google was so confident it had the “upper hand” with android and its 2B users why would it pay an estimated 9 billion to Apple [1] to remain the default search engine on iOS? That screams desperation to me. [1]https://www.google.com/amp/s/9to5mac.com/2018/09/28/google-p...

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#556

Post by jmanderley »

mirimir wrote: post #509
ken wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point may be valid, but it's not what this discussion is about. Apple didn't cut off a user for running unauthorized software on their iPhone. They cut off Google for using a paid enterprise service to distribute their software in violation of its TOS.

Yes, and more to the point, they cut off Facebook and Google for distributing unreviewed apps to the general public. So the violation was using the enterprise key to evade app review by Apple. Which Apple does to protect its customers. And so Apple is just protecting its customers.

Facebook already got their access back, I assume the block on Google won't last all that long, either.

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#557

Post by Spooky23 »

wutbrodo wrote: post #378
51lver wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not wrong, you're just in the wrong place. Apple is the sysadmin and the phone holders are the users. They WANT apple looking out for them. Anyone who says otherwise stupidly wasted $1000 when they could have bought any number of unlockable devices for that money. I say this with an unlocked and de-googled android phone next to me, and several hacked arm devices at home. I OWN THEM, with no doubt, so I agree w…

Is this true of people who voluntarily signed up to be paid for data collection? It's like saying that Nielsen panelists need to be protected from Nielsen by Vizio. (Insert standard caveat about the degree to which kids' autonomy is in the hands of their parents).

Nielsen is a white Knight compared to what Vizio is doing.

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#558

Post by Spooky23 »

ajross wrote: post #474
seba_dos1 wrote: post #426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I signed no contract. Facebook and Google did sign it and distributed their software based on it. > It's not like Facebook and Google were hacking their way in here. They literally did (in the legal sense). But of course, it's a battle of two evils here. Both sides can just nuke each other if you ask me, I won't miss them ;)

> Facebook and Google did sign it and distributed their software based on it. I think we're talking past each other here. I'm not talking about how Facebook and Google's spy kits were licensed to the end users or about their compliance with Apple's own vendor license. I was pointing out that the principle here is that I (and Facebook and Google) should have the ability to write and distribute software for you (and me…

What kind of principle is that it without rules?

Free speech doesn’t allow libel and slander. Free assembly doesn’t allow riots. Without a framework for meaningful justice, the high minded principle is just a race to the bottom.

I should be able to have the freedom to choose a platform where I have some protection against the various bad actors out there. Without Apple, the only options we have is non-participation, believing the lies, and arbritration.

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#559

Post by abtinf »

taurath wrote: post #542
abtinf wrote: post #468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such an action would result extraordinary liability for a company. Public discovery would likely lead to consumer lawsuits, shareholders suits, replacement of the CEO, and shuffling of the board of directors. Not to mention possible criminal/civil penalties that pierce the corporate veil.

This would never be a direct action. But they don't have to go out of their way to inform either. Do you think Facebook's right wing oppo research firm would balk about leaking a story that a competitor's phone is vulnerable? Absolutely not.

Merely leaking it would be of no consequence. They could even do it directly as a blog post from their security team. Attempting blackmail would be the trouble.

Re: Apple blocks Google from running its internal iOS apps

#560

Post by Spooky23 »

ajross wrote: post #418
simon_acca wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I signed no contract. True, but you entered in a contract with the app developer and they are bound by one with Apple. Apple’s right to act on iOS devices is in virtue of them being a service provider to google more than the company that sold you your phone

> you entered in a contract with the app developer ... wat? No, I didn't. It's easy to imagine I "must have", but in fact there's no signature, no negotiation nor in many cases any consideration. Ah, but you say: I must have signed a contract to use the app store that I downloaded the app from, and that must constrain me to honor the terms of the app that I downloaded, which is constrained by Apple's contract with th…

Electronic signatures are a thing. You absolutely are bound by contract.
Post reply on HN