Security companies hate Apple because Apple gives them no business, especially when it comes to iOS devices. They stand by helplessly, eyes cast downward, hands in pockets, while Apple continues to manage its own mobile device security. Meanwhile, in the Land of Free and Open, Android sufferers slap ineffective protections on their handsets that do little more than chew up processor overhead. Occasionally, one of these security jackholes will sound off about the coming tsunami of malware that will strike iPhone users any day now and how much Apple will rue the day they spurned them.
Our latest butthurt sniffles come from Andrew Storms, director of security operations for a company called nCircle. Instead of directly railing against Apple’s security, he takes a slightly different tact. He claims that the iOS 6 dialog boxes that appears when an app requests access to things like contact data will annoy users more than they will help them. See if you can guess the RGB of the shade of red on Storms’s face while delivering the following quote:
Instead doing the difficult work of putting together a privacy policy that has some teeth or going after app developers already violating policies, Apple has basically decided to annoy their users by requiring them click through a dialog box for just about every app on their phone. These dialog boxes are going to be like one of those whack-a-mole games – exactly the kind of thing users despise and ignore completely.
Except that Apple has gone after developers. Tim Cook allegedly went after Path’s CEO himself when the news of their unauthorized sending of user contacts broke. Storms is quick to remind people that they were the ones who broke Pathgate, and it’s obvious they miss the attention a little. Apple isn’t exactly known as a company with a “turnstile” approach to booting apps from its store, unlike some other app stores I could mention. If anything, they’re a little too aggressive. As for “annoying” boxes for “just about every app on their phone”? I have 226 of them on mine. Here’s my list of apps that have permission to access contacts:
Slightly less than 226
The laughs don’t stop there. In his post, which I won’t link to for obvious reasons, Storms suggest a change to Apple’s dialog box to more accurately reflect the reality of what you’re allowing the app to do:
Is it OK for me to cry in front of you?
Good stuff, Drew. The more hyperbole you and your bloatware kin vomit from your caketraps, the more assured iPhone users can be that your wares are not required on Apple’s platform. Watch that you don’t hyperventilate from all that heavy sobbing.
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