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Comment by sneak | Hacker News Reader

The fact that Apple is still pretending that lack of sideloading is a consumer protection device is so despicable.

There are ways of squaring the circle. There are user experiences that can make even the dumbest user understand that they are taking the security of their device into their own hands.

Once they understand that, it isn’t up to Apple to decide for them that the iPhone that the user purchased must remain secure. Users must be permitted to make potentially dangerous choices with their own hardware if they so choose.

Mac users can disable system integrity protection and modify the OS or run unsigned apps (though the hoops to do this get more burdensome each OS release, and unsigned apps can’t use the secure enclave, or modern VPN apis, etc - another scumbag move by Apple) and the sky hasn’t fallen over there, nor in Europe where sideloading on iOS is mandated by law (and Apple implemented).

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The fact that they refer to it as "sideloading" rather than just "installing" is all I need to know about where their priorities lie. As long as they view installation of arbitrary programs by end users as being something deviant then I can correctly conclude that they do not view me as the owner of my own hardware, and therefore I won't be buying anything from them.

Louis Rossman was right.

On the last paragraph, while it should be possible to turn protections off I don’t think it should necessarily be convenient. If there’s no tradeoffs you end up with some number of users running unprotected for no good reason. The capability is there if one needs it, but it really should be a need that’s the motivation, and most users don’t actually have that.

Would it be ok if they said they won’t attempt any service or repair to a device in this mode without a full factory reset?

No, unless they can prove that the problem was caused by software.

How would you prove that? It seems like a nearly impossible burden.

If I want to see if a PC's unusual behavior is caused by hardware or software, I boot it from a USB stick with a known-good OS and some diagnostic tools on it. Phones could be designed so that such a thing is possible, though current phones mostly aren't.

But you could have a hardware problem (such as with the OS drive interface) that doesn’t show up with that sort of test, or a software-triggered problem that doesn’t go away easily (like a driver-caused hardware fault). It seems easier to just allow the warranty provider to perform whatever software changes they deem necessary, and leave the user to do what they want after it’s fixed.

> you could have a hardware problem (such as with the OS drive interface) that doesn’t show up with that sort of test

If the hardware is faulty, that sort of thing should show up on an automated test of the drive. In a professional setting, I'd expect this sort of thing to be run unattended: plug it in, turn it on, check back later to see if anything failed.

> a software-triggered problem that doesn’t go away easily

This sounds like re-image the OS territory. A user sophisticated enough to unlock and modify the OS is sophisticated enough to manage their own backups.

I seem to recall having to accept that loss of all data is a possibility when getting warranty service on laptops. That seems fair for phones too.

Of course they shouldn't wipe/reflash devices needlessly if a hardware problem is obviously the cause.

Do Windows repair shops refuse to work with computers where the user installed anything from outside the Microsoft Store?

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