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Comment by elchief | Hacker News Reader

We had one of these kinda bugs.

If you uninstalled our software it deleted a major chunk of your Windows registry, crippling your computer. It was a one character error in our script. The first ticket read "Uninstalling [Product] destroys your computer".

I was responsible for customer support. Good times! Was a rough week. We managed to not get sued.

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Pretty terrible that such a thing is even allowed by Windows. This is why as a user I like Apple's OS X sandbox.

If a software needs/has root rights, then all bets are off. This is true on any OS.

Similar things have happened on OS X: http://apple.slashdot.org/story/01/11/04/0412209/itunes-20-i...

Parent said "This is why as a user I like Apple's OS X sandbox.".

This is a bug from 15 years ago, much much before the sandbox feature was introduced.

A sandboxed iTunes would have prevented that.

A sandboxed iTunes would also prevent syncing your iPod and importing existing music collections, because those both require access to files outside the sandbox, which is probably why Apple hasn't done that.

Programs can read files outside their sandbox if they're asked to by user input[1]. Sandboxing does not prevent interaction with USB devices

[1] See "Powerbox and File System Access Outside of Your Container" at https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/Securi...

That doesn't mean iTunes can't work in a sandbox, it'd just need to request specific permissions.

A sandbox isn't a totally isolated prison. It's a permissions system. Programs can read specific files and folders outside the sandbox and can even ask the user add new files/folders to their whitelist.

About a year ago or so I tried to fix a computer of an OS X user where the Dropbox installer somehow deleted the home directory and replaced it with the dropbox application... That was an odd experience (and one where sandbox didn't help...)

Windows 8 introduced a sandbox and users hated it. (Probably because it also forced digital signatures but hey, specifics)

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