The 2021 Web Summit was held in Lisbon, Portugal, and as part of the various talks, Apple took place with the presence of Craig Federighi, the company’s senior vice president of software. Federighi has talked about different aspects of Apple software but has mainly focused on iOS. And in fact, has focused his talk on the security of the iPhone operating system.
Federighi has highlighted different aspects of iOS security but has placed special emphasis on the request by the European Union, through the Digital Markets Act of December 2020, to allow the download and installation of apps on iOS to through sources other than those designated by the owner of the platform. That is Europe wants Apple to allow apps to be loaded on the iPhone without going through the App Store, and Apple has charged against sideloading.
The sideloading it’s a bug for apple
During his stay on the scene, Federighi has talked about why allowing the loading of apps on the iPhone (and in general on any operating system) is an error that puts your safety at risk in many ways. Apple’s senior vice president of software has indicated that bypassing the protections of the App Store is a mistake and has even given some information about Android.
Without mentioning them, and referring to them as “another mobile platform”, Federighi has indicated that 5 million attacks on Apple customers have been detected in just one month, from software and devices in an Android environment. According to Federighi, the fact of “giving the user more options […] I would withdraw the choice of a more secure and private device. “
The only reason [del reducido número de ataques en iOS] is that the rest of the platforms allow sideloading. On the iPhone, sideloading would mean downloading software directly from the open internet or from a third-party store, bypassing the protections of the App Store.
We have talked about the pillars that protect customers on the iPhone. With sideloading, those successive protections are undone. There is no human review of apps and no single point of distribution for apps loaded via sideloading. The floodgates are open for malware attacks. And we are not the only ones who believe that this is risky.
Thus, it does not seem that Apple intends to support the request of the European Union about the possibility of installing apps on the iPhone that are not present in the App Store. With the security control that Apple has of all its contents. We’ll see what happens in the future, but the company keeps making it clear over and over again that his way of viewing iOS is the safest for users.
Via | Lecture by Craig Federighi at the Web Summit 2021