[Openmcl-devel] Apple To Require Sandboxing For Mac App Store Apps - Slashdot

[Pascal Costanza]

On 6 Nov 2011, at 19:30, Scott L. Burson wrote:

> On Sun, Nov 6, 2011 at 1:21 AM, Pascal Costanza <pc at p-cos.net> wrote:
>> So what about XCode and Lion - they won't be sold via the appstore anymore?
>> 
>> [To be more precise: Will Apple play by the same rules they set for others?]
> 
> They've already sandboxed a bunch of their apps -- Safari, Preview,
> TextEdit, etc. -- which are of a kind as to be appropriate for
> sandboxing.
> 
> Not selling Lion itself in the App Store would miss the point, since
> this is the basis for the new security features.
> 
> I don't know about XCode.  Maybe they figure that if you're a
> developer, you're willing to take the risk that XCode will be
> compromised and damage your system somehow.  There's nothing new about
> this risk, after all.
> 
> I am not by any means an automatic apologist for Apple, but I do work
> in the application security business, and I think this is a good move.
> As Macs get more and more market share, they are becoming more
> attractive targets for malware.  If Apple can prevent the emergence of
> Mac botnets, they will have done the world a tremendous favor.


I agree that, from a security point of view, this is a good move. However, I hope that Apple sees a benefit in eating their own dog food, because I'm convinced that the result would be even better for everyone involved.


Pascal

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Pascal Costanza