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Apple

iOS 17 To Support App Sideloading To Comply With European Regulations (macrumors.com) 157

Posted by msmash from the shape-of-things-to-come dept.
Apple in iOS 17 will for the first time allow iPhone users to download apps hosted outside of its official App Store, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. From a report: Otherwise known as sideloading, the change would allow customers to download apps without needing to use the App Store, which would mean developers wouldn't need to pay Apple's 15 to 30 percent fees. The European Union's Digital Markets Act (DMA), which went into effect on November 1, 2022, requires "gatekeeper" companies to open up their services and platforms to other companies and developers. The DMA will have a big impact on Apple's platforms, and it could result in Apple making major changes to the App Store, Messages, FaceTime, Siri, and more. Apple is planning to implement sideloading support to comply with the new European regulations by next year, according to Gurman.
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iOS 17 To Support App Sideloading To Comply With European Regulations More

iOS 17 To Support App Sideloading To Comply With European Regulations

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  • Wow (Score:2, Troll)

    by phantomfive ( 622387 )
    This is the reason I haven't bought an iPhone for 16 years. Maybe I'll actually buy one now.

    • Re: Wow (Score:4, Insightful)

      by ArmoredDragon ( 3450605 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @01:25PM (#63456696)

      Yeah, interest is piqued. Though you probably still need a mac to realistically do any development, which is lame.

      • Yeah, interest is piqued. Though you probably still need a mac to realistically do any development, which is lame.

        Considering you can get a M2 Mac mini for $600, I think you're a bit whiney.

    • Wow can you brag about not owning a television for 16 years!

      • Depends on if a monitor counts as a television or not.

  • Great news (Score:5, Insightful)

    by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @01:07PM (#63456624) Homepage Journal

    Hopefully this will open up new app stores and competition will drive down prices.

    Best of all we should get some decent browsers for iOS now.

    • Drive down from free?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        I've noticed that apps on iOS are sometimes priced higher than on Android.

        Actually the most annoying thing is having to buy twice, once for Android and once for iOS. Maybe not we can pay once for both.

      • What apps are people actually paying for? Games?

        • What apps are people actually paying for? Games?

          Sure, but not just games though.

          I've driven an all electric Nissan LEAF EV for nearly 10 years now and have been using Leaf Spy PRO [apple.com] for quite some time to monitor my battery usage and remaining range, it's far more accurate than the existing instrument cluster. While I have an iPhone and use the Apple app just fine, when my sister drives the car she uses an Android phone but doesn't drive it nearly as much as I do so it doesn't make sense for her to pay to use the app - but if we could sideload it from the

      • Free apps have alway not been worth the price. On any platform.

        That may be the one thing apple had over android. better games. Or maybe not I do not game on mobile (much), so shovelware may be as apparent on both these days. It seems a mobile thing.

        And had being much in the past. I will keep on android like everyubody in most countries in the world does. (unless a better choice comes along).

    • Re:Great news (Score:5, Insightful)

      by EvilSS ( 557649 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @01:52PM (#63456776)

      Hopefully this will open up new app stores and competition will drive down prices.

      It will open up the larger app companies (Google, MS, Amazon, Epic, EA, etc) to put their own app stores out, making their apps exclusive to those, and charge the same as they do now, because you didn't think they would give YOU a cut of THEIR savings, did you? You know how streaming went from basically everything on Netflix to every producer making their own service for their own content? Yea, it's going to be like that.

      • Only now, instead of the mere bread-and-circuses that is video streaming; all those dodgy, unvetted apps will have access to millions of peoples' banking and health data!

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        Well Fortnight at least has been arguing they want to not charge users the Apple Tax and will pass on the saving. Let's see if they stand by that.

      • You know how streaming went from basically everything on Netflix to every producer making their own service for their own content? Yea, it's going to be like that.

        No it won't. Quite critically we already have an open platform, one far more popular than iOS in terms of market share, and that platform hasn't become what you said either.

        The overwhelming supermajority of people do not stray from the walled garden.

    • How cheaper than "almost free" do you think paid apps can get?

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @01:19PM (#63456668)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

      Good question. I guess we'll find out when exact implementation of installing from outside the walled garden comes out.

    • This is a good question. It wouldn't surprise me if side-loaded apps are blocked from large chunks--possibly iCloud access, photos, etc.

      It would be nice to more easily install scummVM, but that's the only usage I'm particularly looking forward. I barely use any apps anymore.

      • I barely use any apps anymore.

        The browser is also an app. This means, finally, that iPhones an have a browser that isn't a privacy nightmare.

    • Entitlements are an important point.

      I can give you a parallel example. On an Amazon Fire tablet, you can switch into "kids mode", which is a locked down environment where the user can only use the apps 'granted' to them by their parent. This works great, and I'd recommend it to anyone with small kids.

      However, as kids get older, they want more things that you can't get on the Amazon app store (eg. the Fitbit app). "No problem, just side-load it!" - and sure, you can do that, BUT, in kids mode,side-loaded app

  • if i could bittorrent on my ipad i wouldnt need a laptop

  • Apple could just require the sideloaded app package format to be such that Apple can put the sideloaded apps into a common sandbox. The sideloaded for the apps can also be configured to run Apple’s verification tool over the packages and put a red border around questionable apps and post a warning saying the checks aren’t exhaustive or warranted complete but the app appears dubious.

    The iOS devices have been able to side load for quite some time. Using xCode and binary libraries or objects. Wri

  • Filesysem access? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fluffernutter ( 1411889 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @02:15PM (#63456838)
    I won't get an iPhone because I can't just plug the phone in and use it for storage. I wonder if this will change anything in that regard.

  • Sideloading Already Exists (Score:5, Informative)

    by flink ( 18449 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @02:22PM (#63456858)

    We already sideload our pre-release apps before they go up onto Test Flight. You just need to go through a couple of hoops to bless the developer certificate before iOS will trust an app downloaded from a website. It's not so different from the ritual you already have to go through on locked down configs of Windows or OSX with apps from "untrusted developers".

    I wonder if this goes beyond side loading as a one-off per-publisher thing and will allow the use of 3rd party app stores.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      I expect they'll just make it easier. To the rest of the world, including Slashdot, having to do more than click or drag and drop is "impossible."

    • It's not so different from the ritual you already have to go through on locked down configs of Windows or OSX with apps from "untrusted developers".

      Sorry but *horseshit*. Windows, OSX and Android give you a simple screen asking if you want to run an untrusted app. Even locked down Windows provide a simple toggle to disable the lockdown in security settings.

      They are nothing at all like the requirement for an Apple device to have to have developer mode enabled, and if you think enabling "Developer Mode" is in any way the same in the eyes of users as "Do you trust this app?" I really suggest you leave the office and go talk to a real person to get in touc

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by flink ( 18449 )

        You don't need developer mode. You download the app. It appears on your phone's home screen, but it will refuse to run out-of-the box. You go to Settings/General/Certificates and VPN, and an entry will appear there with phrasing like "Untrusted certificate from enterprise {DEVELOPER_NAME}". You click on that and say trust developer and the app will run.

        This sounds complicated, but it is almost the same set of steps you have to go through in OSX when running in secure mode - you attempt to open the app, g

        • Wow. You counter the fact that the process is more complicated than on OSX, Android and Windows by describing an EVEN MORE COMPLICATED process. *slow-condescending-clap*.

          OSX when running in secure mode

          Something you can turn off on OSX making your comparison to iOS irrelevant.

    • >"It's not so different from the ritual you already have to go through on"

      And let's compare that to Android. You turn on side loading in settings (after getting a sensible warning), and you load your OWN app by clicking on it. You don't need special software, credentials, certificates, approval, and/or blessings. Yes, there are risks. But THAT is at least some real amount of last-resort freedom.

      I predict this Apple implementation is going to be only available to "vetted" large interests. It won't be

  • Hmmm .. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SuperDre ( 982372 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @03:26PM (#63457010) Homepage
    So this DMA should also apply to Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo with their digital stores on their consoles ..

    • No. Why would it? Laws are more complicated than the silly titles they are given. If you actually read the law you'd immediately see that Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo do not meet the requirements of:

      (2)‘core platform service’ means any of the following:
      (a) online intermediation services;
      (b) online search engines;
      (c) online social networking services;
      (d) video-sharing platform services;
      (e) number-independent interpersonal communications services;
      (f) operating systems;
      (g) web browsers;
      (h) virtual

      • I'm somehow not understanding what keeps "(f) operating systems" from covering the system software of a video game console. Xbox One runs Windows XB, PlayStation 4 runs Orbis OS, and Nintendo Switch runs Horizon OS.

    • If it does apply to them, then that would only be a good thing. The consoles are far too locked down.

  • This is a terrible idea for most users (Score:3, Insightful)

    by HnT ( 306652 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @03:47PM (#63457046)

    Just another incredibly stupid move by the EU cronies. This is a terrible idea for most users who have exactly zero idea about privacy and security anyway.
    Walled garden or not, for the average user this protection and forced code review was a very good thing.
    Poking holes into it will open the floodgates to even more hacked devices and botnet zombies.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by thegarbz ( 1787294 )

      Just another incredibly stupid move by the EU cronies. This is a terrible idea for most users who have exactly zero idea about privacy and security anyway.

      A user who has installed nothing but apps from an app store will continue to install nothing but apps from an app store. We have an alternate platform which has allowed sideloading since the beginning, and its users are doing perfectly fine.

      • Just another incredibly stupid move by the EU cronies. This is a terrible idea for most users who have exactly zero idea about privacy and security anyway.

        A user who has installed nothing but apps from an app store will continue to install nothing but apps from an app store. We have an alternate platform which has allowed sideloading since the beginning, and its users are doing perfectly fine.

        Great!

        So keep your Alternate Platform; but leave mine the FUCK ALONE!

    • Yeh humans need benevolent dictators to protect us. Problem is they don't stay that way for long. Remember Google's "Don't be evil"
    • Seems to me you're the one with zero ideas of privacy and security. Tons of malware have made it onto iOS devices pretty easily, and Apple sells your information just like google does (the are an ad service; just because they stopped calling it iads doesn't mean they stopped). There are already tons of holes in the ship, you're just closing your eyes to them.

    • The old crony seems to be you! As for cronyism, that's America's main feature. The EU on the other hand actually works for free competition and properly functioning markets! Americans talk a lot of about freedom, but they don't seem to recognize it.

  • From my perspective, this is a blow to enterprise security.

    The BYOD mechanism relies, of course, on measures like encrypted containers to keep our corporate data safe. However, like all of security it is a multilayered, defense in depth model, and one of those layers is Apple doing a reasonably strong level of QA and security checks before publishing to the App Store.

    Now we donâ(TM)t have that last step anymore, and some of our users will certainly download things they shouldnâ(TM)t. Itâ(TM)s

    • If you're worried about enterprise security, why are you allowing sideloading? They're not the user's devices - it's a corporate device. Also HAHAHAHAHA about the QA checks. Tethering apps made it through, malware makes it through, white hat hackers easily make it through. That you say that with a straight face means you can't see the truth.

  • "could result in Apple making major changes to the App Store, Messages, FaceTime, Siri, and more"

    I doubt they'd open any of those up because they're afraid. The'll do it when they're forced/regulated into it.

    • "could result in Apple making major changes to the App Store, Messages, FaceTime, Siri, and more"

      I doubt they'd open any of those up because they're afraid. The'll do it when they're forced/regulated into it.

      They can't open up FaceTime. Or did you forget?

  • Considering that most smartphone users use their phones as a Digital Wallet, I can see nothing but a serious erosion of security across not only iOS; but every Apple subplatform.

    A sad day for Apple Users.

    Thanks for nothing, EU Petty Dictators. Thanks for removing Billions of Apple Users' Choice!

    BTW, did anyone bother to ask Us?

    Didn't think so.

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