What exactly is the blame of Android? That it allows the app to read photos when user allows it to read photo files?
Because this criminal behaviour is also present in Linux, Windows and macOS.
Or the fact that an app can write a file to disk? And then another app can open the file? Also criminal behaviour present in other operating systems. Some users might even call it a feature and do the unthinkable - share files between applications! Horrible!
Seriously, you're blaming the OS because it allows you to run useful software on it, just like a desktop computer. If you want a jailed down device, it's fine: buy Apple. But that doesn't mean every pocket computer needs to be a crippled device.
> Seriously, you're blaming the OS because it allows you to run useful software on it, just like a desktop computer.
Unlike a desktop computer Android prevents you from taking steps to protect yourself. Without rooting your phone you can't even install firewalls or prevent applications from ever connecting to the outside world. Google designed their OS to collect and leak your data. It's why their permissions system (even when working as designed) is garbage. Google doesn't want you to have the ability to protect yourself. It assumes responsibility and lets you (sometimes) disable some permissions from some apps (but not others) at their discretion. No one does that on my desktop computers. Most people's phones are filled with apps they don't want but aren't even allowed to uninstall.
It looks like netguard is a VPN service, not a true firewall. A firewall on my desktop doesn't require me to route all my traffic through a VPN. Netguard also injects ads in your traffic (or at least did) https://imgur.com/a/2YG7Q
Netguard is open source (with a license not supported on iOS: https://github.com/M66B/NetGuard), so there is no reason to use a build that shows ads. Alternatively, as I said earlier, there are multiple firewall apps you could use that don't require root.
The weird thing is that you went out of your way to research to find a misleading quote when the page itself points out why the quote is misleading and that the app is open source (negating your ads claim earlier).
It has to route traffic through a local VPN to drop the traffic. Doesn't play well with other VPNs for this reason. Real firewalls need root. The VPN trick is a hack to get around that while still providing some of that functionality. Yes, you could edit the source code and compile it yourself every time it updates to remove the ads, but I think that's a little much to expect.
Ultimately this is functionality users should have access to by default without needing to resort to hacks and ad-filled workarounds.
Android: without rooting your phone, I keep writing this on HN :) it is called "NoRoot Firewall". Free app, it creates a VPN within your phone and asks you for every ip:port to allow/block and one can also use rules such as Block 111.111.., port: 123. Worth checking out. I have e.g. a chess app, I keep it block all IPs/Ports. I never have to worry for tracking, spying, ads, etc.
I would not consider my iPhone to be a crippled device.
Just because these issues exist on a traditional computing device, does not mean we should continue that trend when a new type of platform exists (mobile).
Plus, many of us likely have much more personal data on our phones that we ever had on our computers, especially location data for where you are all the time.
This is absolutely a failure of the OS, but if you choose to accept that fine. But the issue is for those that are not in the tech community and don't realize there data is being mined when they specially chose the option to deny it.
I expect my devices to uphold the security model they advertise.
My desktop OS (macOS, for what it matters) doesn't ask me to approve permissions for apps, so I assume that anything I install has whatever privileges I have (or root privileges, given the broken must-install-as-root behaviour of many of them).
On the other hand, for example, Firefox asks my permission before allowing sites to use the microphone or camera, and I expect it to enforce that. If sites can get access to my microphone or camera without my giving them permission, then Firefox has failed, even if those sites have got that access through unexpected means.
I agree it's very hard to have a secure but useable general-purpose system—but pretending that you're offering such a system while not actually having the appropriate mechanisms to enforce it is, arguably, an even worse solution than offering an utterly locked-down system.
Just as an added point for my claim that this position is not hypocritical, I consider https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20387298 to be a flaw in the macOS security model, for which the OS deserves blame, and not just an instance of poor app design (although it is clearly that).
Here's a simple experiment. On a Linux box, open your GUI text editor. Try to open /var/log/syslog. You will see "Permission denied". That's because only apps with root can access /var/*.
> I assume that anything I install has whatever privileges I have (or root privileges, given the broken must-install-as-root behaviour of many of them).
My point is that Linux apps don't have general root rights. Even though you must install them as root. That is, unless you start them as root. So an app can't just decide to access and change some other app's settings.
> My point is that Linux apps don't have general root rights. Even though you must install them as root. That is, unless you start them as root.
I'm running macOS, so this isn't directly relevant; I don't know much about Linux apps, but macOS ones often do some skulduggery—for example, Dropbox uses its root installation privileges to make some very hard-to-eradicate startup items (https://applehelpwriter.com/2016/08/29/discovering-how-dropb...). Nonetheless, you are right that I was confusing "installed as root" with "has root privileges".
> So an app can't just decide to access and change some other app's settings.
Because this criminal behaviour is also present in Linux, Windows and macOS.
Or the fact that an app can write a file to disk? And then another app can open the file? Also criminal behaviour present in other operating systems. Some users might even call it a feature and do the unthinkable - share files between applications! Horrible!
Seriously, you're blaming the OS because it allows you to run useful software on it, just like a desktop computer. If you want a jailed down device, it's fine: buy Apple. But that doesn't mean every pocket computer needs to be a crippled device.