> From a system design perspective, I believe User-Selected / User-Approved feature is one of the most powerful functions on Mac
Most people using computers and phones do not want to deal with ACLs or permissions or anything like that, instead they either want it to magically work (which is a bad idea since there is no implementation of that idea that is also secure), or they accept a system that will ask them based on their intent.
If we can figure out if something was intended (The 'User-Selected / User-Approved' part), we're going to have a much better time creating systems that make security acceptable and applicable for mass market users. It still won't be perfect, and you'll still have things like social engineering or simply ticking users into believing they want to do something, but at least the primary reasoning will exclude processes sneaking in all sorts of activity that is supposed to be based on what the user wants (mostly... different people want different things and you'll find incompatible needs on the outer edges of the spectrum).
Asking someone 10 times to approve full disk access for some random binary name that doesn't ring a bell isn't useful (as it doesn't really resonate with a normal user's intent). But asking if "Chat App" should be allowed to "Manage your payment cards" is something people can get pretty decent opinion on.
> Asking someone 10 times to approve full disk access for some random binary name that doesn't ring a bell isn't useful (as it doesn't really resonate with a normal user's intent)
It's also super great when these dialogs randomly appear out of the blue without you doing anything obviously related to whatever is being asked.
Talking about random names. I really hate when binaries named by what seems like smashing some keys randomly are running on computers and it is OK. At least Microsoft, Dell, HP, Lenovo and Realtek are guilty of that.
And particularly often while you’re typing, hitting the spacebar or return to confirm whatever pops up, only to make you perplexed and try to recollect those few milliseconds you believe to have managed to see the name to try to find out what you’ve just been made to approve or decline.
> From a system design perspective, I believe User-Selected / User-Approved feature is one of the most powerful functions on Mac
Most people using computers and phones do not want to deal with ACLs or permissions or anything like that, instead they either want it to magically work (which is a bad idea since there is no implementation of that idea that is also secure), or they accept a system that will ask them based on their intent.
If we can figure out if something was intended (The 'User-Selected / User-Approved' part), we're going to have a much better time creating systems that make security acceptable and applicable for mass market users. It still won't be perfect, and you'll still have things like social engineering or simply ticking users into believing they want to do something, but at least the primary reasoning will exclude processes sneaking in all sorts of activity that is supposed to be based on what the user wants (mostly... different people want different things and you'll find incompatible needs on the outer edges of the spectrum).
Asking someone 10 times to approve full disk access for some random binary name that doesn't ring a bell isn't useful (as it doesn't really resonate with a normal user's intent). But asking if "Chat App" should be allowed to "Manage your payment cards" is something people can get pretty decent opinion on.
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