Apple warns Australia against joining EU in mandating iPhone app sideloading

https://www.neowin.net/news/apple-warns-australia-against-joining-eu-in-mandating-iphone-app-sideloading/

56•bundie•13h ago

Comments

blitzar•12h ago

Or else what?

westmeal•12h ago

Tim apple will be very upset or something

svoit•12h ago

Are you another CBB listener in the wild by chance?

westmeal•12h ago

I don't know what CBB is sorry.

blitzar•11h ago

AI says "CBB listener" likely refers to someone who listens to the audio broadcast of Celebrity Big Brother.

1317•11h ago

from a quick google i think it's probably https://www.earwolf.com/show/comedy-bang-bang/

ref: https://www.reddit.com/r/comedybangbang/comments/ueshca/how_... https://www.avclub.com/and-now-scott-aukerman-and-ben-schwar...

wat10000•12h ago

Or else the policy will “bring increased privacy and security risks to users, opening the door for malware, fraud and scams; illicit and harmful content; and other threats.”

AstralStorm•11h ago

Yeah sure, most users do not sideload. It's mostly used to add extra stores too by power users, especially on Android, rather than loading random apps.

meepmorp•12h ago

I think the word "warn" is a bit of editorializing (by the Guardian, originally). They're just making the same argument in Australia that they did before the EU.

bamboozled•12h ago

The guardian loves hyperbole , I pay for it but they love publishing rot more often than I’d like to admit.

anotherhue•12h ago

Clearly they have never met an Australian.

mystraline•12h ago

Better yet, repeal DMCA 1201 and ALL associated other country equivalent 'anti-circumvention' laws.

AND ALSO force monopolies, like Apple, to open like the EU did.

bitpush•12h ago

> Apple warns Australia

Who the heck does Apple think they are?

Also, why doesnt Apple "warn" China for the well documented privacy/security implications in that country?

wyldberry•12h ago

Because China makes their stuff and they've invested billions in skilling up Chinese labor.

lazyeye•8h ago

Actually just "billions" is an understatement...

https://youtu.be/NAj9zB4vaZc

wat10000•12h ago

They are “warning” in the sense of describing what they claim will be negative outcomes from this. It’s not a threat. As for China, what would they say? “Your policy of surveillance and censorship puts users’ privacy and freedom at risk”? They know, that’s the whole point.

mmmlinux•8h ago

They could say "We're going to stop subsidizing the entire Chinese tech industry"

wat10000•8h ago

I'm confused. Are we in favor or against Apple trying to dictate laws in sovereign countries?

skyyler•8h ago

It depends on how much money we can make through exploitation of those laws, I think?

OsrsNeedsf2P•12h ago

They aren't warning Australia as a threat, they are making a very valid argument:

> Apple claims that allowing sideloading and alternative app stores effectively opens the door for malware, fraud, scams, and other harmful content.

You don't want random apps on your phone. The App Store vets apps thoroughly to ensure there's no malware. It would be virtually impossible to do the same for arbitrary apps getting side loaded.

kjkjadksj•11h ago

I want random apps on my phone. The computer has all these same risks yet the sky doesn’t fall.

bitpush•11h ago

This is the part I wish Apple apologists get. Your precious Macbook Pro allows arbitrary apps to be installed over internet, and that seems to be doing just OK.

Imustaskforhelp•11h ago

They think that every part of apple is fine.

But to be honest, I am in android and I have some deep criticisms of android too. Wish things were more linux like (ie. literally running pure linux in mobile phones), there is pinephone os but I kinda wish that it becomes mainstream enough

ccakes•9h ago

Not really. A random app I download from Github Releases can easily ship my ~/.ssh/id_rsa off to some server and I'd never be wiser. That's very hard to do on a phone.

They're not the same thing and treating them as if they are is somewhat naive.

protimewaster•9h ago

I think the point is that even that threat hasn't rendered MacBooks to be widely deemed insecure or untrustworthy. So, if the threat of similar insecurities were to show up on phones (which is debatable since AFAIK both iOS and Android have substantially different security models compared to traditional desktop OS apps), why would phones suffer a different fate than laptops or desktops?

tonyedgecombe•9h ago

Android offers that (for the moment).

unfitted2545•11h ago

If that's a concern, then download apps from the App Store. Just don't make it practically impossible to do anything else.

mcphage•11h ago

The worry (not sure it is merited) is that major app developers like Meta, Google, etc will start their own app stores, leading everyone to need to start downloading apps from outside Apple’s App Store.

someNameIG•7h ago

Which hasn't happened on Android, Meta is big enough to have their own app store yet all their apps are on Google Play.

cwillu•2h ago

Oh no, people will be able to choose who to trust on their devices, and then they might not choose apple! The horror!

bundie•1h ago

Lmao

exe34•11h ago

> You don't want random apps on your phone

No. Just the ones that I want are fine, thank you.

rpdillon•10h ago

A walled app store is neither necessary nor sufficient to prevent malware and scams. This is just Apple trotting out their usual arguments to try and stem the tide of countries that are mandating side-loading.

LocalH•9h ago

> The App Store vets apps thoroughly to ensure there's no malware.

nice joke

at best, that sentence needs to say "less malware"

regularjack•7h ago

I do want random apps on my phone. Even if I didn't, it's my phone, I call the shots.

victorbjorklund•5h ago

It works for the mac. Apple isnt varning us that macs are unsafe and dangerous.

ksec•5h ago

While this isn't exactly warning Australia as a threat as many comments have suggested. It wasn't long ago Apple actually warn that they might pull iPhone out those countries.

Their PR system aren't as good as it was and plenty of traces left on the internet.

ChrisArchitect•12h ago

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jun/06/australia...

amiga386•12h ago

I suspect Australians will probably want their government to follow Apple's advice. Their government is so incompetent, it lets private companies absolutely fuck over aussies and give them the full monkey's paw treatment, and government doesn't fix it.

Example: The 3G switch-off.

What was intended: As telcos switched off 3G, the government wanted to be sure this wouldn't affect people calling the 000 emergency number (equivalent of US 911)

How the government wrote it: they told telcos to block all phones that might fail to make a 4G/VoLTE emergency call

What happened next: telcos blocked millions of people. Even if you owned, e.g. a Sony Xperia which has no problem making 4G/VoLTE emergency calls... if you didn't buy it from Optus, then Optus can't guarantee compatibility, so they block you. Come back when you've bought the same phone from Optus! And if you want to take your Optus-approved phone to Telstra... oops! You have Optus's Xperia, not Telstra's Xperia, so they can't guarantee it'll work in an emergency, better block you to be safe, come back when you buy the phone from them as well.

https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/a...

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-11-03/brand-new-phones-unab...

Apple would love to run rings around such an incompetent government, and somehow get an even tighter monopoly than it already has.

bitpush•11h ago

If you dont like government policies, you vote them out not ask a trillion dollar company with little to no oversight to come and bulldoze them.

pjmlp•11h ago

Company CEOs have to learn that companies obey the laws of the countries they operate on, not the other way around.

ksec•5h ago

There was roughly 10 years of Apple thinking they are the law. Very unfortunate Apple didn't learn from its mistakes.

Pesthuf•11h ago

The entire EU is in flames ever since they allowed "sideloading". Every device is compromised, people are eating their children to survive.

This is what Apple and macrumors users actually believe.

lazyeye•8h ago

Apple would prefer that users are limited to only their scams.

solarkraft•2h ago

I’m concerned because I was close to suggesting that anything Apple is against must be good. But I like their stance on privacy. Them going so hard on making a point about being anti-consumer may harm future privacy efforts.

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