“Lately I’ve heard a lot on technical podcasts about the public outrage over “Microsoft Genuine Advantage” and the fact that it ‘phones home’ every day,” Daniel Jalkut reports for Red Sweater Blog.
“Apple released Mac OS X 10.4.7 last week, and ever since I installed it, I’ve been noticing Apple’s own modest home phoning behavior. In this case it’s ostensibly to provide users with the opportunity to check whether the Dashboard Widgets you download are identical to ones featured on Apple’s site. Sort of a security debriefing, I guess,” Jalkut reports.
From the 10.4.7 release notes:
You can now verify whether or not a Dashboard widget you downloaded is the same version as a widget featured on (http://www.apple.com) before installing it.
Jalkut writes, “The problem is this feature popped up without my permission, and there’s no obvious way for me to turn it off… I can’t see that anything at all is being sent back to Apple, but that’s sort of not the point. The mere act of “checking in” lets Apple know that I’m here and I’m running 10.4.7. They didn’t ask my permission to start making this regular checkin, and I’m not even sure what benefit I’m going to be getting out of allowing it.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Shades of the iTunes ‘MiniStore’ brouhaha (please see related articles below). Apple should ask permission first, explain what they are doing, and give users the option to turn the “feature” off if so desired.
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Related articles:
Apple’s iTunes MiniStore now asks for permission before operating – January 18, 2006
Critics say Apple snooping on users via new ITunes ‘MiniStore’ feature – January 13, 2006
Download LittleSnitch. It caught the offending Dashboard “phone home.”
OH NOES!!!111!! WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE!1!1!1
APPLE PH0NEZ H0M3 ABOUT WIDGETZ!!11!11!
Do people have software update basically do the same thing? There should be some user control over this, but is it really a bigt deal?
Apparently I was one of the first to have the Windows crap tell me I had a fake copy of Windows (I didn’t– my laptop’s clock was incorrect. Don’t get me started about how stupid…) Anyway, not even the M$ reps at my university knew what was going on. My computer was entirely legit, but it was trying to get me to pay money or I would receive any further updates. THAT is a very different than what’s going on here.
I have yet to see a widget open by itself and attempt to extort me for money because it’s too dumb to tell the time.
ive not tried it yet but here is how to turn it off:
http://blog.wired.com/cultofmac/index.blog?entry_id=1515043
Yeah, I agree. Phoning home is the issue, not whether data is sent or not. Apple has been getting off the path of respecting its customers lately, and this is another example. This should be an option that the users can turn on or off and it should be off by default.
MDN word: freedom
Did anyone see that movie where the little brown creature used a Speak & Spell to phone home? That was a lot more disturbing than this story.
i tried little snitch and it seems pretty good, but it makes me think that someday it’s gonna go off so frequently that ill want to pull the ethernet cord from the wall screaming.
i’ve tried it, it works no mo’ worries. it goes to show the mac community is quick to respond. Thanks all.
The fact that it phones home does not concern me. The fact that the Department Of Homeland Security, the FBI and the CIA are keeping a log of every computer that phones home – that concerns me!
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fskin chumps…
get a grip, it’s only the widgets… updating important stuff like currency rates ect!
Jimbo, what the hell are you talking about?
Unfortunately, 10.3.9 is probably the last ‘truly secure’ OS Apple made. Although Spotlight and Widgets do increase productivity, they greatly increase the chance for wrongdoing. Spotlight makes its very simple to flag your computer based on the keywords in its compiled database, and Widgets allow people to have 100x more 3rd party software on their system than ever before. Its all theoretical, but the possibilities means Apple must stay on top of it to remain secure. Now a blatantly insecure OS like Windows implementing these same ‘features’ means . . .
Sorry Thorin, the heavy drinking on July 4 still has my head spinning. I was making a li’l joke about phones and monitoring. Thought you might catch the little winking dude at the end of my message.
Wigets are very powerful. Some can have root access and as a result they are a potential source of malware entry.
I would think it would be in everyone’s interest to be running the latest, most secure version of each widget.
Anyone offended by this ‘phoning home’ behavior is just looking for something to complain about. Do you use Software Update? If so, Apple already knows far more about your computer than any Widget version check would tell them.
The MacOS has no license key, so even if you didn’t pay for your upgrade to Tiger (which is NOT free, unless your Mac came with it pre-installed) Apple has no way of knowing.
Sorry, my bad. I was starting to think that you were a whackjob conspiracy theorist for a minute. Have a good day all!
Bill, I agree that they have nothing to worry about. I think that the big bitch is that A) Apple didn’t really tell anyone that this was going to be a new “feature”, and B) Apple has not provided an easy way for the average user to stop the phoning home. They should have learned their lesson from the iTunes incident, and from recent incidents involving Microsoft Windows phoning home and made this optional.
Won’t use Dashboard. Little Snitch won’t warn when a widget is phoning home because net widgets need permission to go online anyway, so redirects to a basement in Russia go unnoticed. I’ve zip-archived Dashboard. No auto checks with Software Update, either, not the least because I have too many mods I must return to spy mode before it runs.
Just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get me.
Slightly different take on “Apple should have told us …” – Apple has been “secure by default” in the past, relying on “user choice” to open up ports and the like. Here, they should have popped up a message stating WHY they want to have our Mac “phone home” and click the button to allow or dis-allow it. Fully informed. Choice. No fuss.
You guys understand this is not Apple checking up on you right? Your mac isn’t sending apple vital data about your system. What this FEATURE does is check your widgets against those at Apple.com. Should it find a difference, you know that there is either an update, or it could determine that the widget is a malicious program and alert the user. All that apple gets to see is a hit from 10.4.7. So apple gets to see how many 10.4.7 users there are(without knowing who or where they are) and the user gets a more updated and fully secure system. This is a great feature to have. I wish every program on my mac checked for upgrades.
MDN: Apple should ask permission first, explain what they are doing, and give users the option to turn the “feature” off if so desired.
I agree 100%, but since 10.4.5 the Dock has been contacting Apple and nobody said BOO!!
There are other Apple programs that “call home” too. Once you install Little Snitch and tighten up from the default settings, you’ll see the ugly truth.
And that’s nothing compared to the secret things going on in EFI based Mac’s and PC’s.
EFI can contact the internet and download even without the OS even knowing about it!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extensible_Firmware_Interface
Welcome to TRUSTED COMPUTING, your machine is not yours anymore!
I just noticed that Mail sent a message “Registering .Mac Server Prefs” or something similar.
Funny, but I don’t even use .Mac.
It leaves one wondering…
I really don’t see how a simple update program makes this a big deal, but whatever. Now if it takes inventory of your whole system and uploads your documents then I would be upset about it. But I believe this works the same as software update and I see nothing here to get all excited about. Microsoft is a different story all together. What they do is claim legally bought software is pirated and then limit you from updating your system until you talk to there mafia. That is unexceptable!
Agree with MDN’s take. It’s nice to see this site actually disagree with Apple once in a while. I guess they only go into rabid fanboy mode when an outsider criticizes Cupertino…
Help Viewer phones home, Software Update phones home, iPhoto phones home, Pages phones home, iWeb phones home, Keynote phones home, Dashboard phones home, etc. They’re only checking for new versions/new info. So what? Are you going to be completely isolated in your own little Mac world? These programs do it, and don’t warn you about it before they do it. Some even politely let you turn off the feature. We’re not talking malware here. We’re talking programs you actually use day in day out FFS.