“Google and Facebook employees can once again use private iOS apps after Apple reinstated the necessary enterprise certificates,” Liam Tung reports for ZDNet. “[Apple] yesterday had yanked the certificates from both companies for misusing them to distribute data-gathering iOS apps to the public.”
“While Apple’s move blocked the two non-compliant research apps, it also blocked private iOS apps the companies had been legitimately using with employees,” Tung reports. “Google and Facebook on Thursday confirmed to the media that Apple had reinstated their certificates, clearing them to use internal iOS apps once again. ”
Tung reports, “Apple is now likely to crack down on misuse by other companies too.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Lessons learned at Facebook and Google? We wouldn’t bet on it.
Apple’s Developer Enterprise Program is, in part, intended to help developer’s distribute and securely host proprietary, in-house iOS, watchOS, and tvOS apps within their organization to employees’ devices.
More information here.
SEE ALSO:
Apple bans Google from test apps after it admits using ‘research’ app – January 31, 2019
Should Apple’s power over Facebook worry the rest of us – January 31, 2019
Big surprise: Google is also abusing Apple’s Enterprise Certificate system to collect extensive data on users – January 30, 2019
Apple blocks Facebook from running all of their internal iOS apps by revoking distribution certificate – January 30, 2019
Apple bans Facebook’s ‘research’ app that paid teens to install VPN that spies on them – January 30, 2019
Hidden documents reveal how Facebook made money by bamboozling children – January 18, 2019
Roger McNamee: I mentored Mark Zuckerberg. I loved Facebook. But I can’t stay silent about what’s happening. – January 17, 2019
Apple CEO Cook calls for U.S. Congress to pass comprehensive federal privacy legislation in TIME op-ed – January 17, 2019
Senator Marco Rubio introduces privacy bill to create federal regulations on data collection – January 16, 2019
Apple endorses comprehensive privacy legislation in U.S. Senate testimony – September 26, 2018
Trump administration working on federal data privacy policy – July 27, 2018
Interesting article, highly critical of Apple in regards to protecting privacy, now given that the suspension of private apps at Google was only a few days, I wonder then if the Atlantic article has some merit.
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/01/apples-hypocritical-defense-data-privacy/581680/
Well, at least booster seat boy learned what “by the short hairs” means.
They (Google, Facebook, Uber) will do it again…
In a sense it is to Apple’s benefit to reinstate certificates or risk loss of users that are used to services from Google/FB after finding the iOS version begins to severe lag in feature updates to their Android App counterparts. Perhaps another level of certificates might be worked out where Beta apps for usage research can be distributed to non-employee users that agree to the conditions of the Beta program.