You can, but users need to right-click and click “open” the first time they open the app.

You can build and distribute them, but it's very ugly. When a person first tries to open your unsigned and unnotarized application, they get a big warning that the app cannot be opened. They need to actively whitelist it by going to the system settings or by right-clicking the application bundle and selecting "Open" from the menu. And the warning that it gives to users is such that your average user won't even have any idea that whitelisting is an option.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202491

While the process is fairly simple, it basically excludes all normal people from using your application if you don't sign them. So any application that wants to distribute outside macOS experts needs to get their application signed and notarized.

you could put a note in the dmg (drag app to apps folder screen) that says to right click->open when opening for the first time

Technically you can, but if you do, Apple will lie to everyone who tries to use your app by telling them that it's dangerous and probably contains malware, and will make them jump through a bunch of hoops and try to talk them out of it at every step before they can actually run it.

I don't like the $99 fee either, but to be fair, Apple will tell you that they can't tell if the app is dangerous. Not that it is dangerous. Specifically, they will tell you that the app Cannot Be Opened Because the Developer Cannot be Verified

You can of course open it the app anyway by disregarding this protection for the specific app in settings.

> Apple will tell you that they can't tell if the app is dangerous. Not that it is dangerous. Specifically, they will tell you that the app Cannot Be Opened Because the Developer Cannot be Verified

Okay, how about this? They're trying their hardest to give everyone the impression that it's dangerous without explicitly saying so.

But it is dangerous by definition. Run unknown binary is dangerous. I wish macos had an easy way to sandbox apps.

> But it is dangerous by definition. Run unknown binary is dangerous.

Making Apple $99 richer doesn't make your app any less dangerous.

It makes random apps much less likely to be dangerous.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36086537 is an analogous case. When the primary provider of free domains names went away, there was a HUGE reduction in phishing websites. Those types would spin up thouands of sites on xyz, vip and similar TLDs faster than the white hats could whackamole them.

A domain going from $0 to $10 vastly curtailed that activity. You don't have to make something impossible, you just have to make it not cost effective to shot gun it.

>It makes random apps much less likely to be dangerous.

Only because Apple has made it so.

What would be the drawback if I, a macOS developer not paying Apple $99 per year, had access to the macOS application notarization service for free?

You aren’t the center of other people’s lives. How is any old arbitrary user to know you’re not a con of a dev?

Software sales are contrived fiat exchange to give your code access to my hardware and userspace. Who the f are you?

> You aren’t the center of other people’s lives

And Apple is?

Is Apple some immutable scientific center of reality? No. But neither are you. It’s not a question of Apple is or isn’t but a statement “you are not”.

Apple suddenly vanishing would actually have a much more dramatic effect on millions than 1,000 random open source freelancers vanishing.

Having "skin in the game" is a way to keep a community honest. Even darknet markets use bonding for vendors. Not to mention that in the case of Apple registration, it leaves a paper trail. Though I'd agree that the $99 for the privilege seems arbitrary.

The $99 buys a certificate that Apple can revoke if (for example) you were using it to sign malware. The revocation of your certificate would prevent your malware from running on any Mac connected to the internet [0].

To me at least, that feels materially less dangerous to run than an unsigned app. Whether or not the system is effective, or if that's worth the $99 is obviously up for debate.

[0] https://eclecticlight.co/2020/10/28/code-signatures-1-how-th... (Search for CSSMERR_TP_CERT_REVOKED)

- AppStore apps must be sandboxed.

- AppStore apps are reviewed by Apple.

- Apple can ban malicious app in AppStore.

- Apple checks binaries when you run them even they aren't from AppStore due to notarization.

I don't mind the pop up except for, I wish they had a way built in where it doesn't do it for like a special list of apps. Apps I am thinking of would be like GIMP or VLC. Well known open source projects that have been around a long time.

The message (before first run only) just says the software "can’t be opened because Apple cannot check it for malicious software." and "This software needs to be updated. Contact the developer for more information."

Anyway, it's only hard to run if you have no idea what you're doing... pretty much the same people who should not be running executables randomly downloaded from the internet are the ones blocked by hurdles like this.

"This software needs to be updated" is an outright lie.

No it’s not. It needs to be updated in order for it to run without that warning.

If the user has permission to disable the warning, they can, otherwise the app needs to be updated.

Well, no, because the latest version of a lot of software will still produce the warning since the developer refuses to pay the Apple extortion fee.

Yeah, all Apple users know that "this software needs to be updated" means "the software itself is fine, the developer just needs to pay us money". It's obvious, not misleading or an attempt to create FUD at all.

Why doesn't Apple say what you said? "The software itself might or might not be fine, the developer just needs to pay us money"? Because then their extortion racket would be laid bare to consumers.

Open source and not-for-profit software has been put at a disadvantage here, which I think is very bad for several reasons.

I think you know that downloading an unsigned binary from the internet and executing it on your personal machine is utter stupidity from a security point of view.

Certainly, yes.

However, there is a space of potential solutions to this problem, many of which don't involve giving Apple money.

Somehow Apple chose a solution which would involve developers giving Apple what is for many people and open source projects a significant sum of money.

Then, Apple decided to not directly tell Apple users that the thing standing between them and the software they downloaded is that Apple believes the developer needs to give Apple money.

What a fascinating turn of events.

> Somehow Apple chose a solution which would involve developers giving Apple what is for many people and open source projects a significant sum of money.

Perhaps if the open source community had provided a solution that actually served the needs of end users in this regard, Apple could have adopted it.

> Then, Apple decided to not directly tell Apple users that the thing standing between them and the software they downloaded is that Apple believes the developer needs to give Apple money.

You’ve admitted that they are solving a real problem, therefore this is not an honest representation of what is going on.

Sounds like a racket. MSFT does the same with SmartScreen, regardless whether your executables are benign or not, unless you pay them (or a third party) for a signing cert.

Oh goodness. I get this crap all the time at work.

Apparently Adobe Acrobat isn't a commonly downloaded application. Somehow I fail to believe that...

The result? Everybody ignores SmartScreen warnings now...

The last time I've seen it SmartScreen did not make the option to continue completely undiscoverable though.

Yep, AAPL has a $2.8 trillion market cap because of all the $99 fees they charge developers.

> make them jump through a bunch of hoops and try to talk them out of it at every step before they can actually run it.

Right click --> open --> open. 3 clicks is not "a bunch of hoops".

It's 3 clicks if you know how to do it, which they go out of their way to not tell you in the error you get when you try to run it like any other program.

If they told you how to do it, then what would even be the point? The whole idea is to add a stumbling block in the path of malware authors getting users to run a trojan.

Anything the user learns to do by rote without first understanding the security implications provides zero security. Like the Windows Vista elevation prompt — users just learned to hit "Yes" and got infected anyway.

> If they told you how to do it, then what would even be the point?

To warn a user.

And what would be the point of doing that? You have to have some behavioral outcome you expect.

Do you expect people to react by not running the program? Why? If you find out that they are in fact still running the program just as much with the warning in place, because they aren't reading the warning... then have you actually "warned the user"?

Users don't know that, though. macOS treats the app that they want to use like they're radioactive and don't work, and doesn't give them the explicit option of running what they want anyway. They have to know some magic ritual to open it.

Never used a mac, but I assume that is only for installing from the store, correct? If I publish an open source program that one installs with `brew install` or whatever it's called none of this applies?

yes and no. you can't sign your app with a certificate so if you want to have a frictionless install you have to pay. (the friction is having to explain that you have to press ctrl while clicking and then click open and then click trust this app) command line utilities don't have this friction and brew mainly installs command line utilities (though there are app binaries distributed through a separate brew thing... keg or cask or cellar or something like that)

traditionally you would need to pay the 99 bucks to install a binary on your ipad or iphone or iwatch. those need to have the certificate signed by apple to run on the phone for general security reasons so some website couldn't sideload an app. now you can do all of that without paying the 99 bucks... but if you wanted to sell it on the app store or distribute it for external testing you still need to pay.

> general security reasons

Cash cow reasons*. The system is designed to be secure even against signed apps.

Yes, all of it is open for development. The only thing about mac is that, if you want to distribute apps via the web, you'll need to instruct the user to bypass the code signing requirement by right-clicking on the app or DMG and clicking open from there. Getting a Developer ID code signing certificate is only available with a paid developer account.

> Never used a mac, but I assume that is only for installing from the store, correct?

Incorrect, and why would you try to answer someone's question when you admittedly have no knowledge of the situation?

Most macOS apps don't go the App Store route, but user have to manually click a checkbox in system preference to say "I allow app from any developer", it is an issue distributing to people who doesn't know a lot about software

> user have to manually click a checkbox in system preference to say "I allow app from any developer"

The "Anywhere" option no longer exists in System Preferences/Settings: https://support.apple.com/HT202491

It was removed in macOS Sierra.

Oh right, you need to run sudo spctl --master-disable in order to have that option