If, like our phones, workstation software actually had to request specific access at install or use, then it would be much more dangerous if software that needed quite extensive access was exploited like this.

But we don't. Our workstations are actually fairly dumb in this regard. Why is that?

Note: Newer Windows an Mac systems might have this with their stores, I don't know. But a store isn't a requirement for this, so why have we had to wait so long?