[HN Gopher] Updating from macOS Ventura to Sonoma Silently Enabl...
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       Updating from macOS Ventura to Sonoma Silently Enables iCloud
       Keychain
        
       Author : frizlab
       Score  : 52 points
       Date   : 2024-05-19 19:44 UTC (3 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (lapcatsoftware.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (lapcatsoftware.com)
        
       | saurik wrote:
       | This isn't the first time, nor will it be the last: the only
       | reason I'm actually using iCloud Keychain is because, despite
       | always turning it off and feeling like I needed to keep doing it
       | over and over again every time I got a new device, one day I was
       | in a discussion with someone about it and I went to show them how
       | I turn off most of the iCloud features, and I discovered I had
       | actually failed and now had already been using iCloud Keychain
       | and so all my passwords were already in it.
        
         | tailspin2019 wrote:
         | I had the exact same experience with iCloud Drive (or whatever
         | it is/was called) years ago. I kept turning it off and never
         | agreed to use it and one day discovered it was on anyway and a
         | bunch of my stuff was already in the cloud.
         | 
         | Pretty egregious behaviour.
        
       | plorkyeran wrote:
       | Isn't the workaround here to back up your keychain file, remove
       | your passwords from the keychain, update to Sonoma, disable
       | iCloud keychain, then import the backup? Not a trivial process,
       | but should be easier than the author's attempted workaround of
       | disabling SIP and installing while offline.
       | 
       | Long term I suspect the actual answer will be that if you don't
       | want to use iCloud Keychain then you just can't use the keychain
       | at all, which is a shame as it once was one of the good parts of
       | macOS.
        
         | lapcat wrote:
         | > should be easier than the author's attempted workaround of
         | disabling SIP and installing while offline
         | 
         | Disabling SIP wasn't an issue, because I had already done it to
         | eliminate slow app launches:
         | https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2024/2/3.html
         | 
         | On my second attempt, I managed to update without an internet
         | connection. See the new addendum to the article.
        
       | nhod wrote:
       | i understand and agree that this should at the very least have an
       | opt-in dialog box.
       | 
       | that said, apple did add the option for end-to-end encrypted
       | "advanced data protection" for the majority of icloud data a year
       | or so ago.
       | 
       | perhaps they also enabled it by default in sonoma?
       | 
       | https://support.apple.com/en-us/108756
        
         | lapcat wrote:
         | > perhaps they also enabled it by default in sonoma?
         | 
         | No, they didn't.
         | 
         | Anyway, iCloud Keychain has always been end to end encrypted.
        
           | TillE wrote:
           | Right, it's obviously end-to-end encrypted because if it
           | weren't, everyone would have been screaming for years about
           | how horrendously insecure it was.
           | 
           | iCloud Keychain is fine, just use a good password. There's no
           | particular harm in letting Apple store an encrypted blob for
           | you on its servers.
        
           | SpikeDad wrote:
           | And only enabled if 2FA is enabled. It won't work without (as
           | won't many Apple services).
        
         | CharlesW wrote:
         | Even with so-called standard data protection, iCloud Keychain
         | passwords are always end-to-end encrypted, and Apple cannot
         | decrypt them.
         | 
         | "For additional privacy and security, 15 data categories --
         | including Health and passwords in iCloud Keychain -- are end-
         | to-end encrypted. Apple doesn't have the encryption keys for
         | these categories, and we can't help you recover this data if
         | you lose access to your account."
         | 
         | https://support.apple.com/en-us/102651
        
       | throw20240511 wrote:
       | Gah, I didn't realize that iCloud Keychain was enabled
       | automatically on ios17. I checked and it's been on for months.
       | Why would they do this?
       | 
       | I remember when Microsoft uploaded people's personal wifi creds
       | in Windows 10. It's all highly suspect.
       | 
       | Stop it. This over sharing by default will doom us all.
        
         | ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
         | Actually, I figured it out, when an app I wrote, that uses the
         | keychain, started allowing me to log into the app, using Sign
         | in with Apple (which has some stuff that is only available when
         | the login is set up), on devices that were not the ones that I
         | set up.
         | 
         | In my case, I liked that, and so will my users.
         | 
         | But I do think that it could be problematic, if this means that
         | authorities could now get ahold of your keychain, when having
         | it restricted to a single device, avoids that.
        
       | LeoPanthera wrote:
       | Presumably, only if you already have an iCloud account, and are
       | signed in?
        
       | wila wrote:
       | I had to blink twice last time when I installed Sonoma on a new
       | partition that I did not have to provide a wifi password. This
       | appears to confirm that. While I can understand that some people
       | would appreciate this, I'm not exactly chuffed by a fresh install
       | silently grabbing passwords from an old install.
        
         | LeoPanthera wrote:
         | That is not related. Mac computers store the last successful
         | wifi credentials in in the EFI, and use them to give macOS
         | Recovery internet access.
        
         | spaceguillotine wrote:
         | if you have an iPhone, iPad or any other logged in device with
         | the wifi password it will auto grab it from that device without
         | you doing anything.
        
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       (page generated 2024-05-19 23:01 UTC)