[johncolanduoni]

If you added a button to Firefox (or Chrome, or IE, ...) that gave JavaScript access to your filesystem when it was switched on, would you expect user security to be unaffected because nobody would be tricked/pressured into turning it on by web pages? Remember there are many people that not only don’t know what JavaScript is, but don’t even know what a filesystem is.

[kodablah]

Why did you choose a button for this analogy? Why not a deeply buried setting with clear warnings? Or, to be a more apt analogy to side loading, why not a separate compilation flag when rebuilding the browser? Your analogy is unfair... making something like this possible doesn't mean making it easy or likely to be tricked into. Saying it does muddies the discussion.

[erikpukinskis]

It doesn't matter whether it's a button or a magical incantation you whisper to Siri. The point is the code path is a security hole, whether or not a user enables it. It's harder to secure a door against intruders than a brick wall.

[johncolanduoni]

A deeply buried button was what I imagined, not something on the address bar you could accidentally click. A separate compilation flag when rebuilding the browser is not accurate if you're comparing to Android's side-loading model (not even enabling developer tools require anything that onerous). I would argue your addition of "easy" or "without warnings" is what muddled the discussion.

[jpttsn]

I think users can jump through those hoops as well. Before emoji were available as a system keyboard, for international (non-Japanese) iOS users, many users downloaded apps to enable the emoji keyboard.