[michaeldorian]

The downside is not for folks like us on here that can make decisions about what is good and what is bad. Apple has invested heavily in creating an experience where the common person with no mental model of how this stuff is relatively safe.

The downside is Mom somehow installs said store, and said store distributes a poker game that does something malicious. Mom blames her iPhone as that's all she knows. She doesn't separate hardware from operating system and apps like we do.

[kokey]

I got my mom an iPhone for this reason. Then she kept locking herself out of it by typing in the wrong password. She lives in an Android dominated country so asking for help around her had varied results, including having her phone wiped and icloud account replaced a few times. In the end I got her an Android phone of the same model as the people around her. When I saw her next I noticed her phone had adware on it. I didn't know adware was a thing on phones.

[_qulr]

Let's talk about my mom. When her brother died, she inherited a Mac and an iPad from him. I helped my mom set up the Mac for her, and she was good to go the same day. Whereas she spent many months (it may have been a full year, I don't recall) in a battle with Apple to get them to allow her to erase and reinstall iOS on the device. She wasn't trying to get my uncle's data, she just wanted to use the iPad for herself. Apple wanted a death certificate and all kinds of legal crap.

You don't own iOS devices, you're just paying an exorbitant rent.