[PlutoIsAPlanet]

> Why would you give those apps root access?

You shouldn't but you install debs/rpms from the internet which get root permissions during install.

[cassianoleal]

Not the apps though. The packaging system yes, but whatever scripts run as part of the installation of a package is the package maintainer's responsibility. Not trusting your distro's package maintainers means you don't trust anything on your computer.