[sagarm]

This is the idiomatic way in C++. I'm not even sure what your proposed alternative is -- as other commenters have noted, an exception or "panic" are not actual options.

Every pointer dereference, array access, and even integer truncation is UB in C++. This isn't rust.

A static analyzer can and does catch these errors and others internally. Typical usage of StatusOr is via macros like ASSIGN_OR_RETURN and RETURN_IF_ERROR; actually using the * operator would definitely draw my attention in code review.