[sroussey]

Agree, but how it is enabled is important.

The same popup that asks for microphone access but now says the word root in its place, and a consumer is like “not sure what root is, maybe they meant toot!”

And then their whole machine is compromised.

[spaqin]

Ever since I remember if you wanted root on Android, you had to go out your way by flashing SuperSU, then Magisk or KernelSU; most users don't ever use that. Even more so, with few recent solutions like KernelSU or some Magisk forks you have to go out of your way again to whitelist the app before it can even ask for root - mostly for avoiding detection, but that does act as an extra layer of security.

I'm not too worried about security for normal users if we kept it that way. I just want not to have any extra roadblocks for the powerusers from the banks, Authy or McDonald's.

[ruszki]

The problem is that the bar needs to be moved higher and higher, to a level nowadays which would be annoying to most of us who know what they are doing.

20 years ago if I started to list ip addresses to my ISP on the phone I got somebody technical immediately. This doesn’t work anymore, because people know more about this. This caused that for example I could only turn WiFi on or off on my ISP’s router and nothing else without a specific request to them, a manual restart to my router days later, and I need to use a terrible buggy software.

These kind of things unfortunately also restrict beginners, or people who without such barriers would start to tinker, and eventually learn to do these safely. Even I waited for weeks with the call, who have been configuring routers for 25 years.

I’m installing now a self hosted OwnTracks on docker. A lot of beginner started to do the same. They make rookie mistakes all the time. Let them make those mistakes.

I would have never learned what I know without the freedom of making mistakes.

[lurking_swe]

often times we’re lucky if a user reads those popups at all. :)