Too little, too late, #Apple. You made it very clear we had to update to #Tahoe to prevent device armageddon so reluctantly I did, on both iPhones and the family iPad.

And now, over a week after all the #DarkSword mass panic and upgrading, you change your mind? Not cool.

But I won’t be buying any more Apple devices anyway. For a variety of reasons, many of which relate to your contempt for your users - which is clearly shown by this late action.

https://www.wired.com/story/apple-will-push-out-rare-backported-patches-to-protect-ios-18-users-from-darksword-hacking-tool/

Apple Will Push Out Rare ‘Backported’ Patches to Protect iOS 18 Users From DarkSword Hacking Tool

As DarkSword spreads, Apple tells WIRED it will enable iOS 18-specific fixes for millions of iPhone owners who remain on that iOS version rather than force them to update to iOS 26.

WIRED
@drewtowler I enabled lockdown mode on my devices instead of updating to Tahoe.
@zed That would have been impractical for us but glad you made it work for you.

@drewtowler tbh, I would love for the EU to roll out regulation that requires major tech companies to give security updates for all major versions of OS within the last 3 years, and require that installs of the latest major version of an OS are available for as long as they're still receiving security updates.

Gotta figure out how to stop companies from bad faith complying by just releasing "minor" updates forever tho.

@zed Well I’m not in the EU but I sympathize. My likely tech path over the next couple of years is less Apple, more Fedora and more /e/os (to avoid jumping from the Apple frying pan straight into the Google fire).

@drewtowler ahh, gotcha. tbh I didn't know the flag.

If macOS wasn't required for my job, I'd be using Fedora on my computer. I use an iPhone 13 mini, and unfortunately there are no modern phones that are this size, and so I can't see myself getting off it anytime soon.

@zed Fedora 43 with Plasma latest is what macOS should have been. I have it on an old Thinkpad and I love it. When Asahi Linux sorts out Thunderbolt support I'll dual-boot it on my Mac too.
I'm not sure my eyesight would cope with an iPhone 13 mini - but my iPhone 13 regular is _heavy_. And my wife's 14 pro max is like lifting a lead brick.