Apple deletes critical forum post, reportedly for 'Terms of Service' violation

Apple is famous for not taking criticism well. This can be seen on their forums where they often delete posts deemed critical to the company. The latest example involved a security issue on the iPhone 3G, and the "perpetrator" had his hand slapped.

The incident involved tough talk about an iOS patch that closed several security hole. While that was all well and good, the patch was excluded from the iPhone 3G. That's because the actual patch came as part of iOS 4.3, and that OS version excludes the iPhone 3G (and 2.5G) and the iPod touch 1st and 2nd gen.

Sophos said:

"There might be a hardware reason why the latest version of the software can't be run on older devices. Even so, Apple could still release an update for Safari for older devices, the most problematic omission. Apple should still produce patches, otherwise security conscious people would have to upgrade."

An unnamed Register reader, who probably wants to remain anonymous to avoid being banned completely from Apple's forums, posted the following since-deleted message.

Dear Apple,

Following the reviews of the new IOS 4.3 release I was absolutely baffled that Apple is leaving a major segment of their customers vulnerable to security issues in the iPhone. Various security issues have been identified on IOS 4.2 and lower. Some of them in Safari. Yet iPhone 3G users are not offered security updates as they are encapsulated in IOS 4.3 release.

I feel that Apple has an obligation to at least keep supporting previous generation of the product for at least 5 years after EOL of a product in terms of providing security patches when major security leaks have been identified.

I would like to ask fellow 3G users to react to Apple too so this issue will appear on Apple's management radar screen!

In addition to deleting the post, Apple sent the reader an email, saying

Apple removed your post on Apple Discussions, titled "Please Apple, you cannot leave a major share of your customers vulnerable," because it contained the following: Speculation or Rumors Discussion of Apple Policies, Procedures or Decisions Petitions

As we said, this isn't the first time this has happened, and it won't be the last. It's not just criticism on official forums that raises Apple's ire. In this case, however, there were a significant number of security patches that were implemented.

It's possible that hackers like the iPhone Dev Team may release updates for jailbroken devices to protect against the security holes. After all, the iOS gravy train has ended for those older devices so they have quite a stable platform version to work against.

Via: The Register