Comment by marcellus23

4 months ago

Can you explain a bit more what makes Sign in with Apple different from Google Sign-in? Apple certainly does maintain a list of users with accounts. So what does "non-directory" mean here exactly? Why can Apple not attest that you control that account at sign-in time?

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marcellus23

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crusty  4 months ago

Now? nothing. I think this thinking is a relic of Google's status as seemingly the last remaining email provider to automatically create a Gmail account when signing up for a Google account. So using Google SSO meant using your Gmail account, and so control of the email address was nessissary for control of the Google account. If you lose the email account, you lose the Google account. This is not true anymore since you can sign up for a Google account with any email.

Whereas you can (and I believe always could*) create an apple ID with any old email address.

*Maybe this delinked situation only came about when they added the App Store to OS X, and figured they'd make less money if they require existing Mac users to get a new email account in order to buy programs in the manner which would grant them a cut.

Apple has a list of all the email addresses for its sole IDs, but it doesn't control them, and having one deleted doesn't nessisarilly affect the other.

Google and custom domain email have always been delinked from this perspective. You could create a Google account with a custom domain and then point the domain elsewhere or lose control of it, and you'd still retain conto of the account.

Basically, the required example essentially theoretical at this point - maybe it works for employers at companies that also happen to provide SSO services. So if you work at Facebook, Google, Apple, or github and have a me@FGAG.etc.com email dress, and you signed into slack through the SSO that affiliated with your company and the company email, but later don't work there and you've had your work account access revoked, you won't be able to use that SSO to sign into slack. That's what they mean by directory control or whatever.

In contrast, if you sign up to github with your work email account, unless it's a managed device managed by your work, your work doesn't actually control the account. They just vouched for your affiliation at sign up when you verified your email. So if you use a github SSO to sign up for a service that 'verifies' your work email address from github during the process, that won't change when you leave and the company revoked access to the email. Github SSO, in this case, isn't verifying you have an email account @company.com. They are verifying you once did, or at least once had, access to it. This is what they mean by the non-directory whatever.

lathiat  4 months ago

I think what he means is, if you have an @gmail.com account via Google, that is pretty good proof of control. But if you have any other e-mail (e.g. a custom domain) via Google, it's not.

Similar with Apple, if you were signing in with an @icloud.com, it's pretty good proof, but if you have an Apple ID with a third-party e-mail it's not proof of current control of that e-mail.

That's my guess.

  • marcellus23  4 months ago

    That helps, but I still don't have a full picture. What's the threat here? Is it that: if a hacker gains temporary access to Bob's email bob@example.com, they can create an Apple account attached to it, and use that account to sign in with a service ABC, then that hacker gains access to Bob's private info in service ABC? But if the hacker already has email access, can't he just log into service ABC directly anyway?

    Also, is it impossible to have a Google account with a non-gmail address? The original poster seemed to be saying that Google _is_ a directory SSO and Apple _is not_ categorically. But if you can have a Google account without a Gmail-ran email account, wouldn't Google have the same vulnerability?

    • nodamage  4 months ago

      I think the most likely threat in this case is with ex-employees. If Bob has access to bob@example.com and creates an Apple account with it, then subsequently gets fired from example.com, they might delete his email address but his Apple account will still allow him to login to services using Sign in with Apple. (Because Apple only checks ownership of the email address when the Apple account is being created.)

      Google accounts have the exact same issue so I don't understand the distinction made by the OP though.