Security

App security overview

Apps are among the most critical elements of a modern security architecture. While apps provide amazing productivity benefits for users, they also have the potential to negatively impact system security, stability, and user data if they’re not handled properly.

Because of this, Apple provides layers of protection to ensure that apps are free of known malware and haven’t been tampered with. Additional protections enforce that access from apps to user data is carefully mediated. These security controls provide a stable, secure platform for apps, enabling thousands of developers to deliver hundreds of thousands of apps for iOS, iPadOS, and macOS—all without impacting system integrity. And users can access these apps on their Apple devices without undue fear of viruses, malware, or unauthorized attacks.

On iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch, all apps are obtained from the App Store—and all apps are sandboxed—to provide the tightest controls.

On Mac, many apps are obtained from the App Store, but Mac users also download and use apps from the Internet. To safely support Internet downloading, macOS layers additional controls. First, by default on macOS 10.15 or later, all Mac apps need to be notarized by Apple to launch. This requirement ensures that these apps are free of known malware without requiring that the apps be provided through the App Store. In addition, macOS includes industry-standard anti-virus protection to block—and if necessary remove—malware.

As an additional control across platforms, sandboxing helps protect user data from unauthorized access by apps. And in macOS, data in critical areas is itself sandboxed—which ensures—that users remain in control of access to files in Desktop, Documents, Downloads, and other areas from all apps, whether the apps attempting access are themselves sandboxed or not.

Native capability	Third-party equivalent
Plug-in unapproved list, Safari extension unapproved list	Virus/Malware Definitions
File quarantine	Virus/Malware Definitions
XProtect/Yara signatures	Virus/Malware Definitions
MRT (Malware Removal Tool)	Endpoint protection
Gatekeeper	Endpoint protection. Enforces code signing on apps to ensure only trusted software runs.
eficheck (Necessary for Mac computers without an Apple T2 Security chip)	Endpoint protection–rootkit detection
Application firewall	Endpoint protection–firewalling
ipfw	Firewall solutions
System Integrity Protection	Only Apple can provide this
Mandatory Access Controls	Only Apple can provide this
KEXT exclude list	Only Apple can provide this
Mandatory app code signing	Only Apple can provide this
App notarization	Only Apple can provide this

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Apple Platform Security

App security overview