MAC APP STORE APPLICATIONS MUST BE SANDBOXED BY MARCH 2012

As of March 1st, 2012, Apple will require all apps available in the Mac App Store to be "sandboxed," which Apple says is "a great way to protect systems and users by limiting the resources apps can access and making it more difficult for malicious software to compromise users' systems." The other side of that coin is that by limiting access to said system resources, applications are also more limited in what they can do, which has left some developers facing a tough decision: either comply and get in the App Store, or go it alone. They will be able to request access to some resources, but they'll have to provide a justification for it to Apple as part of the submission process. Apple had actually intended to implement the requirement this month, but it's apparently decided to give devs a bit more time to get used to it.

GOOGLE CHROME 10 NOW AVAILABLE WITH SPEED BOOST

It was just a month ago that Google released version 9 of its hot browser Chrome. They have now released version 10. The new version has speed increases as well as a new Options layout and sandboxing of integrated Flash, which provides better security from malware. Chrome 10 scored a 66% increase in Javascript performance. Users can now sync passwords across multiple computers as well. Google has some handy videos showing the improvements which you can view here.

GOOGLE CHROME DEV BUILD SANDBOXES FLASH

On Wednesday Google announced a new developer test version of its Chrome Web browser that will place the code of Adobe's Flash Player plug-in in its own sandbox. For now, the update just applies to the Windows Versions of the browser.

A sandbox isolates the running code from the rest of the operating system so that its has no access to critical processes or data, thus preventing it from either intentionally or unintentionally doing harm. Flash has been famously criticized by Apple CEO Steve Jobs for its lack of security and stability.

Google already uses sandboxing for HTML rendering and JavaScript execution, making it one of the most secure browsers available.

The announcement appeared on the blog dedicated to Chromium, as the open source browser engine project is called. (To further complicate things, the company also plans an upcoming operating system, Chrome OS, using some of the same Chromium code base.) The blog post states that Google engineers have been working closely with Adobe to implement the plug-in sandboxing. Adobe recently used the technique in its own Reader X plugin for Acrobat PDF files.

According to the post, written by Google software engineers Justin Schuh and Carlos Pizano, "This first iteration of Chrome's Flash Player sandbox for all Windows platforms uses a modified version of Chrome's existing sandbox technology that protects certain sensitive resources from being accessed by malicious code, while allowing applications to use less sensitive ones. This implementation is a significant first step in further reducing the potential attack surface of the browser and protecting users against common malware." [PC Mag]