In the years since Apple released the iPhone, with its “locked-down-by-nature” approach to application security, the company has progressively chipped away at the freedoms Mac developers have historically had to do, more or less, whatever the heck they wanted.

With the introduction of the Mac Application Sandbox in 2012, Apple applied an iOS-like mechanism through which applications are entitled only to access their own data, and must explicitly request permission from Apple to access any resources “outside of their own sandbox.” At the time, I wrote that while the technology was promising, it left much to be desired.

Around the same time, they introduced Developer ID, a system for certifying at runtime that a given piece of software has been cryptographically signed by a developer whose identity is known to Apple. Applications that are not signed with Developer ID are allowed to run in macOS, but by default are met with a foreboding warning about the safety of doing so. The component of macOS that is responsible for limiting the launch of software from unknown developers is called “Gatekeeper.”

Last year, in 2018, Apple introduced a new notarization service, an expansion of Developer ID functionality. Developers submit their applications to Apple, where they are scanned for known malware, and have their use of specific system technologies vetted. The “notarization” on an app allows the system to verify at runtime that a given application passes a baseline safety metric for downloaded software.

Finally, in 2019, Apple announced that software signed with Developer ID certificates, that is to say all non-Mac App Store software, must also be notarized. The Catalina 10.15 public beta identifies software that has not been notarized as potentially risky because it “cannot be scanned for malware.”

In effect: developers who ship software directly to end-users are now required to notarize their apps.

While working on the notarization process for my own apps, and a company I work for, I noticed an interesting error from “altool”, the command line program that is used to submit binaries to Apple for verification:

1 package(s) were not uploaded because they had problems:
Error Messages:
To use this application, you must first sign in to 
iTunes Connect and sign the relevant contracts. (1048)

The error is easily worked around by logging in to App Store Connect and agreeing to any updates Apple has recently made to their contracts. I’m so used to more-or-less blindly agreeing to these changes, that it didn’t sink in for me at first what a potentially major change this is.

My colleague Patrick Machielse noticed right away what the larger implication is: all Mac software, inside or outside of the Mac App Store, can now be held up by unsigned contract agreements with Apple. In a rush to fix a horrible bug and get it out to customers? Better review that new contract ASAP.

For the past 35 years, any Mac developer who wanted to ship an update directly to customers could do so by recompiling a binary and distributing it. When macOS 10.15 ships this fall, the status quo will change. Mac developers must register with Apple and sign their products. They must submit their binaries to Apple for notarization. And most significantly of all, they must agree to the terms of Apple’s App Store developer contracts, even if they don’t distribute their apps through the App Store.