Apple's apps bypass firewalls like LittleSnitch and LuLu on macOS Big Sur

This is one of those tough cases where software cuts both ways.

Some people are smart, informed developers that install a trusted tool to monitor their traffic and have legitimate reasons to want to inspect Apple traffic. They're dismayed.

Most people are the opposite and this move protects the most sensitive data from being easily scooped up or muddled in easily installed apps, or at least easily installed apps that don't use zero days.

Is the world better or worse due to this change? I'd say a touch better, but I don't like the fact that this change was needed in the first place. I trust Apple, but I don't like trusting trust.

I'd argue this opens up a giant attack surface where malicious software will try to route its command and control communication through a protected service. Do we really want to trust that Apple will keep all 50+ of these privileged services fully protected?

I think it makes the "world" slightly worse in that it will be harder to discover malware. Little snitch has a small user base, but it's been used to identify many forms of malware and protect many more people once the threat is identified.

The decision is questionable, but you can always inspect traffic from the machine outside it, I would even say that's preferable in context of malware.