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

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 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.

But it's like installing a custom HTTPS cert in your OS to inspect potential traffic that malware may use through, say, a Google Doc or Sheet. It's helpful to true professionals dealing with highly sensitive information, but it's ultimately a bigger source of compromise for the vast majority of software users.

I don't think there is an easy answer here. That's why I said I thought it made the world a "touch better" and I can see from your response that you understand the tradeoffs roughly as well as I do based on the wording of your response. The fact is that contemplating these hard tradeoffs belie the underlying truth: Securing computers is hard and getting harder and the stakes keep going up. I can't say if this move by Apple will ultimately be worth it, but I certainly understand the predicament they are in. This is no easy work.