Add the SDK to Your App

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The recommended development environment is:

  • Apple Xcode® (latest available version)
  • The minimum target version supported by the SDK:
    • For iOS - 13.0
    • For macOS - 10.15 (Catalina)

The HID Approve SDK for iOS/macOS distribution is available in two multi-platform binary framework (XCFramework) bundle variants designed for specific integration environments.

  • For production environments, use the HID_Approve_SDK.xcframework bundle which supports the following architectures:

    • iOS Production (ARM64)

    • macOS (Apple Silicon ARM64, Intel x86-64)

  • Non-production environments, use the HID_Approve_SDK_NonProd.xcframework bundle which supports the following architectures:

    • iOS Integration-Testing (ARM64)

    • iOS Simulator (Apple Silicon ARM64, Intel x86-64)

    In this variant, the built-in anti-debugging and anti-swizzling defenses have been disabled to allow the use of debugging tools such as Flex and Flipper for internal integration testing.

Important: As an integrator, you are responsible for ensuring that the Non-Production version of the SDK is not deployed in production.

With the disabled defenses in the non-production variant, it could potentially allow a malevolent attacker to bypass security measures and facilitate reverse engineering of sensitive algorithms or business logic.

The following are recommended XCode secure-coding compiler settings:

  • Debugging symbols stripped (release binary) - build setting
  • Automatic Reference Counting (ARC) memory management - build setting
  • Stack Canary – buffer overflow protection

    • "-fstack-protector-all" (Other C Flags)

    For further information, go to https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/104048

  • Position Independent Executable (PIE) to enable full ASLR for binary - set Generate Position-Dependent Code to NO

    • For further information, go to https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/qa/qa1788/_index.html

  • Stack smashing protection is activated with PIE and "-fstack-protector-all" (Other C Flags)

The SDK does not support the Apple “sharing access to keychain items among a collection of apps” feature. Sharing access to keychain items between several apps will lead to irrecoverable errors.

For further information about the feature, go to https://developer.apple.com/documentation/security/keychain_services/keychain_items/sharing_access_to_keychain_items_among_a_collection_of_apps.

Use the SDK in your App

The HID Approve SDK is delivered as a XCFramework bundle (HID_Approve_SDK.xcframework). It is available in the iOS/Libraries folder of the delivery package.

In order to facilitate testing during the development process, this XCFramework bundle also provides the iOS simulator binaries.

  1. Copy the XCFramework bundle (content of the iOS/Libraries folder) to your preferred libraries location.
  2. In your Xcode target, add the XCFramework bundle to your project Frameworks, Libraries and embedded contents setting.

Add Functions to your App

Managing Persistent Data

  • For iOS, the HID Approve SDK stores it's persistent data in several databases in the iOS application sandbox.

    This persistent data can be removed by either:

    • Resetting the HID Approve SDK with the dedicated HIDDeviceFactory.reset() method - all the data will be removed (existing containers, keys...)

    • Uninstalling the application

  • For macOS, the HID Approve SDK stores it's persistent data in several databases in the SearchPathDirectory > librarydirectory and SearchPathDomainMask > userdomainmask directories of the application (for further information, go to https://developer.apple.com/documentation/foundation/filemanager)

    Note: These directories will remain on the macOS workstation even after the application is uninstalled. As an integrator, you must make sure the SDK's persistent data is correctly removed. The typical persistent data path is Users/%username%/Library/Containers/%appbundlename%.