I do not know about all Unix like OSes, but Linux has sandboxes you can run as you main user. Not as safe as running as a separate user and sandboxing, or running in a VM, but reasonably solid.
> I'd argue that time has largely passed, for most third-party commercial developers and even for some OS vendors.
In theory, iOS has some protection: the security model is that not all apps can be trusted with everything, so they have to ask for permission to access camera, GPS, texts and so on. I think apple even kicks apps out of its store that try and abuse this.
> I'd argue that time has largely passed, for most third-party commercial developers and even for some OS vendors.
Agreed, but what can you do about your OS vendor?