I really don’t mind that they hide the button to enable installs from .APK when they are being directly downloaded. It has been in my opinion very bad idea from the beginning that it shows that, it has enabled multiple malwares in android. Non-technical people should not have easy way to install things, even with big warnings, because people ignore warnings.
If google removes the ability to install non-store apps all together, then that day I will stop using Android.
Everybody knew were the ship was, because at that time star link usage by area was shown publicly. There was map online that showed all clients online.