However, Tuinman then went on to say that if the worst case scenario does come to fruition he believes that, through unknown means, the F-35’s software could be altered without permission by third party operators. He compared this directly to ‘jailbreaking’ an iPhone, a process which allows end users to access features on iOS devices that are not usually allowed by Apple’s own software at the cost of theoretically voiding the device’s warranty and opening up the risk of security vulnerabilities or software malfunctions.
I’m not sure there would be much of a choice in a situation where the US held operation of the F-35 hostage.
Supposedly these nations bought the F-35 because it was a superior fighter, so the choice would be using an “inferior” domestic fighter (I think the typhoon is great so this argument seems silly to me) or jailbreaking and potentially having an imperfect implementation of the platform’s software.