51–60 of 201 posts
> "The information fed back to Google includes barometric pressure readings so it can work out, for example, which level of a shopping mall you are on." I scoffed, but this is actually a thing: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4431287/ (It's also useful for weather observations, see the old PressureNET.io site for an opt-in version.) Anyway, my monthly mobile data usage for Google services is 110 MB and t…
If this is a real concern, wouldn't android's source show the evidence?
also, most of the claim seems to be for code in the very closed source google play services (wildly guessing from the features involved)
Is it not assumed/expected that if you're using android then google has access to all your phone's data/sensors?
Yeah but that doesn't mean that they should snap a photo or turn on the mic in my bedroom. The point is that there are limits. Legal and ethical.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
*if you're using android with Google Services
Not certain why the downvotes; apart from community ROMs and Amazon's Android devices, Samsung has been positioning itself for some time to not be completely reliant on Google for it's phone business - they have an App Store of their own and their own duplicate functionality of many of Google's core services for Android. I wouldn't be surprised if they de-coupled from Google entirely at some point (yes, they'd need t…
Is there a project to replace all of play services with FOSS/encrypted ones?
> "The information fed back to Google includes barometric pressure readings so it can work out, for example, which level of a shopping mall you are on." I scoffed, but this is actually a thing: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4431287/ (It's also useful for weather observations, see the old PressureNET.io site for an opt-in version.) Anyway, my monthly mobile data usage for Google services is 110 MB and t…
Are barometric sensors commonplace in smartphones?
Here's a the same story via the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/may/14/australia... A quote contained within both stories: > The software company Oracle revealed Google could be harvesting a gigabyte of data from Android devices each month Given that my data plan is 1.5 GB/month, I would notice if a gigabyte magically disappeared every month (it doesn't). Hopefully the ACCC has enough skepticism…
So quite a lot I'd assume would be buffered and sent back while you're on a wifi connection.
Here's a the same story via the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/may/14/australia... A quote contained within both stories: > The software company Oracle revealed Google could be harvesting a gigabyte of data from Android devices each month Given that my data plan is 1.5 GB/month, I would notice if a gigabyte magically disappeared every month (it doesn't). Hopefully the ACCC has enough skepticism…
I'm not saying that's what they do, but you can have many scenarios when you get 1gb of information without transferring 1gb of data.
Here's a the same story via the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/may/14/australia... A quote contained within both stories: > The software company Oracle revealed Google could be harvesting a gigabyte of data from Android devices each month Given that my data plan is 1.5 GB/month, I would notice if a gigabyte magically disappeared every month (it doesn't). Hopefully the ACCC has enough skepticism…
> "The information fed back to Google includes barometric pressure readings so it can work out, for example, which level of a shopping mall you are on." I scoffed, but this is actually a thing: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4431287/ (It's also useful for weather observations, see the old PressureNET.io site for an opt-in version.) Anyway, my monthly mobile data usage for Google services is 110 MB and t…
- after stopped using Google Play services/framework and replaced it with microg, battery life improved for 30% with same programs beeing run and same settings without losing any functionality, this is the most obvious part that something is going on and it is hard to deny. I never used (while on google play) any syncing, gps fix and so on. Meaning exactly same settings, same programs, no google applicatios (maps,...) same AOSP rom, not even factory resetted in between, just no Google Play presence on same phone. I switched to microg as I have figured out that whatever I do can't stop the Google Play services/framework communicating with google (firewall, xprivacy,...)
- there are hidden sync in Google Play that can't be disabled and are syncing regardless of your settings (https://www.reddit.com/r/Nexus5/comments/270axz/enabled_reve...), like Location reporting (not the one visible, there is second one, you will need root to see it, you can disable it but it will automatically turn back on after a while).
- DNS is defaulting to google dns 8.8.8.8, it is overriden in most cases by router settings but still.
It is up to each person to decide what this means but I would seriously suggest looking at https://lineage.microg.org/
Google is fundamentally dishonest. Example: my phone has both a Wifi and GPS chip. I open Maps and it tells me it can't give me navigation unless I turn on Location Services or whatever, which allows them to use the Wifi to scan for APs or whatever else they do. It's 100% a lie, because any other GPS based navigation system (such as TomTom, Magellan GPS devices) can in fact do this; and they have far less CPU power t…
The cold start for a GPS can take several the better part of a minute. Using WiFi or other information to get an improvement on the cold and warm start times. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_to_first_fix A relevant patent https://patents.google.com/patent/US20020142783 https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/230305/warm-...