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Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

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Re: Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

#131

Post by scarface74 »

gruez wrote: post #17
gameswithgo wrote: post #7

the locked in store model has completely failed. both for ios and android it is a terrible experience compared to PC. you are stuck with only the search tools the hardware maker gives you, often designed in a user hostile way (ios brings up ads) and no way to bail out to a different store. as well the monoculture leads to a race to the bottom with garbage programs shoving their way to the top via misleading a dishone…

>unwashed masses don’t know that so it doesn’t matter. They seem to be able to find epic's fortnite just fine. What more do you want?

With the Fortnite security issues, that’s not exactly saying much for alternate stores. https://www.cnet.com/news/fortnites-battle-royale-with-andro...

Re: Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

#132

Post by scarface74 »

keerthiko wrote: post #46

In an ideal world, OS maintainers, instead of running a software store with a client-end on consumer devices, would run just a repository, with version control, metadata and downloadable packages for apps submitted to and supported on their platform, but allowed any third party to link to their repositories for fetching information or downloads. This would allow external review hosting, discovery, competing marketpla…

What could possibly go wrong? Viruses, malware, ransomware, toolbars, etc.

Re: Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

#133

Post by mtgx »

rayraegah wrote: post #15

It's not just ad fraud, they've been copying information like whatsapp phone number, reddit username, telegram username etc. https://www.reddit.com/r/miband/comments/8eqtve/why_did_mifi...

"Whoops, yet another (totally convenient for our business model) error! But that's okay, because we won't be punished if we say it was an error."

Re: Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

#135

Post by 076ae80a-3c97-4 »

blantonl wrote: post #129

One of the things that is really troubling about the Google Android Play store is the ease that an app developer can develop an app and remain totally anonymous unless you are forced to file a lawsuit or subpoena to Google to reveal information. I own and operate a fairly popular audio streaming platform, and I've had to deal with numerous instances of unscrupulous app developers who steal API keys from our licensed…

Time to cycle API keys?

Re: Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

#136

Post by glenneroo »

HenryBemis wrote: post #96
rayraegah wrote: post #15

It's not just ad fraud, they've been copying information like whatsapp phone number, reddit username, telegram username etc. https://www.reddit.com/r/miband/comments/8eqtve/why_did_mifi...

I keep sounding like a broken record. This is not for your "average user" but I use two methods to block all data transmissions for applications that doesn't make sense to have internet connections (e.g. a selfie app): a) The device's App-Data settings. I keep most boxes unchecked. I don't understand why CamScanner (legit super useful app) needs internet connection when I just email myself all the scans, and not usin…

I know the selfie app was just an example, but what's the point of a selfie app if you can't share the selfies?

Also you are assuming people have due diligence to actually care or understand which permissions an app is requesting and to actually stop long enough to consider the implications. Consider that most of the world is technologically illiterate, and pop-ups will probably at most be a very mild annoyance for end-users who blindly press ALLOW in order to open the app because it has kittens and rainbows.

Re: Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

#137

Post by lima »

076ae80a-3c97-4 wrote: post #135
blantonl wrote: post #129

One of the things that is really troubling about the Google Android Play store is the ease that an app developer can develop an app and remain totally anonymous unless you are forced to file a lawsuit or subpoena to Google to reveal information. I own and operate a fairly popular audio streaming platform, and I've had to deal with numerous instances of unscrupulous app developers who steal API keys from our licensed…

Time to cycle API keys?

App update cycles are slow so this would break old versions of his apps.

Re: Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

#138

Post by Yetanfou »

mattkevan wrote: post #123
Yetanfou wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution is what has been suggested earlier: allow users to choose their own 'store', don't lock them to a single vendor. This is already possible with Android where F-Droid is a good example of a 'store' where the chance of being exposed to these shenanigans is close to zero. Currently iOS users lack this option so for them the only way out is to change platform.

> This is already possible with Android where F-Droid is a good example of a 'store' where the chance of being exposed to these shenanigans is close to zero. There are many other stores where the chance of being exposed to these shenanigans is close to 1. Think of the article recently about super-shady app stores for iOS that misused enterprise certificates to sideload apps [0]. If alternate app stores were to be all…

I don't think people using Android are different from those using iOS and recognise that that most popular alternative 'store' for Android does not seem to fall victim to these problems. This is very much related to the fact that F-Droid only hosts free software but the same thing could be done for iOS if Apple lifted its heavy control over the platform and its users. I see no reason why a similar free software store for iOS would turn into a scumware-infested hell hole.

Re: Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

#139

Post by fooqux »

DarwinMailApp wrote: post #94
rayraegah wrote: post #15

It's not just ad fraud, they've been copying information like whatsapp phone number, reddit username, telegram username etc. https://www.reddit.com/r/miband/comments/8eqtve/why_did_mifi...

I actually can't believe this. How in the name of all the is holy are we letting them get away with this. Sure, we talk about the problem a lot. But we need to take action. It seems every big corporation are abusing the trust we give them in some form or another. Please, for the love of God, can anybody prove me wrong. Are there any companies than don't abuse our trust?

Abuse your trust? The better question is why are you trusting them in the first place? If you actually read the TOS of a service, you'd know that they are usually quite forthright with what they are going to do.

If a murderer knocks on your door, informs you that if you let them in they're going to brutally murder you, but you choose to ignore that because they brought you free stuff, you don't get to complain about being murdered later.

Re: Popular Google Play store apps are abusing permissions and committing ad fraud

#140

Post by dx034 »

doublepg23 wrote: post #24

It's amazing how poor the filtering is. There are plenty of developer horror stories of legitimate apps being taken down by some broken, automated process - sometimes taking peoples' entire Google accounts with them. Then you're stuck dealing with more automated systems for support. Of course these garbage apps make it through somehow. My favorite is an SNES emulator that's full of ROMs. Clearly a copyright violation…

Which shows badly machine learning works compared to all the promises made by big companies. Google can't identify fraudulent apps, amazon apparently has a big problem with false positives regarding reviews (deleting real 5* reviews while keeping fake ones), YouTube thinks a church fire is a 9/11 conspiracy theory, etc.
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