I decompiled the White House's new app • Hacker News Board

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#171

Post by cuu508 » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:09 AM UTC

crumpled wrote: post #166

Groxx wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The permissions snippet they show also doesn't include location, and you can't request location at runtime at all without declaring it there. I'd verify all this stuff for myself, but Play won't install it in my phone so I can't really get the APK. Maybe because I use Graphene...? but I don't know all the ways they can restrict it, maybe it's something else (though for a pixel 9a it's rather strange if it's hardware…

If you use Aurora Store instead of the Play store, you can download APKs. They are a Google Play store proxy.

Or from APKPure https://apkpure.com/the-white-house/gov.whitehouse.app

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#172

Post by ghywertelling » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:16 AM UTC

Mathnerd314 wrote: post #167

fjdjshsh wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>as it seems to be mostly written by AI. Is there something in particular that made you conclude that or are you going just with how it felt? For what it's worth, it didn't seem to me.

There's a specific writing style for globalized English that AI's use. And then this post also had none of the stylistic flourishes that a real author might add. And then simple things like constructing a table of 68 libraries or whatever organized by relatively subjective categories. That is something that nobody is going to do by hand.

There is a new term "load-bearing" which is used a lot in my usage of AI. Has anyone else encountered this term being used a lot in their conversations? Or is it a quirk of personalization?

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#173

Post by no-name-here » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:18 AM UTC

windexh8er wrote: post #169

Izkata wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps the apparent hallucination they mentioned in their comment?

Apparently just like OP, you didn't read the article either. Just because the app doesn't ask for permission in the manifest doesn't mean it can't be acquired at runtime. It's very publicly documented [0]. So, no. Not a "hallucination". [0] https://documentation.onesignal.com/docs/en/location-opt-in-...

How certain are you of that?

That appears to be about providing a message to the user before requesting permissions.

However, it appears even permissions you allow your app to request still need to be declared beforehand? https://developer.android.com/training/permissions/requestin...

Regardless, people are reporting mixed info on whether the app declares location access: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47557010

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#174

Post by trueno » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:23 AM UTC

ghywertelling wrote: post #172

Mathnerd314 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a specific writing style for globalized English that AI's use. And then this post also had none of the stylistic flourishes that a real author might add. And then simple things like constructing a table of 68 libraries or whatever organized by relatively subjective categories. That is something that nobody is going to do by hand.

There is a new term "load-bearing" which is used a lot in my usage of AI. Has anyone else encountered this term being used a lot in their conversations? Or is it a quirk of personalization?

been getting a lot of "load-bearing" and "roll your own" lately.

us humans, even if kinda trash at many things, are pretty rad at pattern recognition.

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#175

Post by trueno » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:33 AM UTC

goodmythical wrote: post #150

fjdjshsh wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>as it seems to be mostly written by AI. Is there something in particular that made you conclude that or are you going just with how it felt? For what it's worth, it didn't seem to me.

[flagged]

> Haven't you heard? It's cool to dislike things "because AI".

There's no explicit rules against it, but I cannot stand this type of sarcastic im anti-everyone-else commentary. Super reddit-coded, and you could have made your point without it. There's a lot of discussion to have about that point actually, but I'm pretty sure we've all been collectively scrolling long enough to just kind of roll our eyes at this stuff.

I read through it. I get some AI vibes. Probably a little bit of both.

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#176

Post by VerifiedReports » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:37 AM UTC

Izkata wrote: post #153

fjdjshsh wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>as it seems to be mostly written by AI. Is there something in particular that made you conclude that or are you going just with how it felt? For what it's worth, it didn't seem to me.

Perhaps the apparent hallucination they mentioned in their comment?

You mean fabrication?

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#177

Post by VerifiedReports » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:38 AM UTC

trueno wrote: post #175

goodmythical wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> Haven't you heard? It's cool to dislike things "because AI". There's no explicit rules against it, but I cannot stand this type of sarcastic im anti-everyone-else commentary. Super reddit-coded, and you could have made your point without it. There's a lot of discussion to have about that point actually, but I'm pretty sure we've all been collectively scrolling long enough to just kind of roll our eyes at this stuff…

Look out: It's forbidden to compare HN to Reddit!

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#178

Post by matwood » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:39 AM UTC

ghywertelling wrote: post #172

Mathnerd314 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a specific writing style for globalized English that AI's use. And then this post also had none of the stylistic flourishes that a real author might add. And then simple things like constructing a table of 68 libraries or whatever organized by relatively subjective categories. That is something that nobody is going to do by hand.

There is a new term "load-bearing" which is used a lot in my usage of AI. Has anyone else encountered this term being used a lot in their conversations? Or is it a quirk of personalization?

I use load-bearing all the time in conversation. People need to be careful that just because they don’t use certain phrases, it doesn’t automatically mean AI.

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#179

Post by trueno » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:43 AM UTC

VerifiedReports wrote: post #177

trueno wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Haven't you heard? It's cool to dislike things "because AI". There's no explicit rules against it, but I cannot stand this type of sarcastic im anti-everyone-else commentary. Super reddit-coded, and you could have made your point without it. There's a lot of discussion to have about that point actually, but I'm pretty sure we've all been collectively scrolling long enough to just kind of roll our eyes at this stuff…

Look out: It's forbidden to compare HN to Reddit!

frick

Re: I decompiled the White House's new app

#180

Post by gitaarik » Sun, Mar 29, 2026, 5:54 AM UTC

colesantiago wrote: post #2

This is a pretty standard decomplation of an Android app. I am sure if you decompile other apps used by hundreds of thousands of people, you would find all sorts of tracking in there. Thanks for helping the White House improve their app security for free though.

True for any random game app in the Play store, and flashlight and note apps. But well reputable companies don't put too much weirdness into their apps.