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Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

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Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#281

Post by grapheneos »

lenerdenator wrote: post #121
catlikesshrimp wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AOSP is still open. The problem is nobody wants to bear the (monumental) cost of polishing and convincing brands to allow installing it in THEIR devices. Google was motivated back then for creating an alternative and openness was a good bait.

The fact that no one wants to bear the cost to pre-load it on devices, when combined with the fact that it's not nearly as easy to install OSes on mobile devices as it is on most laptop/desktop/server machines, means that it might as well be closed-source. The point of software is to be executed. If I don't have a good way to execute the software for its intended purpose, I have a collection of ones and zeros, and no…

It's much easier to install another OS on smartphones supporting it well, not harder.

https://grapheneos.org/install/web

Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#282

Post by grapheneos »

exceptione wrote: post #150
gruez wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's also incorrect, because the gmscompat app is just a helper app. Play services can and does request additional permissions. Those permissions are handled by the OS under the play services app, not gmscompat. If you want RCS for instance, you must grant play services and google messages phone and ICC auth access, which isn't seen in gmscompat at all.

> That's also incorrect, because the gmscompat app is just a helper app. Hmm, ok. I was reasoning the helper app was needed to get around the default assumptions from Google Play Services. > Those permissions are handled by the OS under the play services app Yes, but I assume you don't mean that as that GOS makes special hard-coded provisions for the play services. GOS claims to run Play Services like any other unpri…

Google Mobile Services apps installed on GrapheneOS including Play services run as regular sandboxed apps. They receive absolutely no special access compared to other apps by installing and running them. There are the standard permission toggles for granting those but none of those are required for typical usage to provide compatibility with many apps from the Play Store depending on their services.

There are additional special permission toggles for RCS and Android Auto. The issue with RCS is mainly that they split the implementation across Google Messages and Play services. Android's standard permission model gives special access to the app selected by the user as the messaging app but Google Messages expects Play services to have special access too.

The shims defined with GmsCompatConfig are a small subset of the overall compatibility layer. It has many shims which need to actually implement the functionality such as remapping the Play Store using privileged installation APIs to the regular ones available to user installed app stores. It has to remap the APIs used by dynamite modules to ones not requiring privileged SELinux policies too. It has a mix of shims which simply stub out the functionality and many which need to handle it as a regular sandboxed app would need to do it.

Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#283

Post by grapheneos »

asnelt wrote: post #62
exceptione wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That can't be true? https://grapheneos.org/faq#hardware-identifiers > As of Android 10, apps cannot obtain permission to access non-resettable hardware identifiers such as the serial number, MAC addresses, IMEIs/MEIDs, SIM card serial numbers and subscriber IDs. Only privileged apps included in the base system with READ_PRIVILEGED_PHONE_STATE whitelisted can access these hardware identifiers. Apps targeting Android 1…

I couldn't immediately find whether GrapheneOS grants READ_PRIVILEGED_PHONE_STATE to Google Play. It might very well be that the GrapheneOS sandbox spoofs a fake IMEI, and I do hope so. In any case, my parent comment was meant for stock Pixels, as mentioned by armadyl further up in this thread.

The only way to install Google Mobile Services apps including the Play Store on GrapheneOS is as regular sandboxed apps. They aren't granted any of the large number of usual privileged permissions, don't run with the usual far more privileged SELinux policies, aren't used by the OS as a backend for anything and aren't otherwise allowed to do special things by the OS in the usual many ways that is granted. They're regular sandboxed apps on GrapheneOS.

Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#284

Post by grapheneos »

kasabali wrote: post #244
exceptione wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That can't be true? https://grapheneos.org/faq#hardware-identifiers > As of Android 10, apps cannot obtain permission to access non-resettable hardware identifiers such as the serial number, MAC addresses, IMEIs/MEIDs, SIM card serial numbers and subscriber IDs. Only privileged apps included in the base system with READ_PRIVILEGED_PHONE_STATE whitelisted can access these hardware identifiers. Apps targeting Android 1…

Play services isn't an "app", it's a highly privileged system service that has access to everything and some more.

The only way to use Play services on GrapheneOS is as a regular sandboxed app. It runs in the standard app sandbox without any of the usual privileged permissions, privileged SELinux policy and many other forms of special access. It also doesn't get used by the OS as a backend for anything. Our sandboxed Google Play compatibility layer implements this by remapping APIs to ones available to sandboxed apps and stubbing out many which aren't needed.

Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#285

Post by palata »

Ajedi32 wrote: post #178
Ajedi32 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't grant yourself admin access with the official build. Only the Graphene devs have the ability to push changes to the OS on your phone. Yes you can fork the software and build a version with your own signing key, then wipe your phone and install your custom build and thereby take back control, but then is that really still Graphene? I think it's fair to say that that's at least borderline anti software freedo…

Thinking about possible ways they could retain the same security properties without impinging software freedom... maybe there's a way they could make the root of trust default to a signing key embedded in the device's own secure hardware? Then by default that key could sign Graphene's own signing certificate to allow them to push updates, but the user would retain the ability to revoke that signature and sign someone…

I am confused, why were your messages flagged? I disagreed with you, but I didn't see a reason to flag them? Also I don't know how to flag a message, but that's another topic.

Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#286

Post by grapheneos »

maybewhenthesun wrote: post #127
pyrophane wrote: post #8

GrapheneOS actually recommends against using Aurora and instead just using the Play Store, so this shouldn't really hurt users. For extra privacy, you can sign into the Play Store with a Google Account that isn't tied to anything else.

The main reason for me to use GrapheneOS would be to sever the umbilical cord to google. I don't really see the point of using GrapheneOS instead of Stock Android if I then have to use the play store.

Using the Play Store on GrapheneOS whether via sandboxed Google Play or another frontend definitely doesn't defeat any the purpose of it. You do not have to use the Play Store on GrapheneOS, but the privacy and security features it provides are not cancelled out by using it.

GrapheneOS has privacy features such as Contact Scopes and Storage Scopes which are most useful when using privacy invasive apps. Using privacy invasive apps doesn't defeat the point but protecting against those is a core part of the purpose of GrapheneOS. Our Sandboxed Google Play compatibility layer is a privacy feature itself to enable people to use those as regular sandboxed apps without invasive access to be able to run apps depending on them.

Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#287

Post by [deleted] »

megagpt5 wrote: post #75
DaSHacka wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually think there's already a lot of us in the 'community' as-is. I personally describe it as 'Valuing Privacy/Freedom over Security'. One pretty clear example of this is how they don't recommend using FireFox Mobile and F-Droid, both of which I use regardless because I'm not willing to put up with worse privacy/usability tradeoffs in the name of (imo 'hyper-')security. I think it's fine the mission of the proje…

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#288

Post by grapheneos »

einpoklum wrote: post #259
pyrophane wrote: post #8

GrapheneOS actually recommends against using Aurora and instead just using the Play Store, so this shouldn't really hurt users. For extra privacy, you can sign into the Play Store with a Google Account that isn't tied to anything else.

[flagged]

GrapheneOS does not include any support for using a Google account and does not require using Google apps/services. There are many inaccurate statements here about what we supposedly recommend. We do not specifically recommend using the Play Store as a source of apps in the first place. We recommend using the sandboxed Play Store for obtaining apps from the Play Store.

GrapheneOS uses Pixels because those are still the only Android devices with reasonable security including decent updates, working encryption for users without a strong passphrase and the hardware functionality usable to provide decent exploit protection. GrapheneOS is in the process of adding support for upcoming Motorola devices meeting the official requirements.

Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#289

Post by grapheneos »

pyrophane wrote: post #8

GrapheneOS actually recommends against using Aurora and instead just using the Play Store, so this shouldn't really hurt users. For extra privacy, you can sign into the Play Store with a Google Account that isn't tied to anything else.

We don't recommend using the Play Store as a first choice for obtaining apps. Aurora Store is another way to use the Play Store as a source of apps. If someone is using sandboxed Google Play in a profile, it makes sense to use the sandboxed Play Store to install apps. Aurora Store is mainly useful as a workaround for store listings enforcing Play Integrity and we do direct people to it for that.

Aurora Store still works fine. It doesn't require the default-enabled account sharing feature. It's not Aurora Store which is getting blocked but rather account sharing. Account sharing is against Google's terms of use and is now being detected more aggressively. We've warned about this for years but it took longer than expect for them to ramp up banning it. It's likely going to continue getting stricter.

Re: Play Store blocks AuroraStore, hurting GrapheneOS users

#290

Post by grapheneos »

megagpt5 wrote: post #75
DaSHacka wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually think there's already a lot of us in the 'community' as-is. I personally describe it as 'Valuing Privacy/Freedom over Security'. One pretty clear example of this is how they don't recommend using FireFox Mobile and F-Droid, both of which I use regardless because I'm not willing to put up with worse privacy/usability tradeoffs in the name of (imo 'hyper-')security. I think it's fine the mission of the proje…

[flagged]

No one has been banned from our chat rooms for mentioning F-Droid. That's a completely fabricated claim easily disproven with a search. There are a massive number of discussions about it where people often disagree about it.

GrapheneOS has official chat rooms on Matrix and Discord to provide people with multiple options. We also have semi-official Telegram and SimpleX groups.

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