Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

eff.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 207 posts

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#51

Post by Nursie »

rtpg wrote: post #5
davedx wrote: post #3

I think it's a great feature. There have definitely been some apps where I would have liked to use them but they've had permissions requirements that I did not believe the app's core functionality needed.

every time I open facebook messanger with gps enabled, I see it querying my location. I hate it so much. Would love to be able to turn that off

I tend to keep GPS switched off in the phone settings because of this sort of thing.

FB is not allowed on my device in the first place because I don't trust it, but it's not the only offender. It really annoys me when I'm in-app or in-browser and I see the GPS icon pop up and start trying to get a lock. Sometimes even before the browser has asked if a page is allowed to have the location.

The answer is no!

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#52

Post by tomp »

jackgavigan wrote: post #18

This is one area where iOS stands head and shoulders above Android. I used to run Cyanogenmod and I remember deciding to not upgrade the Facebook app because doing so would have required giving it a slew of permissions, including the ability to "directly call phone numbers". By contrast, in iOS, I can choose which apps have access to my location, contacts, etc. I know that Apple's track record when it comes to privac…

So far, I've been an Android fan (I love the customizability and all), but if anything will make me buy an iPhone, it's this feature.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#53

Post by lclarkmichalek »

rtpg wrote: post #5
davedx wrote: post #3

I think it's a great feature. There have definitely been some apps where I would have liked to use them but they've had permissions requirements that I did not believe the app's core functionality needed.

every time I open facebook messanger with gps enabled, I see it querying my location. I hate it so much. Would love to be able to turn that off

Open the Facebook app -> App Settings -> Messenger location services -> Uncheck Location is on

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#54

Post by yareally »

DanBC wrote: post #34
ansible wrote: post #19

The original intention (as explained by Dianne Hackborn among others) is that if the user sees the app requesting too many capabilities... the user should simply choose not to install the app. Having the user needing to understand all the different capabilities is too much. Having a bunch of pop-ups ( cough Vista) is also bad UI design. The current set of capabilities is too technical for end users to really understa…

> Have a single fake IMEI number, for example. How would that work in countries where modifying the IMEI is illegal? UK law (note prison sentence) http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2002/31/section/1 I don't know if this is current US law or not. Here's one example http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:S.3186.IS :

It would modify it on the application level (user apps are sandboxed anyways), but not on the system/telephony level. System would still be aware of what the real IMEI is, just not whatever shady app requesting the permission.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#55

Post by mike-cardwell »

wting wrote: post #14

If you have root you can still enable it with market apps.[0][1] However something like this needs to be integrated tightly like iOS and apps need to be aware they may not receive requested permissions. I still use App Ops in Kit Kat and it silently breaks apps all the time. Apps expect to be able request information (e.g. contact details) and crash or stall when they can't. In that respect, LBE Privacy Guard[2] was…

Patch CyanogenMod with OpenPDroid, and install that. That's what I did.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#56

Post by dhekir »

ansible wrote: post #19

The original intention (as explained by Dianne Hackborn among others) is that if the user sees the app requesting too many capabilities... the user should simply choose not to install the app. Having the user needing to understand all the different capabilities is too much. Having a bunch of pop-ups ( cough Vista) is also bad UI design. The current set of capabilities is too technical for end users to really understa…

I can choose not to install an app, but Google prevents me from doing it intelligently, that is, filtering the crappy apps demanding ridiculous permissions. I have to manually click on dozens of them before finding one that does not require, say, Internet access. APEFS (http://www.bs.informatik.uni-siegen.de/forschung/apefs) allowed such filtering, but since Google Play was updated some months ago, it stopped working and was removed. Now I have to resort to F-Droid for free apps, but there are not nearly as many as in Google Play.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#57

Post by biehl »

uniray wrote: post #46

I'm surprised at the EFF. this post seems intended to save face for them rather than anything else. They had a post recently lauding App Ops although it was never officially released, announced nor documented. And it certainly was not accessible to the average user. Also it was obviously not compatible with most apps, as they didn’t fail too gracefully. Again: App Ops Was Never Meant For End Users, Used For Internal…

Because using "beta" features from Google is unthinkable?

I think it makes perfect sense to laud even small steps in the right direction (beta-quality features etc.) and comment negatively on steps in the wrong direction (removing privacy options for users).

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#58

Post by nileshtrivedi »

Nursie wrote: post #42
CalRobert wrote: post #24

I'm probably going to turn in to that old guy with tin foil who can't play any games because nobody supports his choice of platform, but I really miss when computers were devices you could buy and then put your choice of OS on. Phones are pretty much just little ARM computers, why the hell don't I just install Ubuntu, Firefox OS, Android, WinPhone, Symbian, whatever? I could format a microSD card to boot from and go…

One of the issues with that is that devices on ARM systems are not as discoverable as a lot of other systems. You tend to need a kernel built for a particular processor variant, and it needs a device map of some sort for your specific device or it won't know how to find any of the stuff on the board and may just crash. Without this map you just can't boot. Graphics are also very non-open at the moment, so it can be v…

Linux supports Device Tree mechanism which solves this issue. You would download a kernel for the correct processor and a .dts file that describes the phone's hardware.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#59

Post by nileshtrivedi »

CalRobert wrote: post #35
StavrosK wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not? I installed Ubuntu the other day, it was trivial. Plus, there's a multitude of custom ROMs.

Yeah, but what you would call trivial might be insurmountable for lots of people. Cyanogenmod already has a lot of the privacy features missing in Android, but dicking around with clockworkmod recovery, etc. is pretty daunting.

Cyanogenmod now provides a really easy installer that takes care of everything (including unlocking of the bootloader). I used it with my Nexus S last week without any hassles.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#60

Post by thaumasiotes »

leoedin wrote: post #40
DanBC wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Have a single fake IMEI number, for example. How would that work in countries where modifying the IMEI is illegal? UK law (note prison sentence) http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2002/31/section/1 I don't know if this is current US law or not. Here's one example http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:S.3186.IS :

That law seems particularly draconian. I assume it's an attempt to criminalise the changing of IMEIs on stolen phones? Reading that is slightly alarming, if only because I wouldn't have even considered that it could be illegal before today. I wonder how many other pieces of legislation I've naively violated?

http://www.amazon.com/Three-Felonies-Day-Target-Innocent/dp/...
Post reply on HN