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Google has a secret browser hidden inside the settings

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Re: Google has a secret browser hidden inside the settings

#171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why they’re not using the system default webview… Does this mean it’s WebKit instead of Blink? If it is Blink, it seems likely that it’s not as up to date as the one provided by Chrome. EDIT: just noticed the docs link, yeah it’s WebKit.

It's not actually WebKit, that's just a package name that was poorly chosen a decade ago. https://developer.android.com/develop/ui/views/layout/webapp... It's the system WebView, it's just not using Custom Tabs. https://developer.chrome.com/docs/android/custom-tabs/

Ah, my bad!

I was confusing WebView with custom tabs, sorry about that! Been a while since I've needed either for anything.

Re: Google has a secret browser hidden inside the settings

#172
post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't trust google for multiple reasons, wont use them for anything important or start new services, I am careful to what I search, etc... However, as far as my knowledge tells me Google is the best in the biz when it comes to security. While iPhones 0 click exploits cause the death of journalists and leak nudes of billionaires; The biggest 'Android' exploit Pegasus has requires going to some website, downloading a…

Are you sure about biggest Android exploit? Tests conducted by Project Zero confirm that those four vulnerabilities allow an attacker to remotely compromise a phone at the baseband level with no user interaction, and require only that the attacker know the victim's phone number. [1] [1] https://googleprojectzero.blogspot.com/2023/03/multiple-inte...

Do you have evidence Pegasus used this?

Re: Google has a secret browser hidden inside the settings

#173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't trust google for multiple reasons, wont use them for anything important or start new services, I am careful to what I search, etc... However, as far as my knowledge tells me Google is the best in the biz when it comes to security. While iPhones 0 click exploits cause the death of journalists and leak nudes of billionaires; The biggest 'Android' exploit Pegasus has requires going to some website, downloading a…

Google is substantially wiretapped

This is baseless fud.

Re: Google has a secret browser hidden inside the settings

#174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The user is generally never the adversary in any legitimate security situation. Ignorance might be but that’s not something inherent to the user and an area for improvement.

In this case the “user” is in part the person granting controlled access. The person moving the mouse is not the user in total. Take a easier example an atm machine. If a person touching it can access accounts/remove money, there is no question about it being a security problem.

Yeah, it's important to make a distinction between the "user" and the device owner. Often those are the same person but not always. Treating the user as an adversary can be okay in some circumstances, but treating the device owner as an adversary is never acceptable in my opinion.

Re: Google has a secret browser hidden inside the settings

#175
I remember having to do tricks like those to unlock an account-locked Android device once (the kind that wouldn't go away even if you reset the phone).

The browser could be used to download an APK which triggered the Google Account login screen. Then you could login with a throwaway account and that would unlock the device.

Re: Google has a secret browser hidden inside the settings

#177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem very sure that those are the only two security risks to an expected browser being available on an otherwise managed device. I'm pretty certain there may be other risks.

One can absolutely make an argument for a great many risks to be classified under security concern: there are certainly more than just these two. Doing so is simply reductio ad absurdum. To expand on this, we can if we choose classify all parental controls under general access control, and within a principle of least privilege further classify the following as legitimate security risks: - access to the internet - acc…

Please take this as critical feedback, and not as a personal attack: The comments which you are making here suggest that you shouldn't develop any software which in any way touches personal data without significant upskilling on IT security. You're making false comments with complete confidence.

Most security scenarios came about as a result of attackers being able to bring systems into absurd situations, and moving systems through unintended pathways.

"Reductio ad absurdum" could apply to most digital exploits before they've happened. "Why would the system get into that state?"

That's a key difference between physical security and digital security:

- In a physical situation, I need to worry about what a typical criminal trying to break into my home or business might do. That requires reasonable measures.

- In digital security, I need to worry about what the most absurdly creative attacker on the internet might do (and potentially bundle up as a script / worm / virus / etc.). I do need to worry about scenarios which might seem absurd for physical security.

If you engineer classifying only "reasonable" scenarios as security risks, your system WILL eventually be compromised, and there WILL be a data leak. That shift in mind set happened around two decades ago, when the internet went from a friendly neighborhood of academics to the wild, wild west, with increasingly creative criminals attacking systems from countries many people in America have never heard of, and certainly where cross-border law enforcement is impractical.

I've seen people like you design systems, and that HAS led to user harm and severe damages to the companies where they worked. At this point, this should be security 101 for anyone building software.

Re: Google has a secret browser hidden inside the settings

#178
post #10

Google's increasingly cavalier attitude towards security is concerning: 1) Kids WILL use this to bypass parental / school controls as soon as they learn about it 2) In some contexts (especially as high-stakes test settings, but also some military/prison/finance/medical/legal/etc. settings) this IS a direct security risk 3) Given the embedded browser is not secure, if a lot of kids do this, it WILL lead to someone exp…

> Google's increasingly cavalier attitude towards security is concerning: > [3 bullet points unrelated to security] Security is a field related to protecting device-users from malicious actors. Your 3 examples all fall broadly under parental-controls, which are about controlling & monitoring a user's use & access of their device - a scenario within whichc the user is the adversary, not external actors. That may be an…

This is literally a privilege-escalation attack: i.e. the user escapes from controls that are imposed on them by the device manager (which may well not be the user, but a corporate MDM platform).

Are you suggesting that privilege-escalation attacks are not security risks?

Re: Google has a secret browser hidden inside the settings

#180
post #143
post #72

This guy's experience reporting a bug to Google reminds me of mine: Me: Here's a bug in Google Sheets that exposes deleted content to third parties. Google: Not a bug. Working as expected, closing issue. Me: Really? I was personally harmed by this bug while using the application. Google: Actually, it is a bug but it's a longtime known issue, therefore you are not eligible for bug bounty. Closing issue.

That is, to a T, almost identical to my experience reporting a vulnerability to Google too. Me: Here's a bug in Gmail that allows spoofed email to scrub DKIM failures and appear legitimate Google: "Won't fix (Intended Behavior)" Me: Really? Google intends to allow spoofed email to appear legitimate in its interface? Google: Actually, it's a known issue

I wonder if you can string it further.

You: We are OK to publish a blog post about it then, right?

Google: ...

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