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Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

gultsch.social

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Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#41

Post by exe34 »

nonrandomstring wrote: post #36
Dibby053 wrote: post #11

I use an open source SPAM call blocker (Yet another call blocker), which works fairly OK by querying a local spam phone number database. Recently Google Play decided to display a permanent notification prompting me to uninstall that "dangerous" app because it could "damage" my device. It's impossible to disable this notification. This app hasn't been updated in years. It has no ads. The only network request it makes…

Fake security is a big problem to those of us who are concerned with real security. Mischievous and dishonest use of "security" as an cover by policy bullies, profiteers and other gangsters is as much a threat as worms, viruses, zero-days, phishing scams, data leaks all other kinds of actual security problem. Not least because it weakens rational expectations and evaluations of security and substitutes blind trust in…

You have to realise when a large tech company says "security", they mean their security from your attempts to defend yourself. E.g. most of the locking down of devices isn't to make it harder for attackers who want your data (which would defeat their own objectives) but to keep things like DRM keys from you.

Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#42

Post by axelthegerman »

carstenhag wrote: post #29
bertman wrote: post #2

Developer: "Google has just removed #Conversations_im from the Play Store because they think we are uploading the user’s contact list. We don’t." and "To be clear: They didn’t just reject an update. They outright removed the app entirely. Otherwise my plan B would have been to remove the contacts permission which is used to display the name and profile picture locally if the XMPP address matches an entry in the users…

Talk with Google, usually this stuff can be resolved. Their bots flag stuff because of reasons. Yes, sometimes it's BS, but often there's something that you have missed to clarify.

Lol this must be a bigger joke than the app being removed in the first place.

I never heard of anyone who was able to talk to anyone at Google. HN is full of folks getting apps suspended, locked out of their Google account and so on... Not being able to talk to someone is sometimes actually the only problem (though we all know the app store has much more issues than just that)

Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#43

Post by exe34 »

malfist wrote: post #26
Dibby053 wrote: post #11

I use an open source SPAM call blocker (Yet another call blocker), which works fairly OK by querying a local spam phone number database. Recently Google Play decided to display a permanent notification prompting me to uninstall that "dangerous" app because it could "damage" my device. It's impossible to disable this notification. This app hasn't been updated in years. It has no ads. The only network request it makes…

Check out the Aurora store, it's a drop in replacement for the play store withot the Google nonsense. I started using it after Google refused to let me install watch faces, because the apps hadn't been updated for foldable phones.

Do you log in with your google account? I understand that doing this could get one banned from the google polity. The anonymous log in doesn't have search working, last time I tried.

Edit: the trick I found was to search on google.com in the browser, then click on the link until it gives you the option to open in aurora v/s play store.

Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#44

Post by pawelmurias »

realusername wrote: post #13
Dibby053 wrote: post #11

I use an open source SPAM call blocker (Yet another call blocker), which works fairly OK by querying a local spam phone number database. Recently Google Play decided to display a permanent notification prompting me to uninstall that "dangerous" app because it could "damage" my device. It's impossible to disable this notification. This app hasn't been updated in years. It has no ads. The only network request it makes…

It's just a PR game of shifting blame. Who's responsible of all those privacy issues on mobile? Google's own ad machine powered by the GMS running as privileged user or the apps? They chose quickly. Both companies response to the press has been to blame the apps again and again hoping that it would be enough to continue what they are doing. Occasionally they even blame the users directly, the play store page on insta…

Per the amount of access they have some shit tier third parties will steal more privacy as they won't give a damn about it. Most people don't mind the ad company measuring your general profile of interests but really don't want people to read their messages.

Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#45

Post by jeroenhd »

MattJ100 wrote: post #5

This has been happening to a bunch of XMPP apps recently, and as a maintainer of another one (which closely based on Conversations) I'm fearing the worst next time I submit an update. The worst part is the lack of communication from Google about what they think the problem is. There are plenty of apps that do actually upload contact lists to servers (hi WhatsApp, etc.), and they are still listed on the store. Many XM…

> what they think the problem is

See, that's probably where you're going wrong: I doubt a human looked at any of these apps and thought "this is suspicious".

Instead, I think Google is using some kind of AI for determining this stuff. The only human component I expect to be present would be people working to prevent large apps that do upload your contacts to the cloud (WhatsApp and friends) from getting flagged automatically.

Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#46

Post by yaky »

kaptainscarlet wrote: post #21

XMPP as a protocol is pretty much dead on Android with all the battery optimisations in the newer versions. You can't get a decent user experience unless you integrate it with Firebase.

This was quite the opposite for me. Main reason my wife and I used XMPP for several years was because Conversations was the only app to get timely notifications on both googled and de-googled Android. And this worked until at least Android 11. At the time, Riot.im (now Element) either drained my battery checking for notifications without Google Play Services, or seemed to work fine, but did not get notifications in time even with Google Play Services.

What you're describing also has been true for iOS for a while. Apps cannot do long-polling and require a push notification server (usually provided by the app maker, e.g: siskin, snikket, chatsecure), and that adds another point of failure.

Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#47

Post by SamWhited »

paulcarroty wrote: post #10

Out of curiosity, where's xmpp still popular?

It's used by a lot of the big commercial platforms because it's well understood and has libraries for every system and language ever invented just about. Eg. Zoom and Jitsi both use XMPP (Zoom for Chat, Jitsi for chat and signaling), WhatsApp used to just have their entire backend be an off the shelf XMPP server, Cisco Jabber which is still popular in "enterprise" uses it, etc.

And for other individuals just wanting to talk with their parents it's just a chat app, they don't care if it's XMPP or not, Conversations is just really nice to use.

Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#48

Post by nonrandomstring »

exe34 wrote: post #41
nonrandomstring wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fake security is a big problem to those of us who are concerned with real security. Mischievous and dishonest use of "security" as an cover by policy bullies, profiteers and other gangsters is as much a threat as worms, viruses, zero-days, phishing scams, data leaks all other kinds of actual security problem. Not least because it weakens rational expectations and evaluations of security and substitutes blind trust in…

You have to realise when a large tech company says "security", they mean their security from your attempts to defend yourself. E.g. most of the locking down of devices isn't to make it harder for attackers who want your data (which would defeat their own objectives) but to keep things like DRM keys from you.

Absolutely right. This is what I called "Zero Sum Security" (your security is my insecurity), and written about here [0] and discussed with Bruce Schneier.

It's a sure sign of an underlying toxic and abusive relationship.

[0] https://techrights.org/o/2021/11/29/teaching-cybersecurity/

Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#49

Post by GuB-42 »

Dibby053 wrote: post #11

I use an open source SPAM call blocker (Yet another call blocker), which works fairly OK by querying a local spam phone number database. Recently Google Play decided to display a permanent notification prompting me to uninstall that "dangerous" app because it could "damage" my device. It's impossible to disable this notification. This app hasn't been updated in years. It has no ads. The only network request it makes…

It has a pretty bad set of permissions, which are necessary for it to function, but still scary for Google algorithms. Google doesn't know that its GET request doesn't get orders from a botnet and leaks sensitive data the app has access to.

Also, if the app hasn't been updated for years, chances are that it targets and outdated version of Android, which works, but is considered suspicions by Google as it is also a way to bypass some security checks in recent Android versions.

There are probably many other criteria but I think these are the most likely.

Not saying it is a good thing, but it explains the reasoning. I wish Google did human reviews and not rely that much on their bots, but then that's what Apple does, and it is even more locked down. Maybe try F-Droid, it is an alternative app store dedicated to open source.

Re: Google has removed Conversations_im from the Play Store

#50

Post by sdflhasjd »

MattJ100 wrote: post #25
kaptainscarlet wrote: post #21

XMPP as a protocol is pretty much dead on Android with all the battery optimisations in the newer versions. You can't get a decent user experience unless you integrate it with Firebase.

Conversations has supported Google push notifications since 2016, long before Android started getting more aggressive about battery optimizations. It's been a standard feature of XMPP mobile apps for as long as it's been necessary.

These are surely not purely client-side XMPP... clients, though? In order for you to receive push notifications, some server somewhere is connecting as you in order to relay the messages through GCM.
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