Google backdoor into all android phones.

[tearlach2]

As someone else said, we already knew google could do this since they did it before. Considering also the back and forth sync that constantly goes on between our phones and google, it seems kind of ridiculous to think that google would not have any sort of control over that. And to echo another point, we trust google with all of our sensitive information, so I don't see this as anything ridiculous. Frankly, I love the fact that google stepped in, manned up, and not only wiped out the dangerous apps, but theyre pushing an update to remove any code that may be left behind and repair what damage may be done. Google needs to keep some last line of defense to ensure the safety of its users, and clearly it works well. Is it possible that google is going to one day flip out and decide to turn into skynet and try and destroy your life, maybe. But i honestly think its pointless to go crying over what if scenarios until we have a reason to. When google takes a turn in a bad direction and starts using brute force to control our phones and how we use them, then it will be an issue and people will react accordingly. Until then, be thankful google is looking out for you and was able to take action so quickly

Frankly I'm astonished by the support of this and it makes me wonder. I'm astonished by people saying I should be thanking google for this, rather than helping me figure out how to disable this, I'm not asking for advice on how to thank google, I'm sure I can figure out where to send that email.
Google can keep this for the sheep, I just want to disable it on my phone. I want to be sure Google cannot erase a program, whether I am stupid or not. And I'm not trying to be a contrarian, but that viewpoint of wait and see is basically the blueprint of every bad scenario in human history.

EDIT: I guess I should be more clear on what kind of things I like. I like to have a phone that can go on the internet. I like to have a phone that can send and recieve SMS. I like a phone that can run Dalvik VM Java apps. But I don't like a phone that can have apps I have installed on it taken off without my knowledge or other things on the OS side messed with. Putting the phone in Airplane mode to prevent Google from deleting apps or otherwise rummaging through it is also something though which I do not like.

 

[doomer4life]

I'm pretty sure several were caused by overreacting and jumping to conclusions

Sent from my DROIDX using DroidForums App

 

[pyro6128]

I'm just saying I doubt that google honestly cares about that kama sutra app you downloaded. Its not like theyre removing apps to mess with people. Theyre a publicly traded company worth around 600 a share, do you think theyre going to just start screwing with peoples phones for the hell of it. Theyre insuring their investment. I think people are overreacting. You have to take a wait and see attitude because its foolish to assume that such a large company thats constantly in the public eye is all of a sudden going to maliciously attack its clients and destroy its business.

But like you said, thats not what youre asking. I mean this in the most respectful way possible, but if you didn't know about google's capabilities in regards to your phone and its software, then you don't know enough about the software to be able to accomplish what youre asking. Again, no disrespect intended at all.

 

[Detonation]

I'm with the OP on this one. I'm fine with google having my data, but I don't like how they could just automatically change something on my device without ANY consent. Send out a urgent notification over and over, but at least make the end user take some action first.

Google going all skynet on us is a very unlikely situation, but what happens when this automatic push/update system gets comprised? Like when a hacker figures out how to use it and then starts pushing malware and viruses to your phone? This "wait and see" attitude you're suggest is nonsense. Let's wait for something to go wrong and then try to fix it? Wouldn't it make more sense to just prevent it in the first place?

 

[Explosivpotato]

Not sure how the OP missed this part of owning a smartphone.

News Flash: Google knows where you are at all times (latitude, google maps), they have access to all your emails (gmail), they know how many apps you have (usage statistics reporting), they know how many ads you see on your phone (usage statistics reporting again), and they can remove any apps from your phone that they find to be malicious or otherwise in violation of the market terms of service (provided the app came from the market).

Google has a back door into your phone. If they didn't, the entire android platform could collapse in a matter of months. Not everyone reads forums and tech news. They could download one of these malicious apps and never realize what it was doing. This is a privacy concern that
jeopardizes Google AND you. You signed up for this when you got the phone! I just don't understand why you're so shocked by all of this.

 

[Skull One]

I'm not trying to be a jerk but why in the world would you give ANYONE that level of access to your phone? Or will you just defend Google to any length as you just did? I'm sorry but the idea that google can come into my phone without my knowledge makes me really upset. No it wasn't explained to me, I'm damned well sure many others didn't understand that google had carte blanche into my or their phones. I'm mad that other people are defending what I feel is indefensible.

It is a shame you had to edit this post before I was able to respond. Your original "Are you high?" comment at the beginning was the funniest post of 2011 so far. I seriously laughed myself to sleep to that one.

Now to address the rest of your comment.

I really do have to question your grasp of what is consider intrusive. Since you are using a Droid X, I can safely surmise that you are a in the US. Which means at any given moment, the IRS knows exactly how much you have made so far in your lifetime, if you have a job. Your city, county, state and federal governments have your social security number on file as well as a detailed history of every interaction you have ever had with those agencies. If you have any banking instruments such as checks, debit card or credit cards, the issuing agencies have a history of every financial transaction you have ever made.

Please tell me how Google having the ability to remove an app from your phone is more intrusive than what I have stated. Because if you aren't complaining about the above, you really should quit complaining about Google.

Since when does a manufacture have the responsibility to spoon feed you the hows, whens and whys of their products? They provide documentation for a reason. You are responsible for reading it. You have no one to blame but yourself for the lack of knowledge.

I see you have liberty rom, so do I. What are the words written below the Liberty logo as your sig tag? Before you come in here metoo'ing how many proprietary google apps have you deleted or had modified in the course of theming a rom or installing a rom for that matter. And then you defend another poster's saying I should accept that google knows whats best for me, in saying I should read google's TOS? Please, I love my android phone, but you guys who obviously like your android phones too are saying you understood google had a backdoor they can use at anytime? I mean really, isn't this the first kind of thing you would try and disable?
And trying to lump in dumb and dumber by saying apple and ms do it doesn't make it right. That a logical fallacy people have learned in grade school.

Where to begin with that response. The United States Library of Congress has on file that you are now legally allowed to "Jail Break" your phone so that you may modify it as you see fit as long as you do not break any other laws. It was modification introduced to the DMCA recently. That means he has the right to modify his phone as he sees fit. IE theme it.

And please don't try to use the "doesn't make it right" argument here. Because you forgot the second part of that lesson that you learned in grade school. The consumer can buy a different product if they are not pleased with the manufactures work or business practices. Which means you only have yourself to blame if you continue to use the phone.

Would you happen to know if it is based on the market app? I pretty much side load everything I use. Would you have any advice on what attributes the package would be using while looking at all the packages in package manager? Possibly the RemoveAssetReciever attribute?

This is where I have a question. Why do you "side load" everything? Since the Droid X is sold for use on the Verizon Wireless network, it comes pre-installed with the market app. This should have every app ever published to the Google market place. Now it does filter it for your version of Android and your devices capabilities. But that shouldn't be a major issue.

Now there is an assumption I can make. You are pirating applications that are for sale on the Google Market. This practice would then justify your concern of Google's ability to remove apps from your phone that you have installed. Because basically they could remove everything you have stolen if you are in fact pirating the software applications.

If this scenario is the case. Your arguments just lost all value for a logical discussion.

I didn't have the droidx when the guy made the two test programs, I only read about that earlier today on tomshardware. And really, I'd like full disclosure about what exactly they can see, and delete without my knowledge.

I believe we have already covered that that answer is available if you should like to take the time to read all the legal documents.

Frankly I'm astonished by the support of this and it makes me wonder. I'm astonished by people saying I should be thanking google for this, rather than helping me figure out how to disable this, I'm not asking for advice on how to thank google, I'm sure I can figure out where to send that email.
Google can keep this for the sheep, I just want to disable it on my phone. I want to be sure Google cannot erase a program, whether I am stupid or not. And I'm not trying to be a contrarian, but that viewpoint of wait and see is basically the blueprint of every bad scenario in human history.

EDIT: I guess I should be more clear on what kind of things I like. I like to have a phone that can go on the internet. I like to have a phone that can send and recieve SMS. I like a phone that can run Dalvik VM Java apps. But I don't like a phone that can have apps I have installed on it taken off without my knowledge or other things on the OS side messed with. Putting the phone in Airplane mode to prevent Google from deleting apps or otherwise rummaging through it is also something though which I do not like.

I am astonished that you haven't taken the time to read a legal document that you have agreed to abide by when you activated the phone. That right there should bother you more than anything else you or anyone else has said. You the consumer had the power to be proactive and you failed to exercise your rights. Because you failed to exercise your rights and because you blindly signed off on the legal documents, you have left your self with no recourse except to sell the phone and move on.

 

[Natey2]

What's there to obscure? Do you not realize that pretty much your most sensitive data is already accessible with gmail? google voice? google search?

As soon as you access the internet, you're leaving all kinds of footprints and many 3rd parties are getting info on you. Google accessing my device is the least of my concerns (actually really doesn't concern me at all). I just find this entire argument somewhat puzzling.

Yes, forget Google for a minute... *Any* app that has access to your logs can get any data that you copy to clipboard, and all your contacts' email when you synch:

http://www.droidforums.net/forum/dr...what-my-android-apps-doing-behind-scenes.html

Sent from my DROIDX using DroidForums App

 

[TheOldFart]

The OP's post reminds me of a guy who I used to work with. He was paranoid about cookies on his work computer, so he set it to review every cookie. He would reject any and every cookie that showed up. We both used weather sites to check the weather. When I went into Weather Channel or Weather Underground it would show my preferred location. His, of course, would not because he had rejected the cookie. Then he would complain about that and ask why mine worked so well, while he always had to enter his location again.

Those who are complaining about Google's ability to remove apps will also likely be the first ones to complain about not having that ability when they are not aware of a harmful app that Google cannot remove and their phone becomes useless. I welcome that ability for my protection.

 

[Explosivpotato]

Those who are complaining about Google's ability to remove apps will also likely be the first ones to complain about not having that ability when they are not aware of a harmful app that Google cannot remove and their phone becomes useless. I welcome that ability for my protection.

+ 1. In writing a document tracking script for work I have to poll the user's Outlook inbox to check for responses on a certain topic. This prompts a security request, which asks the user if they want to allow access. 9 times out of 10, the user hits "no" and then comes complaining to me that my script is "broken" and that I obviously have no idea what I'm doing.

Sorry, my script is fine, but *something* is broken for sure. :icon_evil:

 

[SixStringTheory]

This thread is useless without a quote from the Android Market Terms of Service, which you can read here: Android Market Terms of Service

"2.4 From time to time, Google may discover a Product on the Market that violates the Android Market Developer Distribution Agreement or other legal agreements, laws, regulations or policies. You agree that in such an instance Google retains the right to remotely remove those applications from your Device at its sole discretion."

So, OP. With all due respect. This is not an undocumented feature. You agreed to it going in. And if you didn't know about it it's only because you didn't read it. No one's out to get you. No one snuck into your phone. You just didn't understand how things work and are now upset about it, but that's really all on you.

But the solution is simple. If you don't like how Google runs, how Android runs, then don't use it...

 

[Skull One]

This thread is useless without a quote from the Android Market Terms of Service, which you can read here: Android Market Terms of Service

"2.4 From time to time, Google may discover a Product on the Market that violates the Android Market Developer Distribution Agreement or other legal agreements, laws, regulations or policies. You agree that in such an instance Google retains the right to remotely remove those applications from your Device at its sole discretion."

So, OP. With all due respect. This is not an undocumented feature. You agreed to it going in. And if you didn't know about it it's only because you didn't read it. No one's out to get you. No one snuck into your phone. You just didn't understand how things work and are now upset about it, but that's really all on you.

But the solution is simple. If you don't like how Google runs, how Android runs, then don't use it...

*sniff*

I have avoided posting it so he would actually take the time and read it. Now you had saved him from himself.

I am a sad panda.

 

[brando56894]

I with everyone else, I could care less about this. Like others said: google isnt out to mess with your phone and become all apple like and tell you what apps you can and cant have on your phone, theyre doing it as a safety feature. If this backdoor was non-existant the 260,000 phones that were infected would still be infected, people would be pissed off and yell at google for not doing anything about it, ditch android and Google would lose market share. Just like explosivepotato and theoldfart said, most people have no idea about the security of their computer/device and randomly click yes or no. Google is playing doctor here, phones are infected and people don't know how to remove the infection so google swoops in and does it for them.

I would think that this backdoor lies somewhere in the OTA function, since thats how it's sent out. If you're really that paranoid about it, learn C, look through the AOSP code and compile a rom yourself without the "scary" features in it!

 

[pyro6128]

This thread is useless without a quote from the Android Market Terms of Service, which you can read here: Android Market Terms of Service

"2.4 From time to time, Google may discover a Product on the Market that violates the Android Market Developer Distribution Agreement or other legal agreements, laws, regulations or policies. You agree that in such an instance Google retains the right to remotely remove those applications from your Device at its sole discretion."

So, OP. With all due respect. This is not an undocumented feature. You agreed to it going in. And if you didn't know about it it's only because you didn't read it. No one's out to get you. No one snuck into your phone. You just didn't understand how things work and are now upset about it, but that's really all on you.

But the solution is simple. If you don't like how Google runs, how Android runs, then don't use it...

well played good sir, well played

/thread

 

[abn75]

This is old news. Did you miss it the last time google did it? Actually read the terms before you accept them.

Sent from my DX running DS4.2

 

[kptphalkon]

Skull's massive reply brought light to my heart.

Have my babies good sir