- cross-posted to:
- piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
- cross-posted to:
- piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
You might sideload an Android app, or manually install its APK package, if you’re using a custom version of Android that doesn’t include Google’s Play Store. Alternately, the app might be experimental, under development, or perhaps no longer maintained and offered by its developer. Until now, the existence of sideload-ready APKs on the web was something that seemed to be tolerated, if warned against, by Google.
This quiet standstill is being shaken up by a new feature in Google’s Play Integrity API. As reported by Android Authority, developer tools to push “remediation” dialogs during sideloading debuted at Google’s I/O conference in May, have begun showing up on users’ phones. Sideloaders of apps from the British shop Tesco, fandom app BeyBlade X, and ChatGPT have reported “Get this app from Play” prompts, which cannot be worked around. An Android gaming handheld user encountered a similarly worded prompt from Diablo Immortal on their device three months ago.
Google’s Play Integrity API is how apps have previously blocked access when loaded onto phones that are in some way modified from a stock OS with all Google Play integrations intact. Recently, a popular two-factor authentication app blocked access on rooted phones, including the security-minded GrapheneOS. Apps can call the Play Integrity API and get back an “integrity verdict,” relaying if the phone has a “trustworthy” software environment, has Google Play Protect enabled, and passes other software checks.
Graphene has questioned the veracity of Google’s Integrity API and SafetyNet Attestation systems, recommending instead standard Android hardware attestation. Rahman notes that apps do not have to take an all-or-nothing approach to integrity checking. Rather than block installation entirely, apps could call on the API only during sensitive actions, issuing a warning there. But not having a Play Store connection can also deprive developers of metrics, allow for installation on incompatible devices (and resulting bad reviews), and, of course, open the door to paid app piracy.
The EU is going to be furious about this
I hope so. I don’t want Android to become the new Apple
Nah, I doubt it. The app developers are freely adding this themselves.
The EU should limit Google giving developers this ability is what they mean
I also dislike DRM but I don’t think it makes any sense to make it illegal.
They’re still pissed that people won’t put up with their shitty YouTube app and use Revanced instead, eh?
That’s not on Google Play so it doesn’t affect it. I honestly don’t know what the point of this is.
Oh I see, so it only affects modded apks… They probably want to crack down on all those slightly-shady “spotify premium free”-apks.
No, it only affects vanilla apks where the dev implemented the check. For some reason the dev might forbid to run the app to users that side loaded the app instead of getting it from play store
Patched/modded apks are unaffected because the check is patched out
That seems likely. The question comes down to where the line should be drawn. Allow the apps the be installed and then when the data is eventually reported/found by the app owners to have them file law suits against those who are “stealing” from them, or to not allow the cracked application to be loaded in the first place, which is easily disguised as a security protocol because if an app has code in it that is not originally supposed to be there, it is very possibly a form of malware, which then can hurt the users in the long run or short run if it actually acts malicious and starts doing shit like old school viruses did on PC.
People want to say we own the device so we should be able to do whatever we want, but blatantly allowing people to install cracked apps with keyloggers onto their phones unintentionally will get them sued, and ultimately hurt how many people stay using their products.
Imagine every user and password with the site listed was suddenly just accessible by everyone. It would be a hellscape of credit card companies trying to stop accounts because you order 18 pizzas off the dominos app in Georgia, and another 13 sandwiches in the burger king app at the same time in Jersey.
We need to have the freedom to load apps we trust, but if you look at the standard user base, that’s who they have to make the phones for.
Could do something like make the users agree to terms by taking the phone into developer mode that makes them non responsible somehow? Might not hold up in court when they get sued though. “All the photos I took on my phone got shared online”
People want to say we own the device so we should be able to do whatever we want, but blatantly allowing people to install cracked apps with keyloggers onto their phones unintentionally will get them sued, and ultimately hurt how many people stay using their products.
Imagine every user and password with the site listed was suddenly just accessible by everyone. It would be a hellscape of credit card companies trying to stop accounts because you order 18 pizzas off the dominos app in Georgia, and another 13 sandwiches in the burger king app at the same time in Jersey.
We need to have the freedom to load apps we trust, but if you look at the standard user base, that’s who they have to make the phones for.
It has been 16 years since Android came on the scene. Why do you think that these things are going to become such a big issue now in 2024 and beyond?
Good that most apps I use now are open source but for those few that I still get from Aurora Store it might be a death sentence but perhaps this API could be spoofed?
Ew. Fuck google
I hate having to be on the side of “Defending” google… but this is the app makers fault, They are the ones using whats provided and installing the artificial limitations.
Google just provided the capability to do it. The app makers are executing it.
No, thanks for the clarification. I misunderstood that part.
Can we do anything ?
Custom ROM or just go back to a flip phone.
It’s only going to get worse with the big players from this point on.
I honestly think I’ll be getting a feature phone next time. I’ll keep an old smartphone just for Android Auto and that’s it.
Some time ago, I looked at kaios devices, and they looked really cool. I only didn’t get one because I need to use some banking apps only available for android
I’m pretty new to this sort of stuff. I was planning to buy Google Pixel 8 sometime in November when they usually have sales. And install GrapheneOS. I never used this type of stuff before.
So will I have some trouble installing some stuff like some of mobile games, banking app, emails, etc? I’m in Canada if this help.
This explains why I couldn’t install retroarch on the GalaxyS24 Ultra of a friend via apk or google play store. Would not work, but somehow the Galaxy store version worked….
This seems like a brilliant feature to roll out as they’re getting investigated by the DOJ for being a monopoly.
Also, didn’t the EU declare that Apple needs to allow other app stores on their devices?
This seems like a bonehead move all around…
Android already has other apps stores, like F-Droid.
Yes, I know. The point is that people seeking privacy eventually won’t be able to use their banking apps and other online financial accounts unless they’re signed into Google Play to ‘authenticate’ the app.
AKA force you into letting them steal more of your private info…
I kinda understand it from the bank’s perspective… They need to reduce risk which is why a lot of banking apps check if the phone is rooted (if it’s rooted, how can you be sure that a malicious app with root access isn’t patching the app in memory and redirecting transfers to a different account?)
Having said that, I really don’t think they need to restrict it such that the app can only be installed through the Play store, as long as the app is properly signed and uses certificate pinning to prevent MitM attacks.
Fidelity apps doesn’t require any of this shite?
But some shiti cash-app does?
I wonder why 🤔
everyone wants to be like apple
In this case, it seems like it’s the app makers themselves who are requiring the Play Store, though. Unless I’m misreading this, the developers are using the Integrity API to determine if the app was installed through “official channels” (in this case, the Play Store). Feels like people should be upset at the companies behind the apps, here.
Okay. Then either use older backup versions of those apps before the requirement of the Play Store, or just quit using those apps and services and switch to less enshittified apps and services.
Easier said than done these days, I know…
Google : “You don’t own your phone, we own you.”
This has almost nothing to do with Google, it’s a feature that has to be enabled by the app developer. Meaning they want to exclude users getting the APK for their app from elsewhere.
Kinda. It might be 3rd parties using it but it is 100% an API designed by Google to keep apps on Google Play.
For all we know it could have been requested years ago by developers who have apps that get pirated but there was no mechanism in place to implement it at the time, and wasn’t a priority.
Just because it’s beneficial to Google maintaining more direct control now, that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the origin.
Well, there is a separate system for pirating prevention, the Google Play license check. That has existed for years.
If an app gets pirated they’re going to have thrown out this check too.
I unironically think so. It offloads the blame onto individual app developers. Google can turn around and say oh well it’s what the market wants
Just the term “side loading” instantly frames installing software on a device you own as something shady.
“side-loading” is literally the norm on Windows and Linux
This poster gets it!
Yes, that’s the implication, and it’s certainly intentional for you to think of it like that.
The fact that an entire generation thinks the only proper way to install software is through an app store is absolutely terrible. Talk about a boon for the gatekeepers, Apple and Google did a bang up job training them to trust no one else.
As a long time linux user i find it normal to only install apps through a package manager (essentially the same) but you have a defined API for package sources and can add sources as you like. that would be the best solution. manually installing apps IS risky, and opens the door for malware and incompatible packages, but if you have a trustworthy package source that your packa manager can varify its packages against it gets way better.
A package manager and app-store, which looks very similar from the outside, operates very differently with respect to security and privacy.
Schools and universities in principle should be the place where they’re introduced to what really means to own a computer. The trend however seems to give out everyone a locked down e-waste with proprietary restrictions all over the place.
I don’t think you appreciate the real reason for “schooling”
Microsoft saw Google and Apple do this with phones, and Steam do this with games, and that’s why they made the Windows store a thing starting with 8.
They wanted to go the same direction.
Put steam with the rest of these parasites ain’t fair… For now
I’ve had people clueless about tech tell me that:
using Linux and not buying Windows I rob MS’s developers,
not doing things the way big corporations want I deprive them of profits and thus rob their workers,
using your own device the way you want it is a crime if you have to bypass what the vendor does,
GPL and BSD licenses are not real sovereign citizen stuff, and if I’m not paying someone for software, I’m robbing the working class,
repairing things yourself in your house is robbing people working in those trades,
reading things in the Web is robbing university professors and book store workers and publishers,
having to learn a particular technology while doing my task at work means I’m a fraud and rob my employer or our clients, because apparently I have to keep all the today’s tech in my head before needing any of it,
if I don’t know some single thing another person knows, they are obviously better qualified than me (say, that other person can write Windows device drivers, while the job is about systems integration),
…
and I don’t remember more stupid shit from those people and I don’t want to, but generally being not a dumb ape in today’s world is considered suspicious apparently.
After that wonderful experience I might be silent about my views with people usually, but really I’ll never stop being anarchist (whatever kind of anarchism that is).
Where do find such bootlickers?
Half of America
I bet they’ll say staying healthy without getting sick equals robbing from hospitals and pharmaceutical companies.
Their views were in general along the lines that there are poor people and there are rich people. Poor people owe nobody nothing (including respect to property rights, personal space, privacy and so on), and are owed everything. Rich people vice versa, it’s them paying with rights for their asocial riches.
Now who’s poor is not absolute, it’s who owns less than deserved, and what’s deserved is big for their friends and similar-minded people. And who’s rich is the same, but owning more than deserved, and if they don’t like you, you deserve less.
It’s the kind of people who love Stalin.
Out of curiosity, where and in which social groups did you hear this? I have never heard such thoughts here in Germany, and we tend to be idiots.
Keep fighting the good fight, we have to keep the lights on in free soft- and hardware to provide a harbor for people who want to escape this shit.
Russia, the social group - eh, schoolteachers
Interesting, thank you!
Angle sphere got a special relationship with the “poors” theybare dirty, stupid and they deserve to get fucked.
Hearing this shit being said in earnest with that class bravado is so fucking cringe
Usually biggest bootlicker is himself 3 pay checks from being homeless too lol
“This shit” was said in the context of a society exactly opposite to anglosphere, where being “poor” is an indulgence for violating every moral rule, every promise, every obligation and every law.
More than that, it was said about the exact people who are, relatively speaking, not poor, rather almost privileged, but are hateful and envious of everyone actually doing useful work, and consider corruption good because in their opinion a bureaucracy worker stealing something entrusted to them is “a respected in the society person collecting rent from their position” or something like that.
The profession of a schoolteacher in Russia pays shit, which is why 3 kinds of people want that - those who are too dumb for other work, those who are idealistic, and those who want to feel that they are important and powerful (power over children) even more than to be paid well.
There are more people of the 2nd kind than you think, but those were of the 3rd undoubtedly. 1st kind is almost extinct - it’s not hard to find a job that pays better, if you don’t want power over children.
I think it’s clear how the 3rd kind intersects with sympathies to sociopathic behavior, and sympathies for corruption and organized crime.
EDIT: Oh, I just realized you thought they were bootlickers and hateful of poor people in this memory of mine. No, they considered that BS to be good for poor people. Basically hateful of capitalism most when it’s many small businesses honestly competing, but thinking oligopoly and state capitalism would be better. They considered me to be on the side of some “rich” people who hurt the poor. While big company owners and such were not, because they are apparently doing lots of charity etc and are respected people. So the “rich” they’d hate would be the “middle class”, not the “boss class”.
What is a “trustworthy software environment”?
Does that mean that it will get mad and fail you for having Developer options enabled? Having F-Droid installed? Having it plugged into a computer?
There’s a bank here that refuses to let you log into their app if you have developer options enabled. Their service was getting much better until that point, but I dropped them completely after that.
I use developer options to get better screen density on my large ass screen, and to you know…develop apps 🤷♂️
FUCK THESE ASSHOLES WHO THINK THEY CAN TELL ME WHAT I CAN AND CAN NOT DO WITH MY PHONE
The Papa Murphy’s app does this as well, it’s ridiculous
People seriously need to start pushing back on the word “secure” being used as a blanket excuse for every restriction.
It feels like every time that word is used, no one is willing to call out the fact that user freedom is equally as important and it’s a lazy, disrespectful developer who won’t take that into account by finding ways to maintain both.
If it detects wrongspeak it will tell the authorities.
U joke but that’s where we are going
I express it as a joke but it’s a ploy to make people realize this.
According to the dumbfucks making the government application of Belgium (to read official communication) trustworthy means having developer mode disabled.
Androids best advantage used to be full control of the device… Those were the days. Then it started with saying they know better than you, then locking you out. Now I’m waiting on a new, better solution.
Honestly it’s not like native Linux is too far fetched, but there would have to be a big open source common ground device collaboration.
Waiting for steamphone
Man I really hate how they stripped your permissions to access the internal and external storage, files can no longer access data from other apps even if you say allow all file access. Also if your phone supports SD cards, you might notice that you don’t have write access to it for some reason on later versions of android. (I really struggled with this with my Galaxy S9 on Lineage), had to use apps that remounted my SD card and what not
So the EU’s been forcing Apple to allow sideloading and Google goes Nah, it’ll be fine?
Google still allows sideloading, it’s the app developers that can prevent you from installing their app from other sources than Google Play. Sideloading an app works fine on Android if the app’s developer allows it. Apple didn’t allow that even if the app devs wanted it.
You are technically (and possibly legally) correct… But the spirit of the law is allowing customers to install what they want on their devices.
This move defuses the responsibility to the developers but EU showed in the past that what they care is the spirit of the law and not the law itself…and they are happy to change the laws to make them more adherent to the spirit
I would be really happy if you’re right, but I sadly think Google’s fine here. As far as I understand it, this particular regulation is to prevent a powerful actor (Google, Apple) to use their monopolistic powers to shut alternative stores down. It’s not about allowing customers to install whatever and however. Google doesn’t shut anyone down with this, so they should be fine. They give the option for app developers to choose if they want to run only on an attested platform - which they sell as a completely optional security feature that nobody has to use.
My guess is if the EU is going to take this further it would have to be regarding a potential monopoly on the attested platforms on the device. Google only offering their own platform as trusted could potentially be seen as another monopolistic behavior. If we’re lucky.
The problem is though that the attested platform only accepts Google play as a store, for this to be truly fair you’d need a way to set a default store setting up and then the attestation API checks that store, but as things currently are it’s giving Google play store an unfair advantage.
So the EU’s been forcing Apple to allow sideloading and Google goes Nah, it’ll be fine?
No but you see we at Google aren’t locking down sideloading. It’s the individual app developers. With the api we gave them for that express purpose. Totally not us locking stuff down though, so EU please ignore us trying to indirectly close doors in our walled garden?
Ehh, this is basically just another form of DRM. No different than you having a Steam and GOG model. You can make your apps using DRM and enforce certain constraints
GOG model
wut? The main selling point of GOG is that games purchased from them are DRM-free.
Yes, that’s my point. Android “doesn’t” have to use Google Play Store, but it is convenient. Other store fronts exist like F-droid and many vendor specific one. Google just provide the DRM mechanism like steam does provide DRM via steamworks
DRM is to prevent piracy. This does not prevent piracy unless it only applies to apps that cost money.
What I mean by that is, this is just an API/SDK for app developers to use. Google does not enforce the use of such things. Much like steam does not force the use of their drm for example (please note the difference between the marketplace and the drm). App developers can always choose how they make and distribute their app.
What legitimate reason would an app developer have for not wanting to let people install their app from sources other than the play store?
Enforcing payment comes to mind without resorting to in-app purchase or any account creation. A lot of desktop software is a good example of those. Sure, you can still have cracks and whatnot, but then again, that’s not the point. Might as well ask what is the point of Denuvo. That is a whole other discussion.
That’s a very legitimate reason! I was talking about free apps, but I failed to mention that in my comment. My bad. Any legit reason for free apps?
Nothing comes to mind. DRM literally means digital rights management and unless you wanted to be petty, like blocking a certain person from using your app, then DRM for something free is not something that I can think of a use case for.
Google is allowing the app developers to choose (for now?). With Apple, developers never had the option to allow other stores or sideloading.
What’s the point of having an android phone then? I fucking hate android so much, but I only use it, not iOS, because of sideloading.
OfIf they take that away from us then why not just get an iPhone then? Our only hope is Linux phones picking up a little.This is just Google’s clever way of not removing the sideloading feature from their OS.
They let app developers to prevent users from using sideloaded app.
This way they can avoid antitrust lawsuits.
I have high hopes for apps like lucky patcher and Revanced manager to help us avoid this bullshit
One reason would be that with an iPhone, you’re paying two to five times the price of an Android phone with comparable hardware.
Hardware isn’t everything. Apple has a couple of advantages over iPhone that let them do more with less:
- iOS needs to support a MUCH fewer devices than Android. Even before they switched to their own silicon, they’ve been optimizing the OS to the hardware really well giving you devices that go toe to toe with Android flagships of the same generation with SIGNIFICANTLY better hardware and like double the RAM. Also why Apple doesn’t really care to increase RAM as much as the android side of things.
- Apple silicon is actually really good and making their own hardware allows them to optimize on both sides of the equation and lets them do more with less.
The selling points for Android (at least the way I’ve seen it over the years) have always been full control (talking about non-root, I’d rather not go down the root rabbit hole here) and (since iPhone 11 started doing firmware blocks on parts) reparability…but both seem to be going out the window lately.
Prices are crap though, but then again Android phones on the top end don’t seem much better. 1-2 gen old iPhones are usually a bit more reasonable though tbh.
I do the same on android, as I have always owned a Samsung Note/Ultra. Only this year have I purchased a OnePlus phone, and I’ll never fucking do it again, I hate this phone so much. Going back to Samsung for sure once the S25 Ultra drops.
It’s the apps that prevent themselves being sideloaded. Presumably, their devs will enact similar policy on EU iOS too.
Fuck me, it’s like a butterfly effect, every mother fucker now will follow suit.
F-Droid
Most of the apps I have and use are installed via Droidify. The ones that aren’t are company apps, like banking or airline. I could just used the web sites for those; they’re only conveniences.
My phone isn’t rooted, and I didn’t read the article so I don’t know how this will affect me. If push comes to shove, I’ll simply bite the bullet and get a phone I can install Linux on next time, regardless of how polished for daily driving it is.
Right on. I do use F-Droid and droidify. I also use Obtanium. Linux phone has never sounded better, godammit. Like you, I really don’t give a shit about those banking apps and other shit, web browsers are more than enough in this day and age.
I would most likely be using a phone with Ubuntu Touch on it as my daily driver if it wasn’t for the fact that the cellular carriers force me to have VoLTE support for calls, which is kind of the point for a phone! And guess the one thing Ubuntu Touch doesn’t have support for!
the google store environment is such a pain, at work we have android based Zebra barcode readers… today when I was sideloading our app one of the devices kept uninstalling it because of google play… what a fucking pain in the ass
only when intune fully took it over did it stop…
DONT MAKE ME LIKE INTUNE GOOGLE… JFK
Did you turn off Play Protect?
And yeah, when we set these barcode scanners up, unfortunately it made me appreciate Intune’s Android management tools. I despise Microsoft and Google, but Microsoft won that round of “Who do I hate the least right now?”
I had a workflow that I designed in May and then we had to wait for the fiscal year to turn over before we could get another batch of the new style of devices. Between May and this week, Microsoft and Google must have made some changes because my workflow didn’t work as directed. I hadnt needed to disable Play Protect for that initial workflow. I just waited until the Intune enrollment was clearly done (policies and profiles were completed in Intune) before I did the customization of the device with abs and such, that seemed to make the other devices go according to plan.
John F. Kennedy?
He’d probably try eating the stupid thing!