After the news cycle recently exploded with the announcement that Google would require every single Android app to be from a registered and verified developer, while killing third-party app stores and sideloading in the process, Google has now tried to put out some of the fires with a new Q&A blog post and a video discussion (also embedded below).
When we first covered the news, all that was known for certain was the schedule, with the first trials beginning in October of 2025 before a larger rollout the next year. One of the main questions pertained to installing apps from sources that are not the Google Play Store. The answer here is that the only way to install an app without requiring one to go through the developer verification process is by installing the app with the Android Debug Bridge, or adb for short.
The upcoming major release of Android 16 will feature a new process called the Android Developer Verifier, which will maintain a local cache of popular verified apps. The remaining ones will require a call back to the Google mothership where the full database will be maintained. In order to be a verified Android developer you must have a Google Play account, pay the $25 fee and send Google a scan of your government-provided ID. This doesn’t mean that you cannot also distribute your app also via F-Droid, it does however mean that you need to be a registered Play Store developer, negating many of the benefits of those third-party app stores.
Although Google states that they will also introduce a ‘free developer account type’, this will only allow your app to be installed on a limited number of devices, without providing an exact number so far. Effectively this would leave having users install unsigned APKs via the adb tool as the sole way to circumvent the new system once it is fully rolled out by 2027. On an unrelated note, Google’s blog post also is soliciting feedback from the public on these changes.
Freedom-embracing goverments will hate this. Those with clout may force Google to make exceptions within their bordes. Freedom-hating goverments will love this, it’s one more step of a long march towards making it hard to do things anonymously online.
I wrote my own Android recipe app and have used it for a decade now. It’s just for me and my family (although you can use it if you want because I like to give back to open source in any way possible.) I have no interest in being a professional developer or applying for approval from the big G. This policy sucks.
if you just want to use it yourself, you just build an unsigned / debug build and upload it with adb, what’s the big deal? that’s how it was when i started with android 15 years ago
My family isn’t going to build anything or upload via ADB. Today I can just put the adb on a share and they can download and run it
i agree it’s less convenient but you don’t think your family will let you plug a cable into their phone for 5 minutes?
You shouldn’t need to use adb to install it (also that will only work for NOW). What if Microsoft blocked Steam on Windows? Would you still say “Yeah but you could still load games from CD?”
That is what you are doing.
Extremely short-sighted, there is absolutely no reason for them to restrict this, this is not security issue its just control, if i want someone to install an apk anywhere in the world i need to be verified by google? Fk that
You are the problem. Its not googles business what we run on our devices. This is a move by big brother. You sound like them.
Point is that you shouldn’t have to sideload an app via ADB if you want to downgrade app versions
what about webapps? No need to install, just create a shortcut on your home screen. sure, you need to be online to use it…
PWAs can be made to work offline by using a service worker. You only need to be online once to download the app, then it stays cached on your device.
When google goes full Apple and makes us use the built-in webapp replete with PrIvAcY sAnDbOx, PWAs will not be satisfactory. Let’s not paint ourselves into a corner.
I meant built in webview, intending to allude to the sheer ridiculousness that third party browsers on iphones just use safari to render the page under the hood.
There’s a lot you can’t do with web apps
i agree that there’s a lot i don’t want to do with web apps but my general impression has been that the pile of can’t do has become vanishingly small over time. can you name an example?
Access local storage, effectively use your CPU, use your GPU at all.
Unless you find a zero day you’re stuck with workarounds like uploading first, cloud storage or rendering in VRML.
Main point, JS just sucks balls.
JS is like butt sex.
The claimed advantage is that it ‘works the same for everyone’ hence better.
Nope!
sure you can access local storage from web apps, though it’s a pain to get at anything other than private storage. which is already the norm on android.
web apps get great cpu and gpu access. especially if you’re willing to focus on a target like ‘mobile chrome’. i think you’re out of date.
‘Effectively use your CPU’
Sure you can bog it down with interpreted crap, effectively means not wasting 99% on overhead.
Use a non-standard mobile chrome only way (what was the point of web apps again?)
What’s the syntax for opening a local file in JS in a browser?
I’d rather it couldn’t…
Sending TCP/UDP packets other than HTTP/Websocket. You can’t read hackaday RSS with your app because of CORS – basically very limited what you can access via internet. Integration with calendar. Bluetooth usable outside of Chromium. No home screen widgets. I don’t think GPS tracking would work reliably in PWA.
Didn’t apple got a slap on the wrist by the EU and was obliged to open sideload apps, under European Union’s Digital Markets Act (DMA)
I’ll grab the popcorn bucket…
Yes, and the EU approved Apple’s solution which still requires developers to register and pay $99/year to sign apps before they can be sideloaded. Google’s $25/once registration (or free for a hobbyist account) is still much better than Apple.
I’m pretty sure this whole idea is that so they can stop pirate apps basically that you access services without paying for them that’s the whole idea of doing this that’s why Google’s information policy in the original idea they’ll all say for its safety they’ll say it’s the protect kids because that’ll get people’s attention the masses reality is it to stop you from pirating music and movies and getting paid apps for free cuz you can do that on a lot of the stores too I’ve seen them I found at least a dozens of them but when downloading them you do get a risk of getting a virus or spyware of course common Sense applies but I’ll use a legit example as a reason why there’s a the use of these pirate amps AccuWeather the weather application they have a lifetime subscription 10 15 years ago it was only $10 I purchased that while as of last year they stopped supporting that lifetime subscription was to pay for a yearly subscription now even all day that honor the people that pay the lifetime one so there’s an example why you would download the app that’s mowed so so that you get what you already paid for with them another good example is to Amazon at the store they pulled their app store off of Android devices now you can still course uses on the fire tablets salon but you can no longer download the Amazon app store for an Amazon device so I had games like bejeweled 2 purchase years ago I have bought on Amazon and Google Play while the Google Play says it’s no longer able to work on devices it was still working on the Amazon app store so I was able to download all my Android phones and stuff like that well now that the store shut down on August 20th I know it’s the game no longer works and you can’t purchase a new copy because it’s not been updated to meet this current standards of today’s Android even though it’s still worked so I had a pirate that too and that’s a legit game I purchased so it’s kind of you know they’re trying to stop us from downloading stuff like that and start looking for the cat phrases when they implement these policies when it comes with side loading amps to prevent applications that have c**************** on them to prevent stuff that is bad or the supports terrorists true it may be out there some stuff but that’s what they’re going to use to scare us to support this whole thing thinking it’s protecting us I think people need to know what their downloading first the staff restricting us Android was all about freedom if they’re going this route I might as well just go buy three new iPhones and just call it a day and don’t even buy any new Android devices anymore if could buy some from about 2 years ago. They’ll still work with all these applications as a new information doesn’t go on the fact until a few years
That’s a lot of words with no punctation whatsoever.
…There are freedom-embracing governments? Are they accepting visa applications?
Allowing foreigners into this freedom-embracing secret country would not be beneficial to staying freedom-embracing I would expect.
It’s the old Allen conundrum “I would not want to be a member of a club that would allow me to be a member.”
I don’t know which Allen your talking about…Google returns shyster BS for ‘Allen conundrum’.
He stole it from Groucho Marx.
I was referring to Woody Allen of course.
But perhaps it was Marx, where you probably should not only use the last name
when naming him as a source :) That would be even worse than only using ‘Allen’.
Although, perhaps Marx would invoke hysteria in less people than W. Allen? Not sure
Interesting you mentioned that there’s a few states in the US that are trying to ban vpns now think about this one Google implements this policy. This will stop you from downloading a VPN because of that state or bandit or that country like China Russia for example bam vpns there’s one state in the US that’s trying to do the same thing they’re using the cat phrases like I mentioned one of my comments on here trying to protect people from c**************** that’s their favorite one or supporting terrorist activity that’s another one. Y’all hear that from both sides of the aisle does it matter what presidents in the White House theater or what shade of skin color they are Muslim Christian black white it doesn’t matter it’s all the same. But if Google is playing on doing this where I’m getting this you won’t be all the downloader pirate version of VPN either to get around some State restrictions because if that’s still loud you could download it by side loading a VPN application even directly from a legit VPN company if the website itself is not blocked third party app store. Google is worried about people getting paid amps for free and that’s what all this policies are bought. Hopefully the federal or even the state will put a stop to that
Punctuation, man. Punctuation.
So Windows requires an account to use and now Android is restricting APK installs. (IOS has mostly been locked down – jailbreaking is a pain). Haven’t looked at Mac lately – I think you need an account when you install the OS and installing an unverified application is only slightly annoying.
It seems like you’ll need Linux if you want unrestricted access to your compute device.
Might as well just buy an iPhone at this point.
Just get rid of smartphone.
This is becoming a stronger possibility in my future. “My phone” was paid for by me using money I earned and I’ll not be told how I can use it.
Actually having that as a plausible choice could be a rather tricky thing now – in the UK this digital ID type crap they are bringing in at least is suggesting a direction of travel where you are not able to exist as a legal citizen/visitor without in the UK for example. And you banking app is a more global issue.
Not that I disagree if you can do without you should, as a computer with a modem of some sort (should WWAN matter to you) is probably the right choice. Folks are generally chatting on whichever social media IRC type chat/voice call platform they use rather than using SMS or mobile telephony element of the smartphone now it seems to me – so what you actually need is the data link to the internet, and you can have that on a device you actually more honestly own. (though in theory you can use a PC WWAN modem for voice calls it seems a bit of a minefield).
Only viable for a tiny percentage of the population. It’s cantankerous to pretend this is generally an available option.
And what stops you? No, seriously?
What stops you? Ask Iphone owners.
Sure you can hook it up to a computer and sideload with adb – what percentage of Android owners own a computer, rather than just using their mobile as their sole computing device? Likely not huge, but that’s them out the picture. Then those with a computer capable of running adb, how many have the confidence to try something like that (I and you know it’s as easy as copy paste a command, but some will be wary)?
Then you’ve got the problem if you’re out and about and want to sideload an app you need, but ultimately need to wait till you’re next at a computer.
No. Don’t get me wrong. I’m no fan of this change! But it’s still a long way from iPhone.
First, you can still side load an app as long as the author registers. Apple won’t let you do that. You have to install the Apple app from their store. The difference is that means Apple has to approve the app itself before you can have it. It sounds like a registered developer can offer side loaded apps all they want without Google approving the individual apps. That is still a difference even if it is not as good as before.
Then there is the ADB loophole. I don’t see the non-tech masses installing your anonymous app via ADB. But HaD types should have no problem doing so.
So yah, it’s a step in the wrong direction but it still is better than Apple. I don’t say this to stick up for Google by any means. But if everyone just threw up their hands, gave up and switched to Apple then side loading would truly be dead.
There are /currently/ trip ways to avoid needing Google to approve your app. They have changed the deal though, and you can only pray they don’t change it again
They will change it again. They will change it again. Use critical analysis. Actually compare the two.
Apple is an unusable walled garden today. Google is behaving in such a way that you reasonably suspect they will be an unusable walled garden someday.
Nothing is forever. If you’re buying a phone or developing an app today, look at the world today. It’s a bummer to tie your investment to a sinking ship but that’s software! That’s the air we breathe.
Personally much as I don’t like Apple I’d loose the ‘un’ as they are actually quite useable with a more stable direction of travel in their hardware and software eco-system. Google are looking like they will take all the worst bits of Apple and use them to replace all the good points they once had, without fixing any of their flaws either…
Certainly wouldn’t suggest going out of your way for either of them – for me I’m holding out hope this will push enough development time and some marketing budget into the Linux phone market – it is already seemingly a valid enough option if you do some of the legwork yourself, and could become turnkey easy off the shelf one good for normies and the techie.
You can just install https://altstore.io on any iPhone and install anything you like
My life is already full of enough pointless inconvenience without jumping through hoops just to update the apps on my phone. Android has been terrible for a while, this is the last straw.
It sounds like this is just a way to stop people installing Revanced Manager unless the devs out themselves so Google’s lawyers can harass them for making 100% legal and non-infringing software.
googled “revanced apk”, clicked the first download link i found, ran it through apksigner verify –print-certs, and it appears to be signed by a valid release key, not an “Android Debug” key. It could happen but so far i haven’t seen evidence that google is denying developer keys to people based on the content of their apps. Even though they very much are policing the play store itself.
Don’t Google it and click the first link. ReVanced’s domain is revanced.app. Any other site (that’s not directly linked from there) is potential malware.
ReVanced, when used as intended by the developers, takes a YouTube APK on your device, patches it, and installs it on the same device. They do this to avoid having to redistribute code copyrighted by Google. It’s that second step of installing the patched APK that will likely fail to work because it’s a newly generated file that will not match a valid signature.
Maybe they could get around that by preparing signatures and make sure the patched output matches a prepared signature. But still means that at some point they will sign code copyrighted by Google with their own key which, if it’s not already against Google’s contract, could be made contractually illegal at any time.
In that worst case scenario, you could still potentially self sign as a user, or install via ADB. But if Google has made ReVanced inconvenient enough that 99% of people who want to use it practically can’t, they’ve essentially fulfilled their objective of killing it off.
well yes google’s tool to prevent you from making unauthorized changes to an apk will prevent you from making unauthorized changes to one of their own apks. you’re saying that in the future, your work around will need a work around. yes. water wet.
The only way we can work around this on stock roms I think is https://shizuku.rikka.app/ .
Long live custom roms!
I would imagine that rooting and de-googling the phone would also work, at least for current Android versions. That’s what I will be doing. Unfortunately, there are no custom ROMs available for my phone.
How would that work around the requirement to sign an app for it to run? Does it have an alternate runtime?
Shizuku and Canta are excellent tools!
inaxcetable google dictat0r
after ALL THE CRAP re capchat i m not a ROBOT ENOFF F,,,,…-– GOOGLE
I PAID MY phone i make with i want with IT !
GOOGLE ENOFF IS ENOFFF ––
BACK OFF GOOGLE -*-
Where’s the “report” button?
Looks like my comment that used a 4-letter word starting with the letter “F” has been sent to a moderation queue. That’s totally fair enough. But I will state again, that anything on a phone that requires me to upload a photo of my ID will not be tolerated. In the name of some vague idea of “security” for some other party, it genuinely reduces my own security. A drivers licence is for driving. A passport is for passing through ports. Any other use is contrary to their design and insecure. I’d be happy to show ID to a human. But I would not let a business, or a bar, or a restaurant, take a digital copy.
I’d love someone to automate making fake pictures for these kinds of services. Some kind of script where I can input a photo and receive a plausible-looking “ID” in return. Seems like something ripe for an AI.
so you don’t have a SIM-Card?
Sim cards are for simming /s
Really though, if a sim was all that was needed for phone things, we wouldn’t be raging in this comments section, so whatever the implications of your glib rhetorical question might be, the premise is invalid.
Btw, I don’t have a (physical) sim-card.
We bought the device. Fingerprint it if you want, which is what a sim amounts to, but let me install my sketchy apks, that’s what I bought the thing for in the first place.
But that’s not what I’m mad about. I’m mad that F-droid will be decimated by this policy.
Email the google mobile strategy execs about this. I have. Their emails are on the press releases.
A SIM card has my name, current address, identifying information and a number that can literally be used to steal my identity?
Oh no it doesn’t. It has a subscriber number that is only used by my service provider.. Thats it.
What does having a SIM card have to do with any of that?
Like my original comment I left up at two of them on here the idea that people like him is trying to say stuff like SIM card is there using it as a way to say if we download third party apps they’re not verified on Google you’re downloading c**************** and other appropriate stuff that’s what they’re trying to say and that’s where they’re going with this that’s why they’re supporting Google and banning it people from downloading third party ounce because they’re getting his application for free and he’s losing money that’s all it’s a boss protecting their revenue the reason why I use childbenography as a example is because people are going to use that to scare us to agree oh we need a bandage amps because that’s what’s going to be on them that’s what the current political system will use anyways in the US they’re always going to use scare tactics the guess the submit to their ideas I think most of us already know the risk when we download third party apps and the download good antivirus application to attack against some of this stuff so he won’t get caught with links to lead to unappropriate content or a virus like some of the casino games I was playing they were scams and you can download them right off of Google Play store and then they have advertising within them that says you can win this and win cash reality is they never pay out and then advertising and it’ll take you to third party apps they’re scams including one that downloaded something on my phone had to use Malwarebytes to get rid of that trash and that was just off of the legit download off of the Google Play store
Please stop with this unintelligible gibberish.
Discord just got hacked and lost a bunch of UK photo ID’s…
Do you develop android apps? Do you develop apps for other people’s Android phones?
Here is what I sent on the feedback form:
The new Android developer verification requirements as described are absolutely atrocious and will destroy Android. These requirements negate the ultimate platform-defining feature of Android that makes it better than iOS: being able to control your own device whether online, fully offline, or otherwise. Mandating that users must check in with ‘Big Brother’ Google every time they want to install an app is something Apple would be expected to do, not Google. The developer verification requirement sounds like it came straight out of Orwell’s 1984, or even worse, Cupertino.
To be absolutely clear, these requirements should not be implemented. However, it takes a special level of gall from Google to not even provide an option to turn this Orwellian feature off. At least allow power users and developers to be able to install what they want at will with a toggle.
“At least allow power users and developers to be able to install what they want at will with a toggle.”
I mean that was already the case with Play Protect and “Unverified Apps” toggle tucked away in the developer settings.
This is Google walling up the Garden to extract more $$ and information
Is there any way to get a phone to connect to its own ADB port? I vaguely remember there is ADB-over-wifi?
Yes, some apps can already do this.
There is a wifi adb app. I just tried running it on my Unihertz and the momernt I hit the ‘on’ switch it says ‘This app requires a rooted device and superuser permission.’. My previous phone was on fact rooted. This one is easy to root, intentionally (they picked specs based on a Kickstarter so of course one would want to be able to root their own phone if they want.)
But anyway, once you’ve rooted and have su you could certainly bypass restrictions anyway.
Huh, i have a similar app aswell and it works without root. I just sometimes need to use floating windows or split screen to pair the app with phone’s wifi adb. The app or rather APPS are “Bugjaeger” and “ADB Shell – Debug toolbox”
Try an app called Bugjaeger or the app “ADB Shell – Debug toolbox” for doing adb stuff without pc. Of course there are some commands that don’t work without a pc (for me atleast, most people don’t really need those commands)
When I changed from iPhone to Android, I thought “android lets me download and install apk apps! I would rarely be using this feature but this is the kind of people I want designing my mobile OS”
Somehow, despite absolutely every horrible thing every massive tech company has been doing for the last several years, Google has finally found a way for me to hate them more than every single company in Silicon Valley combined. Truly impressive.
*-holes doing *-hole things.
More news at 11.
I’ll probably ditch my phone completely and instead build a linux pocket computer with 5G modem.
For years I have been waiting for open source based mobile phone. Unfortunately, all those who have tried have failed to gain enough of momentum or critical mass. Why? From what I have seen it was chip manufacturers protecting their intelectual property. Without good quality hardware you can not succeed on the market. Too bad. I would really like it!
Alternatively, it’s worth observing that today’s Android has become so bloated, that a lean OS written in compiled languages (not Java) may be able to run very well with lower end chips, and have good battery life too. So perhaps that’s the way to go
5G really is the achilles heel here. All the phones that are well supported by free software lack 5G connectivity and it’s unfortunately necessary where I live.
You mean you do not have 4G coverage but have 5G?
Google can revoke your developer account for the apps they don’t like (security, insert another excuse here). Sorry folks, but the security of the app i develop for alternative stores (including websites) is none of your business.
Goodbye F-Droid.
We need an upgrade of the EU DMA to tackle this.
I’m quite sure there are very strict laws here already about collecting and storing government IDs. I remember on several occasions where I had to use my ID and they had to place it in a special scanner that would strip out certain details (they explained because I asked). So asking for flat copies of my ID is very likely already a violation of some law. My job was very clear on “Do NOT email us your passport, we will scan it here and blank out the parts we are not allowed to store. And an email goes into the backup system and is hard to scrub”
Having my government ID stored in some database in another country does not sit well with me as well. There are plenty of other ways to verify someones identity as well. Hell, as you have to pay $25 (another problem on it’s own as well) you could use the bank transfer as ID. Yes, you can get anonymous bank accounts, but you just won’t accept those as ID.
I mean the EU Chat Control law is still being pitched. “It doesn’t break end to end encryption”….no it just reads the stuff on both sides….
As i understand it – only installing apps from phone will be disabled – adb (through usb cable or wifi) will still allow sideloading. Is this really a problem? If you want to really install custom apk, you will still be able to without root or custom rom, you will just need to use cable.
I dare you to explain in 10 words or less how to use ADB on a fresh phone to install an APK.
“Download the APK and press ‘yes, I really want this'” is all that is needed right now, the ADB route is about 100x as complex.
It’s not a bad thing that the over-60 crowd will not be able to figure out how to install malware
It has been rightly pointed out that the over-60 crowd don’t sideload APKs. They get their malware right from the Play Store.
The ‘over-60 crowd’ built everything useful on the net.
The ‘under-40 crowd’ have built steaming fly covered towers of java script (never heard or ‘angle of repose’).
At least one reportedly requires more than one ‘software engineer’ per UI element (Facebook), just for maintenance.
That said, over-60s also realize that phones are appliances.
They really suck as primary computers.
Really really suck big wet cheesy donkey balls.
Rainbow colored puss oozing from multiple boils on donkey balls (‘social media apps’).
Digressing again.
Defense: Is harvest season.
E85 is pure Indica, boot to the head.
Haze makes me want to post on shitty sites.
So we all have to get Harrison Bergeron’d for them?
It’s an annoying extra step. Sometimes you are far away from a laptop or desktop and need to install some half-baked app that’s only distributed as an apk on GitHub. Google killing this is another proof that their greatest desire is to become Apple, not to make exceptional phones.
For many folks it seems they don’t even have a laptop or desktop as they do everything on their phone! a “debug bridge” shouldn’t be the only possible way to install what you wish to install!
oh yea…. some people panic for no reason
You would be singing a different tune if Microsoft banned steam and we were telling you “its no big deal you can install a game from a cd. “
next step : remove cable
“We’ve removed the USB port because the phone charges wirelessly”
Yes, it is. I have firefox + updater app installed on the phone. updater checks for updates and installs fresh version on request. This requires only the phone itself. Nothing more.
Not PC, working adb drivers, working adb setup and the like. Guess who will have outdated apps in that case?
Firefox is an example of an app that already has certified developer keys and will still have certified developer keys in the future.
You say that, but as its one of the last competitors to Googles own browser that already has a near monopoly on browsers – so I’d not put it past google to revoke that certification one day. Thinest of excuses required to then spend a few years fighting with whichever government might have the balls to go after them if any and they can own everyone…
Hm, does anyone know if adbd is bound to localhost?
What is the sign with that most midlest finger on a hand already? Ho, look I have two of those!
Means ‘May you have many sons’.
In Papua.
Is the nicest gesture that can be made at a man.
Great honor and respect!
I’m told that in France it once meant “Ha! I cut off your bow finger and now you can’t shoot arrows and I can!” but that might be apocryphal, I don’t know.
Nobody use this gesture of defiance in France.
It is supposed to have been used by english archers to mean “I still got my fingers” in response to a (doubtfull) command by french dignitaries to cut the fingers of bowmen.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V_sign#Origins
I guess it’s time for the development of a new mobile platform operating system perhaps based on Linux that will replace Android phones. It’s a shame that Google has decided to completely ruin the Android platform.
The world will create a new open source mobile platform that will replace Android and see if Google likes that option.
It will take time but eventually Android will go away.
It’s best to think of the software you are working on as a drop of raw sewage being aeriated at the treatment plant.
You will only be responsible for it for a little while, it will eventually settle to the bottom, with all the obsolete stuff.
Getting too attached to code is madness, how you get the Linux kernel or TempleOS.
This is not ok on so many levels. Google does not own my phone, period. I generally avoid google play since it’s full of ad/malware. This will effectively kill all open source apps, and these are what makes my phone useable.
I’m writing this from a phone running linux based SailfishOS. I’m hoping more people can discover the alternatives to Android in the future (PostmarketOS, Droidian, Mobian, etc.) It’s not yet ready for most people, but a lot of the people visiting HAD would probably be ok with loosing some features to gain A LOT of freedom.
I meant to say that all the good open source apps made my ANDROID phone useable. I’m using mostly open source sw on my sailfishOS phone too. But the first part of my post just turned out wrong.
Exclusively jola and sony phones, are you kidding me?
I’m using both a jolla phone and a oneplus6. There are quite a few unofficial ports. You are not limited to jolla or sony.
I’d love to do something like that but none of them work with modern damaging phones.
Our Android app is part of a larger integrated system that we provide to our (enterprise) customers. Our customers trust us. We’ve built a good relationship with them through the quality of our product and our excellent support. They know our system is secure (in fact, our security is one of our selling points).
I think the main reason I don’t like this is that Google wants to insert themselves into this relationship with our customers.
In theory, they may one day, for some arbitrary reason decide that we’re not trustworthy, and then through this mechanism prevent our customers from installing our software on phones that they (our customers) own.
Couple this with Google’s reputation that decisions like that cannot be appealed, let alone reversed, and it feels like a recipe for disaster.
For background, our users typically use our app from a company issued phone. We just give them a QR code that takes them to the APK that they then sideload.
We don’t need to be on the Play store for marketing or monetization of our product. Users who access our system through the app number in the hundreds, not thousands or millions. The only benefit we’d get from putting our app on the Play store is that it would make distributing updates easier, but even then most of the work in our system is done server side so we haven’t deployed an update in the past year.
Your company already jumps through the hoops to be google-certified, and will continue to do so.
No, that’s precisely the opposite of how we currently work. To get our app to our customers, I downloaded ReactNative, created the app, and made the APK available on our company’s download site (download.ourcompany.com).
Google is not part of any of that. We’re not google certified, we didn’t jump through any hoops, and that wouldn’t have had to change if Google didn’t start talking about certifying developers.
IMHO, Google, seeing itself as the Verizon (Apple seeing itself as Comcast, or, maybe it is the other way around, no matter) now starts taking steps removing any resemblance of the competition.
Call me paranoid, but I was wondering which cell service providers won’t just brick my phone if/when they suddenly find something they don’t like (and I am not aware of) on my phone. Since I rely on my cell phone in case of emergencies, I am afraid I am stuck with their unquestionable communist party choices in exchange for the cell phone service. Glad I do not rely on it to do my banking, or other mission-critical tasks (paperwork) and can always fallback into real-world (albeit, much slower) routines not dominated by the cell phone usage :]
You can pretend that a private company doing whatever it likes in order to “maximise shareholder value” is anything but capitalism gone mad if you want, but that mostly seems like “Anything I don’t like is communism”.
Capitalism is, by definition, multiple parties doing business on a level playing field to the mutual benefit of all involved. Therefore, “capitalism gone mad” as you put it, is no longer capitalism, but something else. In this case, I wouldn’t say communism, but more like fascism (in the true sense, not the way the left and legacy media use it to refer to anyone they disagree with). It may be “soft” fascism, where the Google elites think they’re doing something for the common good, but the effect is the same: short-sighted, heavy-handed manipulation of what should be an open market, to the detriment of all.
Neither a level playing field nor mutual benefit are included in any definition of capitalism I’ve ever heard. Capitalism is defined by the means of production being owned by private interests, the motivation of profit, and a market with little or no oversight; that’s exactly the case with Google here, Google is a private company motivated by profit not being held to any (relevant) laws. The problem with the Google elites being elite is a problem of the compounding effect of absolute capitalism: money making money making money etc.
Expecting a level playing field and mutual benefit to all from capitalism is just a strange religious belief being pushed by the people who benefit from it.
There’s an interesting bit of trivia from Marx, which i learned from Lenin (a chapter titled “Imperialism as a special stage of capitalism”). Capitalism doesn’t have one static definition, but rather is a stage in the history of the world. In the early years, it unseats the monarchy, it encourages the creation of level playing fields for mutual benefit (with many caveats), it encourages commodification and even standardization. But as it matures, it takes on a different character, and eventually takes on many of the opposite characteristics. Capitalism has all of these things within it. Love it or hate it, let’s not simplify it.
Learning about capitalism from Marxist philosophy is just stupid!
Start with ‘Wealth of Nations’.
It has market regulation in the ‘definition’ right from the beginning.
Just not the kind of ‘market regulation’ that commies want.
Also note.
Commies (Marx and Engels) made predictions about the course of capitalism.
It’s on paper and completely wrong!
Everything is not a commodity and profits are not zero.
Marx and Engels would have both benefited from reading and understanding ‘Wealth of Nations’.
Saved the world countless megadeaths.
cronyism or crony capitalism is the term i use for it. i also like to use free market in front of “normal” capitalism for the positive connotation of the term. what we have now is mostly cronyism. free market capitalism had been on the back slide ever since microsoft figured out they could just lobby for anything they wanted. possibly before then.
the only thing that separates fascism from communism in my book is national identity. one pushes it and one tries to stamp it out. at the end of the day the government owns all the things, controls all the things, and people do what they are told or end up in a gulag/concentration camp (only the names are different). neither has accomplished anything of merit, unless you consider body count a merit. capitalism’s failure modes have been a lot harder to pin down. every system of government is still subject to the second law of thermodynamics. when things fail hard enough humans hit the reset button and start over.
Google + T-Mobile just killed RCS on my phone. (Some server migration from what I could tell) Good thing I did not have any important RCS chats, but I am sure some people did.
Oh and T-Mobile is phasing out LTE. Throw all of those phones in the trash and buy new ones!
Not sure the cause but my experience of this sort of situation is that Google about 3-5 years ago started monkeying with the stock Messages app on android. All sorts of confusing appearing-and-disappearing functionality. Nagging pop ups, blatant spam, slowness. Just really making a disaster out of a core phone app that i used to take for granted. I think that kind of unforced error is a much bigger indictment of Android than the headline in this article is.
Had to study parts of “Wealth of Nations”, yes, “Imperialism, the highest stage of Capitalism” and the five signs thereof were on my test. Winter of 1987/1988. Let’s see, “Chapter 1: Concentration of Production and Monopolies” – monopolies, that’s the word. Monopolies, obviously, concentrate capital and become capital monopolies, too. Hence, any liberal capitalism one way or the other gravitates towards becoming monopoly capitalism, ie, capital serving the monopolies.
Unrelated, the derogatory term “communist party choices” referred to the (mostly complete) lack of responsibility, direct or indirect, for the actions taken. Investors’ short-term profits, no, responsibility to its customers. Investors-driven short-term profit strip-mining should be one of many goals, but not the only one, otherwise it does resemble communist party – unrelated to either communism or socialism economic models, though quite related to the bureaucratic organization any long-running human organisation eventually becomes. Bureaucracy was a good term that somehow fell out of use, but it described such entities the best – eventually their existence becomes their only goal, so even the short-term profit strip-mining may become its secondary goal.
Parallels notwithstanding, USSR communist party was such standalone organisation existing in its own spherical vacuum, with pretty much zero responsibility for its actions, direct or indirect. Why seemingly free market based monopoly capitalism has to reinvent the same concept is a bit of a mystery to me, but having worked in corporate world, I’ve noticed that humans in general, when in position of unchecked power, tend to invent just a thing, if not fiefdoms, then something quite close, USSR communist party kind of organisation, again, unrelated to the communism as taught in the textbooks. “Sect” may be too strong of a word, since it implies “the only way is in, nobody is allowed to leave”, but the premise is about the same – only selected “few” are given all the unlimited reins, merit or not, and the rest are mostly acolytes, plus useful idiots, paid or not, helping keeping it shrouded in mystery. Some kind of a shared/secret knowledge, real or made up, that’s supposed to be only fully known by the “selected few” is how sects form their core/circles, and any sufficiently large organisation invents these by a truckload, say, “internal policies”, ie, the secret dance one has to perform make to make anything work or happen : – ]
Sorry about the run-on, but the essence of my rant was thus – any organisation with removed responsibility (and invented rituals) resembles a USSR communist party, hierarchy and all. Whether it is “upper management” in a large corporation, or hordes of “advisor committees” in the UN are details – they TEND to function in about the same way, so there, the reason why I call them all “communist parties”.
You should kick your teacher square in the balls.
school would be more fun if we got to take a nerf bat to any professor we managed to prove wrong. college is a safe space so we need to use nerf. now most of the students would be wielding it like a cop wields a phone book on a perp in an interrogation room, but so long as no bones are broken, im cool with it. i figure it wouldn’t be long before every professor gets publicly flogged out of their positions of power. now if we could only do that for congress.
So long as the prof can do the same to any student he proves wrong.
Also who judges ‘proof’?
Remember college is full of undergrads, most understand absolutely nothing and aren’t even trying.
Profs in the soft subjects…Same as undergrads, but older and convinced they are authorities, no objective truth in anything.
Well you have good examples I’m pretty sure you download your bank applications from the Google Play or Apple pay you’re not side loading them this articles about people being stopped from sideloading applications basically Google is going to use something like well we’re protecting people from terrorists or potentially c**************** the guy get the idea and viruses and malware even though I find the application that don’t have it and sometimes the antivirus software thinks that they have viruses in it because it wasn’t from the Play store I even had antivirus software red flag other antivirus software
“a video discussion”, surely by definition that is a monologue.
I would ditch Android so fast it’d make Sundar Pichai’s head spin if PostmarketOS could figure out how to get battery charging and audio working on the Fairphone 4.
If you’re willing to buy fairphone, then you are already paying extra for a vendor that won’t lock down your phone. Relax, you’re fine. If fairphone decides to reverse their policy of letting you unlock the bootloader and install a custom rom, that would be a huge change for fairphone and has nothing to do with google.
I’m relaxed, I just also dislike big tech. :)
The EU RED directive is strongly encouraging the locking of bootloaders. Give it a few months and don’t be shocked when fairphone does
Huawei likes this !
HarmonyOS NEXT is obviously the future of mobile OS.
Except they aren’t any better in politics. Isn’t Huawei Apple wannabes with chinese quirks (which is even worse).
Guys you are doing a great job
But some of most trusted anti virus company had sold people information to gaming companies. But won’t say names. But the company was fined heavy by European union. But get to CPU companies had put back door program so USA government and back fired on themselves and. Let the wrong people got with the dark fibre. They 3party companies selling information without asking you first. But remember guys happen wit Mirc and bit torrent
Feedback form: https://goo.gle/Android-verification-feedback
This is a shameful abuse of power.
Thanks, just sent my opinion there:
Requiring, for whatever reason, applications to be signed by a company so it can be installed on a private phone not related in any way to this company is unacceptable and breaks any concept of true ownership, no signing other than the one provided by the owner of the phone must be required to install or operate a piece of code in a private owned hardware.
This is obviously not the ‘solution’; but I’m curious how small you could make a USB-C peripheral that acts as a host running ADB and can be controlled from an app on the phone(presumably implemented as a composite device).
It’s be deeply perverse; but for not-much SoC you could theoretically handle all app installs as ADB by laundering them through the little dongle.
You can already do this on phone with termux and ladb
Cant even access your own files system on your phone
Now you can only install what Google tells you?
Nope
Gimme windows mobile or I’ma just flash a custom android 10 rom that lets me do what I want and I paid my money for
Lets get back to just a dedicated home phone and answering machine. It does what I want with a ‘phone’. My desktop and laptops let me do what I want to do with them as well. A camera works as well… Genie is out of the bottle, as people like the ‘convenience’ of a portable comm device and be ‘connected’ 24×7. Not me… So it goes.
well, people might change to harmony os or other, in case they goea open source.
this is another free highway for huawei to conquer the market
hope google is not that foolish
Notice how they are calling it side-loading when in actuality it is installing and running software on a device that a user has bought. Highest level of manipulation and enshittification through the language itself.
every operating system does this now. windows got me used to downloading installers from a website. frankly the least secure thing you can do, unless you trust the site, and that’s not always a good idea. some websites modified the installers to throw in adware or other crap. linux had this all figured out from the get go with its repos. the repos got front ended, and the modern app store is born.
i started mostly on windows 9x-xp, so i still prefer to install things the old way. app stores are not a bad idea though, especially considering that the phone seems to be the essential security appliance now. if there is a device you dont want malware on, its that one. but google is terrible at vetting software. especially given that adware was one of the reasons we started vetting software in the first place, and the play store is mostly adware. google wants ads in your apps because that’s how they make money, so they want to lock out good software so it doesn’t compete with their bad software. its about control. nothing more.
They just lost their monopoly case so this is doubly stupid. If they have to open up to other app stores, then people will just use those instead of the official play store
But if the OS won’t allow you to install apk from anywhere else if its not properly signed by a verified developer the other app stores can exist, even function as normal, but only if they all jump through Big G’s hoops. It seems the only way to load an app that will be allowed without verification for now is via the debug bridge, which requires a computer…
Just remember if you don’t like it to make it know at the feedback link provided in the article. Google isn’t going to read your feedback in this comment thread.
And they are when it’s i n their trashbin?
Doesn’t this mean that we can just change the cert authority to be a third-party? One that allows anyone to upload their self-signed cert? Custom roms shouldn’t have too much effort to implement a third-party authenticator.
I think this plan must have been created by Apple.
And it will boost their sales I imagine, because afterwards the only thing android has going for it are.. ads.
And I think Google might be wrong about the popularity of and love people have for ads..
And of course if they get away with this guess who else embraced the Google way and will feel inspired? Starts with an M and ends with a dollar sign. ‘New In Windroid 12’
2025 really sucks.
look on the bright side, its all downhill from here.
We should just flail our arms and shout WHEEEEE.
Hmm, perhaps I should not have mentioned arms? But it’s a done thing now.
Does this mean third party apps you already have downloaded on your device prior to this roll-out will need to go through this verification as well? I sure hope not because TubeMate has been a lifesaver for the last several years, and that’s probably the ONE third-party app I can’t live without.
I let them know I don’t like their locking down. I have been with Android from the pre-order of the G1. Rooted every device until the phone companies in the US locked their boot loaders. Google can be an unstable mess sometimes. I hope they don’t ruin our experiences.
Sooooo Google is going to enforce this how? Considering there any number of ways to obtain fake ID in the USA alone, let alone other countries, and that you can already find altered versions of stock android ROMs for way more than just avoiding exactly this kind of shitty policies from manufacturers and also from specific service providers for cell phones in particular, Google is going to for see an extreme uptick in people just refusing to use stock Android anymore. Again, Android as an OS is based on a Linux kernel, so anything that can run Android could run a touchscreen Linux distro so long as it has an unlocked bootloader. If Google really stops allowing APK installs directly on devices running Android, people will be far less inclined to use anything that runs stock Android, if it ends up requiring a whole separate device to install even your own apps as APK’s. ADB installs already can’t be done on the same device you install to using that at all anyway. They want us to buy two devices AND pay a fee to be able to use any app in a format tgat works on their OS? Alright, we will just make it a point to break that OS so hard that it doesn’t matter what Google wants. Thanks for a FAFO teachable monent in tech.
Hahah. A couple of months ago I was bitching at One+ because the N30 (or whatever) i had would not at all let me load from unknown sources. There were 2 different options to tick and het it working but neither worked and so I call. I was asking why I can not tick these options so that I can get some apps that I want and they said that the options are not able to be checked because they are concerned for my safety. I was like wtf.. my safety? My Dollars bought this product so that I can do with it as i please.. if i download malicious software that sends money from my account into your personal bank account i am sure you wouldn’t be at all concerned about my safety, would you? This guy was like uhhhhhhhhhh.. Then i was like plus . I am pretty sure your reasoning is absolute bulll$+i# too because If you guys were so concerned about our safety. Why the hell would you leave those two options in the friggin settings for people to googling the how to’s and trying and trying and trying and Going nuts. In 2.places there are settings that mean the same thing. One is per app and one is globally. But you guys take it upon yourself to disable this ability and enable a lot of mental instability because of your concern. That is like dangling a carrot in front of a horse in order to get it to walk yet it will never get it. I think that is cruelty. You are forcing people to go the apple way by way of using your furors play store and i think that is complete bullshit. Now tell me how concerned are you right now for me because i am frustrated as fkkkk.. This guy’s reply is “uhhhhh”. So I ask him fascist regime he is fighting for, Google or Apple. And this guy tries to tell me that the reason why i cant turn on either of the options is.. I then just had to cut him off.. Anyways this conversation got funner and fun funner as it went forward. The supervisor was supposed to call me back but never did.. regardless. It makes sense now.. that was just the guy that puts up the perimeter fence for the “camp”. Here comes the Googlenughen express and if you dont play by their rules. You too will meet the secret police. And to camp you will go.
I wonder if it’s legal for a private company to demand a government-issued ID – and thus reject state-issued ones.
Not that the Google sponsored politicians would do anything about it, and nor does any average Joe have the money to fight Google lawyers.
I feel like I’m not understanding something correctly. is it legal for them to paywall our ability to install things this way on an open-source OS? Is that not a violation of Android being open-source?
Oh you have to pay too? Geez.
Seriously android Is public property open source it would be robbery if Google does shit like this android is not Google property this Is not legal the public can file a lawsuit against Google https://source.android.com/
What is the benefit to Google of implementing this? They are a publicly traded for-profit company and they aren’t going to do this for no reason. They claim that they are doing it to stop malware but how is malware distributed outside of the Google Play Store and installed by users on their own devices something that affects Google exactly?
Sideloading APK’s is sketchy as hell. The guy who said “I make an app for my family”, I don’t even think I would trust my family to make me an app to sideload. What if Microsoft banned Steam? It’s more like, what if Microsoft banned cracked games from the pirate bay, which was the reason I had to reinstall Windows every 3 months back in the day. And Valve is a similarly verified and registered developer for Windows, at least they had to have their exe signed. I sideload porn games, so I get the freedom argument, but I’m also glad they’re making this difficult for me, because I’m trying to stop.
Deeply evil company.
Right now the EU and UK and AU and CA and NZ and US are all moving towards government backdoors in chat.
The solution to such eventuality would be apps made by volunteers. And suddenly around the same time there is this new Google requirement.. coincidence? Is this even Google’s idea or are there external forces at play?
Soliciting feedback? I believe all the necessary feedback was left on the GitHub issues page for “Web Integrity API”. I’m partial to “violates Yahweh’s Terms of Service” and the one that’s written in hex code.
I think it would be paranoid to say the request for comment is just bait to allow authoritarian government officials (who may well be the reason for these extreme “verification” requirements) to retaliate against those expressing dissent.
Paranoid. But not implausible.
They know people aren’t okay with this. What is there for them to learn by requesting this feedback, other than the people who provide it?