Watchdog Which? wants Google to be more transparent about security updates for old phones

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Push messages are an essential part of connected mobile devices. They are also one of the critical missing pieces in the open source Android ecosystem. Until...

A simple way to block access to the internet per app - M66B/NetGuard

Bromite is Chromium plus ad blocking and enhanced privacy; take back your browser

Android is one of Google’s most important tools for collecting data on users. This guide will help you improve your privacy on Android devices.

Factory resets aren't helping. Neither are mobile antivirus solutions. Malware keeps reinstalling itself.

Kaspersky researchers found malware in CamScanner, a text recognition app that was downloaded more than 100 million times from Google Play.

L'actualité du Logiciel Libre et de Linux, sur un site francophone contributif géré par une équipe bénévole par et pour des libristes enthousiastes

Download apks from Google Play Store. Contribute to yeriomin/YalpStore development by creating an account on GitHub.

Malicious apps from a campaign called "Agent Smith" have been downloaded to 25 million Android devices, according to new research by cyber-security firm Check Point.

New study reveals scary, sneaky tactics

GrapheneOS is a security and privacy focused mobile OS with Android app compatibility.

Facebook routinely tracks users, non-users and logged-out users outside its platform through Facebook Business Tools. App developers share data with Facebook through the Facebook Software Development Kit (SDK), a set of software development tools that help developers build apps for a specific operating system. Using the free and open source software tool called "mitmproxy", an interactive HTTPS proxy, Privacy International has analyzed the data that 34 apps on Android, each with an install base from 10 to 500 million, transmit to Facebook through the Facebook SDK.

Objectives To investigate whether and how user data are shared by top rated medicines related mobile applications (apps) and to characterise privacy risks to app users, both clinicians and consumers.

Design Traffic, content, and network analysis.

Setting Top rated medicines related apps for the Android mobile platform available in the Medical store category of Google Play in the United Kingdom, United States, Canada, and Australia.

Participants 24 of 821 apps identified by an app store crawling program. Included apps pertained to medicines information, dispensing, administration, prescribing, or use, and were interactive.

Interventions Laboratory based traffic analysis of each app downloaded onto a smartphone, simulating real world use with four dummy scripts. The app’s baseline traffic related to 28 different types of user data was observed. To identify privacy leaks, one source of user data was modified and deviations in the resulting traffic observed.

Main outcome measures Identities and characterisation of entities directly receiving user data from sampled apps. Secondary content analysis of company websites and privacy policies identified data recipients’ main activities; network analysis characterised their data sharing relations.

Results 19/24 (79%) of sampled apps shared user data. 55 unique entities, owned by 46 parent companies, received or processed app user data, including developers and parent companies (first parties) and service providers (third parties). 18 (33%) provided infrastructure related services such as cloud services. 37 (67%) provided services related to the collection and analysis of user data, including analytics or advertising, suggesting heightened privacy risks. Network analysis revealed that first and third parties received a median of 3 (interquartile range 1-6, range 1-24) unique transmissions of user data. Third parties advertised the ability to share user data with 216 “fourth parties”; within this network (n=237), entities had access to a median of 3 (interquartile range 1-11, range 1-140) unique transmissions of user data. Several companies occupied central positions within the network with the ability to aggregate and re-identify user data.

Conclusions Sharing of user data is routine, yet far from transparent. Clinicians should be conscious of privacy risks in their own use of apps and, when recommending apps, explain the potential for loss of privacy as part of informed consent. Privacy regulation should emphasise the accountabilities of those who control and process user data. Developers should disclose all data sharing practices and allow users to choose precisely what data are shared and with whom.

Le fourbe a été téléchargé 150 millions de fois

La protection des données personnelles, cinquième roue du carrosse dans l'écosystème Android ? Une étude révèle que pas moins de 17.000 applications Android recueillent des informations d'identification qui créent un profil permanent de l'activité des utilisateurs sur leurs terminaux.

A new start-up company called eelo wants to provide you with an alternative version of Android. What makes this different than the version of the mobile OS that you are familiar with is that this version is de-Google-ized. The goal is to allow users to have more privacy than they currently do with the Google Play Services version of the open source OS...