this post was submitted on 14 May 2026
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Your Google Android device is about to stop being yours (keepandroidopen.org)
submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by Nexus@infosec.pub to c/opensource@programming.dev
17 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Is this still going to happen? What can we do?

Edit: Complain to your competent authorities here: https://keepandroidopen.org/cta/#consumers

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[–] joenforcer@midwest.social -4 points 9 hours ago (3 children)

I honestly don't think this is that big of a deal.

The people that want to still use unverified apps can do so after having to go through the flow once and never again. Those that don't even know what that means can't be easily coerced into installing a malicious app because of the security cooldown period.

This was a bigger issue back when the rumor was that no unverified apps could be installed under any circumstances. Now it's completely overblown but the site seems to be doubling down instead.

[–] vanillama@programming.dev 1 points 8 minutes ago

If Google wasn't directly incentivized to screw us over for infinite growth and profits I'd also believe them here, it won't stop here, they'll keep making it harder for us to control our own devices

[–] superglue@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 9 minutes ago

I think people are just worried its going to escalate further from there. Google takes something away, gives part of it back. Then later they take a little more, give less back, etc...

[–] reksas@sopuli.xyz 3 points 5 hours ago

until google removes it or adds even more hoops.

[–] BigTrout75@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (3 children)

Never was. Best option is to buy a phone that's open from the start. Sadly not that many choices

[–] mycodesucks@lemmy.world 1 points 9 hours ago

Yeah... they've been stripping important control features out of the kernel for decades.

This is just the LATEST reason your phone isn't yours.

[–] Nexus@infosec.pub 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yeah, I was thinking might be better to get a phone developed in the EU. I'm considering Jolla phone (Finnish) and FairPhone (Dutch). Or else a Pixel with GrapheneOS (but then it's Google again :/).

Are those sufficiently "open"?

[–] Piatro@programming.dev 0 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I have a FairPhone and the hardware is fine and very repairable (being able to replace the usb socket has saved me from buying a new phone). The android alternative e/os has a lot of criticism the launcher is awful, feels like a cheap Chinese knock off of iPhone-like interface but you can at least swap it out and it's not as secure as something like graphene os. You're making a tradeoff whatever choice you make.

[–] Nexus@infosec.pub 0 points 1 day ago (1 children)

So, what would you recommend, FairPhone but a different OS? Or Pixel/Motorola with GrapheneOS? I'll check out some videos about it in the mean while.

[–] DeckPacker@piefed.social 1 points 1 day ago

I'd probably recommend something with GrapheneOS as it's pretty easy to install and use. I personally use it as well and never had any issues with it. You might want to look if your Banking apps work, but other than that, you can pretty much install most major apps through Aurora (like WhatsApp, Signal etc.)

If you want to go fully open, you could also try buying a Fairphone 4 and installing PostmarketOS on it, as I see PostmarketOS as the long-term ideal future OS for phones, because it frees us from the shackles of phone update cycles and gives the user full control over their OS (including changing the desktop environment).

But if you want to use PostmarketOS you have to be willing to tinker and not everything will work perfectly. Especially the camera will not be perfectly supported, even on the well supported Fairphone 4, your pictures will look worse than the ones you could take on Android, because there aren't good drivers and post processing yet. But it can be really cool if you are an enthusiast.

[–] Tiral@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

That's not the only problem. Open source apps will just die because 99% of people won't download them. So they won't bother writing them unless then can be listed on the Google Play store.

[–] cranakis@reddthat.com 1 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Follow that link and scroll down for what to do.

[–] quick_snail@feddit.nl 0 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

Thanks for clarifying that this only affects Google Androids.

Androids without Google are unaffected

[–] Sightline@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That doesn't really help. I need to know how to completely disable updates on my phone.

[–] joenforcer@midwest.social 1 points 9 hours ago

You can't disable updates to Google Play Services.