this post was submitted on 30 Mar 2025
199 points (98.1% liked)

Privacy

5688 readers
13 users here now

A community for Lemmy users interested in privacy

Rules:

  1. Be civil
  2. No spam posting
  3. Keep posts on-topic
  4. No trolling

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
iopq@lemmy.world
199
Everyone knows all the apps on your phone (peabee.substack.com)
submitted 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) by Ninjazzon@infosec.pub to c/privacy@lemmy.world
27 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Until a few years ago, any app you installed on an Android device could see all other apps on your phone without your permission.

Since 2022, with Android 11, Google removed this access from app developers. Under their new package visibility policy, apps should only see other installed apps if it’s essential to their core functionality. Developers must also explicitly declare these apps in the AndroidManifest.xml file - a required configuration file for all Android apps.

So I downloaded a few dozen Indian apps I could think of on top of my head and started reading their manifest files. Surely they will be respectful of my privacy and will only query apps essential to their app's core functionality? πŸ™ƒ

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Geodad@lemm.ee -1 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Not on my Graphene OS phone.

[–] passenger@lemm.ee 4 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Seems that is not true. Apps will see inside profiles as far as I know.

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip -1 points 4 days ago

"Graphene is perfect in every way and everyone should use it"