Edit: For what it’s worth, you can give Google feedback to stop this nonsense. Scroll down to Get Ready section and click on Share your feedback. You can use the following text as an example.
Android’s strength has always been in being both secure and open. Restricting sideloading goes against this principle and does little to protect users. The existing toggle and clear warnings are already enough to inform users of the risks.
Meanwhile, the Play Store itself continues to be the main source of Android malware. In 2023 alone, malicious apps on Google Play were downloaded over 600 million times. More recently, 77 infected apps with 19 million installs and 200+ other malicious apps with nearly 8 million installs slipped past Play Protect. These numbers make it clear where the real problem lies.
If Google truly wants to protect users, the focus should be on strengthening Play Store defenses. Android’s openness is not the threat; malware inside the official store is. Please prioritize fixing that instead of undermining one of Android’s core values.
I’m considering leaving Apple for Android for a very long time now. On my shortlist I have the Fairphone Gen 6 and the OnePlus 13. Other options are not possible. I don’t want Google or Samsung hardware, or any other manufacturers that make it difficult to unlock your bootloader.
One of the reasons is the freedom to install any app I want on my device, because it’s my device. But with the news about Google forcing developers to share their personal credentials it makes it difficult for me to go to Android. Basically Google is trying to kill sideloading. Should I even move to Android now or is Android with the limitation just like iOS?
They’re not tightening Android up to protect users, they’re doing it to abuse and exploit them and restrict their ability to circumvent the data mining they conduct. There’s only one way they’d theoretically stop this course of action, and that’s if sales PLUMMET. Which won’t happen because the portion of people willing to abstain from new phone purchases to fight this is minimal.
There are millions of terrible trends that the consumer market has allowed to happen simply because the vast majority of consumers will bend over, drop trow, lube themselves up and say “Go ahead, I’m ready!” If we united and made an example of one brand and got even a six-month period of a drop in sales by 50% or more, they would beg us to tell them what do we want in return for buying again. We could have all the control we want, but people just don’t have spines.
If you buy a device right now, you get an immediate benefit, that lasts at least for the lifetime of the device. There is no change yet, and you’ll always be able to just not update to newer versions of Android that restrict sideloading. In case of Fairphone, that device is likely to last a long time.
There is no real risk in buying a phone right now. Only once infrastructure changes that drops previous wireless network technology (i.e. 5g), and the new wireless communication technology is not supported by your phone’s hardware anymore, is when you’ll run into problems. Or when apps require a newer version of Android, but likely you’ll be able to spoof that by rooting your phone and installing certain software.
I don’t think that is how it works.
For example I don’t think you can get google security update for older android without updating the whole system.
there were monthly google security update that are going to become less frequent.
Also I think the part that stops the apk installation (those not signed with signature in google database) are checked by google play services and that is installed in background which is the result of project treble and mainline that google implemented for modular updates without rom update.
so you probably can’t stop google from doing this policy even if you stay on older ROMs.
They way they are tripling down on surveillance tech makes me believe all tech will be compromised sooner rather than later. Keep trying for sure, but online privacy is doomed. Might be a good thing at the end of the day, but this admin has nothing but bad intentions and they aren’t going to stop at ‘no’.
I just put lineageOS on my oneplus 6. When you install it you have the option of leaving out the google specific apps, which I did. I’ve been a long time android user but am wanting to degoogle to reduce my surveillance capitalism exposure. Without the google “play store” if feels a little like when I moved from windows to linux, what if I don’t have enough apps? So far banking apps are a no go (can’t download the apks directly), otherwise I mostly use FDroid apps anyway rather than play store. Feels good to ditch google.
I have an eye on mobile nixos. I have a second oneplus 6 that needs a new usb port so may try fixing that one and seeing how it goes.
It’s only worth it if you can get a custom ROM friendly phone. Otherwise, no. Stock ROMs are approaching Apple’s levels of lockdown. With Apple you can at least get software updates for longer. And more games if you play on mobile.
Yeah that’s worrying for both phones. OnePlus just doesn’t promise updates and longevity. The Fairphone does make these promises, but with a bad track record and the current hardware I’m not certain it will be useful very long.
Older/weaker hardware can last much longer on custom ROMs without Play Services. I have phones like the Xperia XZ1 (from 2017) that absolutely fly despite their older chipsets and limited RAM (in this case a Snapdragon 835 and 4 GB of RAM).
I’m sure hardware is fine, I had a budget phone from six years ago (Huawei Y7 2019) before I upgraded and while it wasn’t good, it wasn’t unusable either. And that phone was just a hair above an Android Go phone. At this point performance upgrades should slow down. I can’t speak for their software support though.
In my opinion: Android used to be a 7/10, iOS at 3/10, now after Google’s announcement, its a 4/10.
For now at least, Google still allows Torrent clients and Firefox with extensions (like uBlock Origin), and this has been the case for the past decade. Google only requires a $25 one time fee for a developer account, Apple requires a recurring $99 per year payment. So Android is still better even with the restriction in mind.
Just pay $25, download apks from anywhere, sign the apps yourself. Supposedly they aren’t checking the contents (I mean, they have like tons of malware on Google Play and they never check those either, I doubt they are inspecting every single app), so just don’t distribute the apps to anyone other than yourself or some trusted friends and that’ll probably keep it under Google’s radar.
I’m currently planning on getting a Moto G 5G 2024 (about $140 right now on discount) for Lineage OS (CalyxOS was also supported, but they recently paused development so I’ll have to wait for that to be resolved). I was also considering a Pixel for Graphene, but its too expensive, and I don’t wanna deal with used market because a lot of then are ambiguous about if its a carrier variant and I just am too depressed to deal with the headache of that.
Even after 2027, Android will still be slightly better than iOS (in my opinion). Android still would (probably) have torrent apps, Firefox uBlock Origin (I can’t guarantee they won’t change it in 2028 or something). And iOS also seems to alway kill apps in the background from my experience, I could never get an app to synching data in the background, but Android is less aggressive with killing apps. Like I literally tried to plug in a USB flash drive and they said I had to install the Sandisk app then I have to keep the app on the foreground to finish transfer, but Android is doesn’t even need any apps, and transfers work in the background. Also, I don’t think iPhones have multitasking with 2 apps on at the same time yet.
I used LineageOS for a long time on my OnePlus One and moved to iPhone since last year. Tried S24 ultra for a month, but I disliked a lot of things. Now I’m getting fed up with the walled garden and the aas kissing Tim Cook does in the White House. I prefer Chinese phones of American ones. Google is the only issue, but I know my way around Shizuku to uninstall bloatware/spyware from Google. But I’m worried apps like ReVanced, NewPipe and several F-Droid apps won’t work because of this dumb policy.
Android - whatever you want, mostly. And so many devs working on it outside of Google, it’s only a matter of time before Google’s restrictions are undone.
Keep in mind, people outside Google have worked on it for 15 years now. There’s a lot of non-Google expertise.
But… Whether it’s worth it is up to you. I use an iPhone for work, because they manage it so I can’t do anything beyond what they permit, even if it’s an Android. I need to make calls and use the tools the company provides. So iPhone. It’s simple, it “just works”.
But for personal, I do a lot of stuff that simply isn’t possible on iOS.
I personally want to keep using ReVanced, Newpipe and a lot of F-Droid apps. I’m just worried in the future it will all be taken away. I have two iPhones now. In the past I used Samsung, but didn’t like the multiple and double of everything. 2 app stores, 2 webbrowsers, 2 note taking apps, 2 mail apps. Some of it was deletable and some wasn’t. I do feel like OnePlus comes with less bloatware.
Right now, with lack of major alternatives, it’s the smaller of the two evils.
And if the pushback I see is proportional to the real pushback, I’d imagine Google will take a step back, giving people more time to prepare.
And in line of getting prepared, if the AOSP project is forked, I’d imagine they could and possibly even would be mainteined while the original AOSP goes downhill. Similarly, if making the software is the problem, iirc there are rudimentary ways to make Android programs without Google’s SDK, of which people could start working on more attently too.
So all in all, unless alternatives get a sudden major boost, I think Android is the safest bet for users that care for freedom.
(And a side note, people should look also for devices that don’t have the bootloader locked from factory)
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They’re not tightening Android up to protect users, they’re doing it to abuse and exploit them and restrict their ability to circumvent the data mining they conduct. There’s only one way they’d theoretically stop this course of action, and that’s if sales PLUMMET. Which won’t happen because the portion of people willing to abstain from new phone purchases to fight this is minimal.
There are millions of terrible trends that the consumer market has allowed to happen simply because the vast majority of consumers will bend over, drop trow, lube themselves up and say “Go ahead, I’m ready!” If we united and made an example of one brand and got even a six-month period of a drop in sales by 50% or more, they would beg us to tell them what do we want in return for buying again. We could have all the control we want, but people just don’t have spines.
If you buy a device right now, you get an immediate benefit, that lasts at least for the lifetime of the device. There is no change yet, and you’ll always be able to just not update to newer versions of Android that restrict sideloading. In case of Fairphone, that device is likely to last a long time.
There is no real risk in buying a phone right now. Only once infrastructure changes that drops previous wireless network technology (i.e. 5g), and the new wireless communication technology is not supported by your phone’s hardware anymore, is when you’ll run into problems. Or when apps require a newer version of Android, but likely you’ll be able to spoof that by rooting your phone and installing certain software.
I don’t think that is how it works. For example I don’t think you can get google security update for older android without updating the whole system. there were monthly google security update that are going to become less frequent.
Also I think the part that stops the apk installation (those not signed with signature in google database) are checked by google play services and that is installed in background which is the result of project treble and mainline that google implemented for modular updates without rom update. so you probably can’t stop google from doing this policy even if you stay on older ROMs.
There’s a reason everyone and their sister are ditching Google apps/products.
They way they are tripling down on surveillance tech makes me believe all tech will be compromised sooner rather than later. Keep trying for sure, but online privacy is doomed. Might be a good thing at the end of the day, but this admin has nothing but bad intentions and they aren’t going to stop at ‘no’.
To degoogle?
To degoogle from google: the company that makes android phones.
I just put lineageOS on my oneplus 6. When you install it you have the option of leaving out the google specific apps, which I did. I’ve been a long time android user but am wanting to degoogle to reduce my surveillance capitalism exposure. Without the google “play store” if feels a little like when I moved from windows to linux, what if I don’t have enough apps? So far banking apps are a no go (can’t download the apks directly), otherwise I mostly use FDroid apps anyway rather than play store. Feels good to ditch google.
I have an eye on mobile nixos. I have a second oneplus 6 that needs a new usb port so may try fixing that one and seeing how it goes.
Yes it’s 100% worth it.
Lots of Free Open Source apps on the F-droid store etc.
And you can patch adds out of apps.
If it becomes a walled garden, it will still be less of a walled garden than IOS
It’s only worth it if you can get a custom ROM friendly phone. Otherwise, no. Stock ROMs are approaching Apple’s levels of lockdown. With Apple you can at least get software updates for longer. And more games if you play on mobile.
Yeah that’s worrying for both phones. OnePlus just doesn’t promise updates and longevity. The Fairphone does make these promises, but with a bad track record and the current hardware I’m not certain it will be useful very long.
Older/weaker hardware can last much longer on custom ROMs without Play Services. I have phones like the Xperia XZ1 (from 2017) that absolutely fly despite their older chipsets and limited RAM (in this case a Snapdragon 835 and 4 GB of RAM).
I’m sure hardware is fine, I had a budget phone from six years ago (Huawei Y7 2019) before I upgraded and while it wasn’t good, it wasn’t unusable either. And that phone was just a hair above an Android Go phone. At this point performance upgrades should slow down. I can’t speak for their software support though.
In my opinion: Android used to be a 7/10, iOS at 3/10, now after Google’s announcement, its a 4/10.
For now at least, Google still allows Torrent clients and Firefox with extensions (like uBlock Origin), and this has been the case for the past decade. Google only requires a $25 one time fee for a developer account, Apple requires a recurring $99 per year payment. So Android is still better even with the restriction in mind.
Just pay $25, download apks from anywhere, sign the apps yourself. Supposedly they aren’t checking the contents (I mean, they have like tons of malware on Google Play and they never check those either, I doubt they are inspecting every single app), so just don’t distribute the apps to anyone other than yourself or some trusted friends and that’ll probably keep it under Google’s radar.
I’m currently planning on getting a Moto G 5G 2024 (about $140 right now on discount) for Lineage OS (CalyxOS was also supported, but they recently paused development so I’ll have to wait for that to be resolved). I was also considering a Pixel for Graphene, but its too expensive, and I don’t wanna deal with used market because a lot of then are ambiguous about if its a carrier variant and I just am too depressed to deal with the headache of that.
Even after 2027, Android will still be slightly better than iOS (in my opinion). Android still would (probably) have torrent apps, Firefox uBlock Origin (I can’t guarantee they won’t change it in 2028 or something). And iOS also seems to alway kill apps in the background from my experience, I could never get an app to synching data in the background, but Android is less aggressive with killing apps. Like I literally tried to plug in a USB flash drive and they said I had to install the Sandisk app then I have to keep the app on the foreground to finish transfer, but Android is doesn’t even need any apps, and transfers work in the background. Also, I don’t think iPhones have multitasking with 2 apps on at the same time yet.
Yes, i went from iPhone to Oneplus 6 with LineageOS and never looked back. Now im on Oneplus 9 pro stil with LineageOS
I used LineageOS for a long time on my OnePlus One and moved to iPhone since last year. Tried S24 ultra for a month, but I disliked a lot of things. Now I’m getting fed up with the walled garden and the aas kissing Tim Cook does in the White House. I prefer Chinese phones of American ones. Google is the only issue, but I know my way around Shizuku to uninstall bloatware/spyware from Google. But I’m worried apps like ReVanced, NewPipe and several F-Droid apps won’t work because of this dumb policy.
Grayjay has been an ok youtube client
I use both at the same time.
From my understanding if you have an apple ecosystem at home and just want everything to sync with each other and work flawlessly, apples the shit.
Otherwise, android is nice and Fairphone is a environmental banger
There’s no comparison between the two.
iOS - you can do only what Apple says you can do.
Android - whatever you want, mostly. And so many devs working on it outside of Google, it’s only a matter of time before Google’s restrictions are undone.
Keep in mind, people outside Google have worked on it for 15 years now. There’s a lot of non-Google expertise.
But… Whether it’s worth it is up to you. I use an iPhone for work, because they manage it so I can’t do anything beyond what they permit, even if it’s an Android. I need to make calls and use the tools the company provides. So iPhone. It’s simple, it “just works”.
But for personal, I do a lot of stuff that simply isn’t possible on iOS.
I personally want to keep using ReVanced, Newpipe and a lot of F-Droid apps. I’m just worried in the future it will all be taken away. I have two iPhones now. In the past I used Samsung, but didn’t like the multiple and double of everything. 2 app stores, 2 webbrowsers, 2 note taking apps, 2 mail apps. Some of it was deletable and some wasn’t. I do feel like OnePlus comes with less bloatware.
You can hide and remove lots with Shizuku + canta
I don’t know where are you located, but check nothing phones too.
No.
Yes.
Right now, with lack of major alternatives, it’s the smaller of the two evils.
And if the pushback I see is proportional to the real pushback, I’d imagine Google will take a step back, giving people more time to prepare.
And in line of getting prepared, if the AOSP project is forked, I’d imagine they could and possibly even would be mainteined while the original AOSP goes downhill. Similarly, if making the software is the problem, iirc there are rudimentary ways to make Android programs without Google’s SDK, of which people could start working on more attently too.
So all in all, unless alternatives get a sudden major boost, I think Android is the safest bet for users that care for freedom.
(And a side note, people should look also for devices that don’t have the bootloader locked from factory)