Unfortunately reading the list of installed apps is a common practice on Android, there's a public API.
Android probably suffered a lot, security wise, by the fragmentation. I still don't know why Google allows such APIs though.
For a number of reasons, including this one, I'm considering switching to iPhones the next time I have to change smartphone. Not super happy about it but I'll adjust 🙄
Because I can profile you with such data. If you have Tinder you're most probably single. If you have an app to register your menstrual cycle you're most likely a woman below a certain age range. If you have an app to track your running, that's another thing I know about you and so on. I can also see if you have any of the apps of my competitors installed.
I reasonably suspect that most people do not know about this and even if they won't care they still are not even asked if they can be profiled in this way.
We say that data is anonymous but you can learn a lot about a person from which apps they have installed (and how the list changes over months and years).
It should at least be an explicit permission. The mobile apps now have to explicitly ask to the user "hey can i access your photos?", I wonder what would happen if asking "hey, can i read the name of all the apps you have installed?" was mandatory ;-)
Unfortunately reading the list of installed apps is a common practice on Android, there's a public API.
Android probably suffered a lot, security wise, by the fragmentation. I still don't know why Google allows such APIs though.
For a number of reasons, including this one, I'm considering switching to iPhones the next time I have to change smartphone. Not super happy about it but I'll adjust 🙄
Why is seeing a list of installed apps bad ? How is this any different than any other operating system ?
Because I can profile you with such data. If you have Tinder you're most probably single. If you have an app to register your menstrual cycle you're most likely a woman below a certain age range. If you have an app to track your running, that's another thing I know about you and so on. I can also see if you have any of the apps of my competitors installed.
I reasonably suspect that most people do not know about this and even if they won't care they still are not even asked if they can be profiled in this way.
We say that data is anonymous but you can learn a lot about a person from which apps they have installed (and how the list changes over months and years).
It should at least be an explicit permission. The mobile apps now have to explicitly ask to the user "hey can i access your photos?", I wonder what would happen if asking "hey, can i read the name of all the apps you have installed?" was mandatory ;-)
Ahh that's a very good point thanks for enlightening me. I do like the suggestion of adding it as an explicit permission.
Sadly iOS allows it as well 😞 and if the next iPhone whatever doesn’t have a headphone port when my 6s dies then I’m going right back to android 🙁
Are you sure? As far as the mobile devs I work with told me this feature is not available for iOS, maybe in the latest version?
Yeah, tough some Android phone makers are removing it too :(