#Versions of android os how to#
#Versions of android os serial#

It also points to /e/OS as an example of privacy done right. is to be expected, as we will see the observed data transmission by the Samsung, Xiaomi, Huawei, Realme and LineageOS Android variants goes well beyond this,' the study says. 'Although occasional data transmission to the OS developer to check for updates, etc. This latest study by Leith, Patras, and Liu however argues what these vendor versions of Android are doing goes beyond telemetry that's necessary for phone maintenance. When The Register asked Google for comment about Leith's related study in April, a company spokesperson suggested phones are supposed to phone home with telemetry data, like modern cars do, to ensure everything is working properly. We asked Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi, Realme, and the e.Foundation for comment but we've not heard back. Leith said he hopes the research will help alert the public and lawmakers that action needs to be taken to give people control over the data leaving their phones. 'We’ve been too focused on web cookies and on badly-behaved apps.' 'I think we have completely missed the massive and ongoing data collection by our phones, for which there is no opt out,' said Leith in a statement. What's more, all of the handset makers, again with the exception of /e/OS, collect a list of all the apps installed on a handset, which isn't ideal if the app reflects sensitive or controversial interests. Microsoft's Swiftkey keyboard on the Huawei handset does similar usage logging. 'This largely undermines the use of user-resettable advertising identifiers.' 'This means that when a user resets an identifier the new identifier value can be trivially re-linked back to the same device,' they explain in their paper. The researchers note that Samsung, Xiaomi, Realme and Google all collect hardware device identifiers as well as identifiers that are resettable, ostensibly as a form of privacy protection. Google extends right-to-be-forgotten to app permissions on older Android devices.Don't look a GriftHorse in the mouth: Trojan trampled 10 million Android devices.

#Versions of android os how to#

Revealed: How to steal money from victims' contactless Apple Pay wallets.

What do iOS and Android have in common? Their apps suck at privacy, boffins say.

#Versions of android os serial#

While Leith's research from April showed that Android and iOS devices were found transmitting data like IMEI number, hardware serial number, SIM serial number, phone number, device ids (UDID, Ad ID, RDID, etc), location, telemetry, cookies, local IP address, device Wi-Fi MAC address, handset Bluetooth UniqueChipID, the Secure Element ID (for Apple Pay), and the Wi-Fi MAC addresses of nearby devices, these vendor-customized versions of Android are even more chatty.

e/OS, according to the boffins, sends no data to Google or third-parties and basically no information to /e/OS developers. LineageOS, though distinct from Google's version of Android, sent a similar amount of data to Google, the researchers found, but they didn't observe data going to LineageOS developers or to pre-installed system apps aside from those operated by Google.