Facebook's Android App Can Now Retrieve Data About What Apps You Use

An anonymous reader writes "Facebook on Friday released its Android launcher called Home. The company also updated its Facebook app, adding in new permissions to allow it to collect data about the apps you are running. Facebook has set up Home to interface with the main Facebook app on Android to do all the work. In fact, the main Facebook app features all the required permissions letting the Home app meekly state: 'THIS APPLICATION REQUIRES NO SPECIAL PERMISSIONS TO RUN.' As such, it’s the Facebook app that’s doing all the information collecting. It’s unclear, however, if it will do so even if Facebook Home is not installed. Facebook may simply be declaring all the permissions the Home launcher requires, meaning the app only starts collecting data if Home asks it to."

Comments

Big Android Problem

[Richy_T]

It was a mistake to allow apps to declare which access rights they want and then present users with a take-it-or-leave-it choice. While this part in itself is not a bad thing, it should be possible for users to fine-tune the settings once an app is installed and the apps then cope with that. I know there are apps out there that let you do this or similar but it should have been built in from the start. This is the activeX of the 2010s

Re:Big Android Problem

[AK Marc]

I agree. I've always called for that. I've been told there are apps that do that, but it should be an OS level feature. I should be able to lie to my apps, much like I can by running a VM in a temporary partition with a single app inside it. Present a blank contact list and call history to any apps that ask. Block access to other apps (email and such). Let me choose.

Re:Big Android Problem

[__aaltlg1547]

you can use "Permissions Free" for example to modify an app's permissions. But some apps won't run if you take away any of their permissions. What's really needed is sandboxing.

Re:Big Android Problem

[Anonymous Coward]

As an app developer I would also like "negotiable" permissions.

I think a long list of permissions can be off-putting to users, and many permissions are needed only when the user actually tries to e.g. send an SMS from the app or take a picture. It would be better at that point to ask the user if they trust the app, much like the Android VpnService has to when it starts.

The other error is that some permissions are far too broad. For example, lots of apps require "Read phone state and identity" which gives the ability to learn not only the phone number, but also whether you are in a call and the number of the other party. Similarly there's a permission to read the phone book. A number of these apps simply want a unique ID for licencing purposes (the IMEI can be used where available, and the phone book gives the google account) but end up with a whole lot more and look a bit suspect.

The ID thing is discussed at http://android-developers.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/identifying-app-installations.html, but the conclusion is poor, suggesting use of ANDROID_ID, but then still needing to jump through hoops for legacy devices. With about 40% of devices at API level 10 (http://developer.android.com/about/dashboards/index.html) this still gives developers a headache.

Re:Big Android Problem

[admdrew]

Cyanogen definitely allowed this at one point (when looking at an installed app's settings, you could touch any of the permissions which would strike them out); it was hit or miss, with some apps crashing constantly when you disabled any of their permissions. I'm running 10.1 right now, and unfortunately this feature doesn't seem to exist anymore.

Re:Big Android Problem

[Fuzzums]

And, obviously, some scheme in the Play Store to flag apps which get too greedy, or which require classes of permissions which few should really need.

Obviously definitely not that. It's a developer-first market. Developers are expensive and they do all the work for Google. For free. So Google is the last one that is going to limit them.

Re:Big Android Problem

[waffle zero]

A cool feature would be the ability to provide selected apps with spoofed data.

That feature was proposed for Cyanogen and a patch was written. It was never included out of fears that developers would block Cyanogen from installing apps on the (then named) Android Market.

Re:Big Android Problem

[Rich0]

There are various patches that implement this. There were some root-requiring apps that did this as well but I don't believe they work post-v4.

The key isn't to return errors to applications - you just need to return a successful call with no useful data. If it asks for contacts, just say that the user hasn't defined any (a situation every app has to handle anyway). If it asks for the IMEI tell the app that there is no SIM installed. If it asks for the location, tell the app that there is no GPS coverage. If it asks to phone home, tell it that the network appears to be down at the moment.

Apps handle all of these things gracefully already. The key is to intercept the API call and direct it along one of these paths, and not to just return an error due to a lack of permissions, which the app no doubt was not designed for since it was supposed to be guaranteed those permissions.

Re:Big Android Problem

[paulkoan]

The Pdroid http://www.xda-developers.com/android/pdroid-the-better-privacy-protection/ patches are a "better" approach. They allow apps to keep the permissions they are designed to use, but feeds them fake data when they use them.

This protects privacy without crashing apps. However, it requires either a custom firmware with it already baked in, or running the patches against official firmware+root. This places it out of the comfort zone of many.

Why are you still surprised by this?

[moderators_are_w*nke]

You buy a device to store your personal data on from a company that collects personal data for a living, and then run an app on it from another company that profits from collecting you data and then are confused when they collect your personal data?

Reposting as me

I doubt most people will flinch but...

[Anonymous Coward]

I was actually curious to try Home, but when I saw the new permissions requested by the Facebook base app, I just said 'enough is enough' and deleted it.

I think I'm definitely in the minority, but stuff like this increases that bifurcation of their userbase. I keep a toe in just because I know people that use Facebook as a primary communications tool, but I already log in only in a separate browser from everything else I do just to quarantine it.

Bye bye Facebook

[rueger]

I looked over the new permissions being demanded by Facebook for the latest Android app update, and stopped dead at the point when they told me that the app could now "call phone numbers without your intervention." Say WHAT??

I expect Google to have pretty intimate integration into an Android phone. I signed on knowing that. From everything I read Facebook is now looking to pretty much take control of the phone OS, not by developing their own, but by hijacking large swaths of control from Android or the user.

Ultimately though one thing is making me stay away from this update, Facebook Home, and probably Facebook entirely on my phone: the Facebook app has been hands down the worst thing I've installed, and gets more useless with a very upgrade.

Use Tinfoil Instead

[Anonymous Coward]

USE TINFOIL FOR FACEBOOK!!!

Seriously guys. It works pretty well, and it isn't as annoying as the Facebook app.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.danvelazco.fbwrapper&hl=en

When you assume...

[93 Escort Wagon]

If an app states it needs permission to do X and Y, it would be rather naive to not assume it will do X and Y.

I'm a little surprised Android hasn't copied iOS's behavior, where it asks the user whether or not to grant permissions to a specific thing (e.g Contacts or Location) at the time the app tries to do so - it just makes sense, and it's not like both OSes haven't copied from each other before. But I suspect Google doesn't really want to remind you of what information each of its apps is accessing, or when.

Pause while in call

[tepples]

For example, lots of apps require "Read phone state and identity" which gives the ability to learn not only the phone number, but also whether you are in a call and the number of the other party.

There's a very good reason for media players and games to require this. Knowing whether the user is in a call allows the program to pause itself until the call completes.

Re:LOL, suckers...

[UltraZelda64]

I don't laugh at all those future phones sold with this garbage, and with it installed and set up in such a way that you are forbidden from uninstalling it...

I already have problems caused by "stock" programs on my phone that cannot be uninstalled without root access, and I cannot trust going through the process of attempting to gaining root, something that could possibly leave me without a phone. Once this garbage makes its way "stock" onto commercial Android phones in the same way, there will be an even greater need to try to gain root access. I am not looking forward to the day when I have to start doing extra research just to find out if a particular cell phone comes with this Facebook garbage, only to find that they all fucking do and the only possibly way out of it is to risk rooting it.

It's already a bitch doing research for a new phone, given all the variations in (incompatible) Android versions. It's a royal pain in the ass trying to find a phone that doesn't suck in general, and doesn't force the use of a cell service provider that tries its best to fuck you up the ass. The last we need is to add fucking Facebook to the mix. Fuck them.