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Micromax Remotely Installing Unwanted Apps and Showing Ads
jones_supa (887896) writes "Reports are coming in that users of certain devices by Indian phone manufacturer Micromax noticed apps being silently installed without their consent or permission. Uninstalling these apps won't help, as they will be automatically reinstalled. Alternatively, instead of downloading apps, the phone might litter the UI with stack of notifications which are advertisements for online stores and other apps. It turns out that the "System Update" application is responsible for all of this. When starting to tear down the application (which is actually called FWUpgrade.apk on the filesystem), the first thing you notice is that it's a third-party application. A Chinese company named Adups developed it as a replacement for the stock Google OTA service. The article shows the potential abilities of this app and how Micromax customers can work around the disruptive behavior."
Problem solved.
just as Google knew it would be used.
Isn't this already the business model for most "apps" these days? The only thing surprising here is they aren't sugar coating it with pleasant sounding euphemisms.
Yea, some of us used computers with only 4K of RAM and remember a day when this kind of shit would have been unthinkable even if it were possible.
But it isn't expressly illegal, so expect more of this. Don't buy something that does this? Sure, enjoy that option while it lasts.
i was proposed an ota update,in France at the end of 2014(november?), for a cheap android 4.2.2 device branded logicom E350, since i had some ads popping up at each action, and finally i discovered malwares as cube.apk , fake google search,
i am not sure 100% they were brought by the update but i found a recovery folder containing a log with the cube.apk , fake google search, if i guess right, it's created by the ota, to flash the o.s . i may be wrong, but i've writen to Logicom commercial service, to warn them(in case of ota hijack or claim for explainations) without any reply since several months.
i had to root my device, very painful when it's a cheap, not well known model/brand, i spent hours to find how to do that and to get rid of malwares with root , and risking to delete an essential system file(because you have to delete all the pieces else they will auto reinstall at the next reboot): so beware of cheap, exotics brands or models
... the only thing worse would be apps you don't want preinstalled, and no ability to uninstall them at all!
Shocked i tells ya!
This is not unlike what AT&T has been doing recently to its android customers.
Every manditory system update (the ones that get pushed without warning when on wifi) has turned into a game of what app did they add and force active this time.
Last time it was uber and a "you're in range of an affiliates wifi, you should sign up" bit of aware.
Has anyone ported cyanogenmod to the phone yet? That's my default answer to the heaping helping of unwanted crap that always seem to get bundled with my phones.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
My phone is constantly downloading shit I don't want. Luckily for me I can freeze it all.
Buck Feta. You know what to do.
...when they introduced Google Play Music etc. via regular Updates through the Play Store.
They learned well from their USA capitalist teachers.
Table-ized A.I.
They learned well from their USA capitalist teachers.
More like the English East India Company.
My Samsung phone came littered with so much garbage that I can't uninstall, only "disable." Stuff that wants to sell me crap, stuff takes up CPU cycles and phones home like a chatty teenager. Nothing of interest to me.
on dumb feature flip phones no less. our newer basic verizon phones (we do not have any 'smart phones') have ads half the time we flip them open to make a call. so fucking annoying and no way to disable or opt out of them short of telling verizon to fuck off and switch to tmobile (which unfortunately isn't really an option because gsm has shitty or no coverage around here).
Fuck them, just install stock android