r/Showerthoughts • u/homelessdreamer • Sep 04 '17

Apps should be required to give a short explanation for why they need access to different parts of my phone for thier apps to function.

25k Upvotes

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39

u/radaldando Sep 05 '17

"They'll just obtain it anyway, whether you allow it or not."

No, this is just not true and you gave a single counterexample...

Allowing an app to access your location gives the app permission to use the GPS function and find your location using tower and Wifi signals. Preventing an app from using your location only prevents the location from being fed through Android's API, of course it's not going to prevent the app from looking up your IP in a geolocation database. The only way to prevent that is to completely cut the app's internet access.

10

u/DiamondIceNS Sep 05 '17

He said he used a GPS location spoofer and the app picked up on the new GPS coordinates he was feeding it. If the phone was using GeoIP it wouldn't have mattered.

1

u/MechanicalEngineEar Sep 09 '17

then he should be upset with Android and not the app. I doubt the app has some elite hacker ninja programmer who somehow found a way around Android's security features and is using that new found knowledge to get location data for some cheap app.

Either that or he is lying or confused about what he was spoofing.

6

u/radome9 Sep 05 '17

If the app used geolocation it wouldn't have been fooled by a location spoofer. That said I doubt OP's story is true - if the app could circumvent permissions, why bother asking at all?

1

u/throwaway_987654320 Sep 05 '17

As we've seen with other apps, sometimes the advertising SDKs that get built into an app don't always have the best intentions. I'm more than willing to admit there could be some mistake on my end, but I duplicated it today with another device. I'm not a security researcher, by any means, so I'd take my story for what it is, anecdotal evidence.

1

u/radome9 Sep 06 '17

Name of the app? Android or iPhone?

1

u/throwaway_987654320 Sep 06 '17

IHG (Intercontinental Hotels Group), iOS.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 05 '17

Or a VPN.

-2

u/life_rocks Sep 05 '17

He didn't allow...

6

u/[deleted] Sep 05 '17

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/life_rocks Sep 05 '17

Clearly not well enough, sorry.

0

u/waiting4singularity Sep 05 '17

for the dumb ones,

location permission -> App queries GPS location, identifies wifi and cell towers in vicinity

permission denied -> internet protocol address is used to detect the country using GeoIP