Let them keep those. I hereby declare that if I don't own the thing, I ain't buying it. So no root, no $$$.

Are they talking about the changes that were made that allow a dev to prevent their app from launching if it fails a Play integrity check?

If so I don’t see that as a big deal since it is up to the dev to use it. OSS devs that want to distribute their app via apk download won’t enable it, and anyone distributing cracked apks will just disable that along with whatever other changes they are making.

I haven't seen proper reporting but the Play Integrity install source thing is accurate. There's a reasonably good overview straight from the devil himself.

Lots of things that have very valid reasons on paper that also just happen to give Google a stupid amount of control and will backfire for a somewhat small percentage of people in very bad ways. We've been at "you can't use pretty much any bank unless you agree to either Google or Apple terms" for quite some years now, now we're giving those same app developers ways to detect if their device has accessibility APIs enabled (useful to protect against bot farms, but also a functional check for "you're able-bodied") or is in security support (also a functional check for "not reliant on hand-me-downs").

From the article it sounds like the limitations come for some app types downloaded directly from a browser. I think this doesn't affect alternate app stores like f-droid where you are effectively delegating approval to their process.

I have come across the other limitations mentioned with the Home Assistant companion app which I could only get matter registration to work with the version downloaded from the Play store.

Degoogled ROMs are gonna be the bomb in the future.

Yeah, but I still really like my micro SD card slot and pen on my note 20 ultra. Dunno what I'll do when I have to replace it.

The pen is the only reason I have stuck with Samsung. If they made a Pixel with a smart pen that I could put GrapheneOS on I'd buy it in a second.

Maybe you should curb your enthusiasm a bit. have you seen what it take to unlock the bootloader from most manufacturers? you might even need your grandma's birth certificate before you're allowed to do so in the future

I am aware, but what choices do we have? I for one stopped using banking apps in my Android phone, not a big deal, we didn't have banking apps there pre 2007 right?

I know not everyone can do it, but we can fight back in our own ways.

And voting with your wallet should be an obvious statement at this point.

The problem comes when it's not an app you're using for the app's sake, but because it's the app of some company you have a real-world relationship with. Your bank's app being the most important one that comes to my mind, considering I've already heard about some banks trying to restrict users to only Google's flavour of Android before this.

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Aaaaand now I'm carrying around a laptop again, at least mini pcs are tiny now, maybe a small handheld would do...

if any of this shit hinders me, I'll get a dumb phone and the cheapest iphone available for manditory work-based things and say so-long to being a mobile OS user.

That doesnt appear to be true, the restriction seems to be on apps being installed from file managers, web browsers, messaging, etc.

F-droid and the like are not part of that list.

This still isn't good, but it doesnt stop you from having F-droid manage your messaging apps it would seem.

Edit: If you're down voting because you think its using the same method as a file manager as the user that replied to me, this is incorrect. This is also an issue going back several versions.

F-Droid uses a session installer method for 3rd party app stores, it does not use the same method as a file manager.

For an article about a similar issue brought up by similar restrictions in previous updates, you can refer to this article:

Android 15 cracks down on sideloaded apps even harder to protect users

Android 15 places new restrictions on what permissions sideloaded apps can be easily granted. Here's what you need to know.

Android Authority (www.androidauthority.com)

You can also refer to this thread in the F-Droid forums which covers this as well, from 2 1/2 years ago:

Sideloading restrictions or removal in future, how it effects fdroid?

recently there is rumour or fact about sideloading apps in android 14. google is making mandatory of minimum api or os version for all apps on google play store [ gps ] and perhaps it will give toast message [ warnin…

F-Droid Forum (forum.f-droid.org)

Which also includes a merged discussion from the last time this came up 9 months ago.

F-Droid has been using the session installer method for quite some time.

For what it's worth I use aurora store and have already noticed some apps refusing to open/work unless I reinstall them from the play store.