Comment by marc_abonce
15 days ago
> F-Droid is different. It distributes apps that have been validated to work for the user’s interests, rather than for the interests of the app’s distributors.
F-Droid's curation saved me at least once when I wanted to upgrade my Simple™ apps and couldn't find them in F-Droid anymore, which led me to learn that SimpleMobileTools was sold to a company that closed sourced the apps[1] and that there's a free fork called Fossify[2].
Had I installed these through Google Play, they wouldn't have cared about this particular change and I would've gotten whatever random upgrades the new owners pushed.
Each app store's policies have their pros and cons, but that's why it's so important to have a diversity of marketplaces.
[1] https://github.com/SimpleMobileTools/General-Discussion/issu...
This weekend I needed to send a few PNGs by email. They were huge, so I figured I’d just grab an image compressor from the Play Store.
I checked out five different apps, each with millions of downloads. Every single one was riddled with data collection prompts and stuffed with ads.
Fine, I thought, I’ll pay to remove the ads. But the options were:
- “Free trial” that defaults into a $5/month subscription
- Or a $19 “lifetime” purchase
It’s so clearly designed to trick people into a recurring subscription for what’s essentially nothing. These apps are just wrappers around existing Android libraries. And if you check the reviews, they’re obviously bought.
This was literally the first time in a year I tried to download something from the Play Store, and the experience was so bad I just gave up and solved it faster in the browser instead.
These apps do exactly that, but are not easy to find from the F-Droid app (I had to use a search engine to find the first one):
https://f-droid.org/packages/mobi.omegacentauri.SendReduced
https://f-droid.org/packages/com.caydey.ffshare
Oh, and also, specifically for PNG optimization: https://f-droid.org/packages/com.wrmndfzzy.atomize
Here is another one: https://f-droid.org/en/packages/ru.tech.imageresizershrinker...
It also has a bunch of other features
Obligatory mention: ImagePipe[0]. It lets you compress pictures and edit them. You can share images to ImagePipe and it automatically shows a dialog to share compressed versions with another app (hence the "Pipe" -- it's a pipeline!)
[0]: https://f-droid.org/en/packages/de.kaffeemitkoffein.imagepip...
This is why I find the thesis that Google and Apple are good stewards hilarious if not malicious. There is absolutely nothing safe about their app stores. Certainly not more safe than something like f-droid.
Are Google and Apple's stores safer than the open web? It really doesn't seem like it, in a lot of ways.
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I feel like this is disingenuous. I have never used F-droid, but it seems they only publish open source apps and they take the initiative selecting them.
This isn't a good app store for the majority of app developers, since they wouldn't be able to publish there out of their own accord.
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Yes browser is a really good tool for utilities like this actually.
But also I suppose that f-droid doesn't have paid reviews or well, everything in f-droid is mostly open source, so I am curious if there are apps in f-droid that could've well suited your need.
I just search on whatever I want on duckduckgo,"open source X android app" or "open source alternativeto Y" or just directly trying to search it in f-droid too.
Not exactly end-user friendly, but this is exactly why I use Termux so much. I had the same image optimisation requirement so I just installed imagemagick via Termux and converted the images. Feels more easier to me to use standard Linux tools via Termux than go down a wild goose chase trying various bloated apps.
This is the wonderful state of the App EcoSystem that Google wants to "gatekeep" - so ppl are forced to swallow shit, tug their forelock and smile at the overlord. I wonder whether Termux will be able to renew its developer registration in the future.
Next time you can also use magic wormhole.
KDE Connect is an open source party pack of system to system tools.
Another option is to block ads using Netguard.
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The SimpleMobileTools fiasco and the way FDroid stayed resilient against it is the perfect example case of how their 'security' argument behind the side loading ban and developer registration mandate is hollow, misleading and harmful.
please fix your ambiguous use of "their"... you mean google and apple, don't you?
Yes. I thought that was clear from the context. Unfortunately, it's no longer editable.
thank you for posting this, emotional roller coaster the parent comment was
I used Simple apps in the past but lost track of them. Now i know why. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.
Indeed we need diversity of the ecosystems.
Yes, and it is crazy that Apple/Google want us to think that AppStore, OS and ContentFilter are not mutually orthogonal concepts.
I had no idea fossify was fork. Until this moment I had apps from both of them, some orange, some green, but the calendar started bugging out by opening a different date to what I clicked on. I see my phone hasn't updated it since last year. Now finally I've deleted them all in favour of the fossify ones. Thanks.
Google has a track record of turning a blind eye to malware and fraud delivered through their own channels. I like how F-Droid tackles them both - they've been my default app store for years at this point.
Thank you for this info. I had no idea why a couple weeks ago the calendar app was suddenly needing to connect to the net on startup and then doing a splash ad. Will be installing the Fossify version shortly!
Is Simple Gallery known to do anything shady now, behind the scenes? I had no idea it was sold either, and it's been my go to gallery app on all my devices for a long time. Just curious.
Fossify Gallery os a drop in replacement with no risk of data siphoning.
Simple Gallery Pro hasn't been updated since the takeover and doesn't even have the Internet Permission, so it is still perfectly safe to use. It is still superior to Fossify Gallery because of its proprietary photo/video editor (IMG.LY). Fossify's photo editor is extremely limited, and there's no video editor at all.
If you don't use the editors (or if you're using the non-Pro Simple Gallery) then you should probably switch to Fossify now.
If you do use the editors then you should probably disable automatic updates in Google Play, so you get a heads up if they ever push a shady update.
super helpful, thank you
This is how I found out my preferred gallery app is crap. I've switched to Fossify Gallery. Also, it's stupid that Simple Gallery just calls itself "Gallery" when it's installed. I almost didn't check.
Uh, I was still using it up until today... I did block its Internet access though.
HA! I use the "Simple" apps as the poster child for my rants about apps kneecapping themselves on purpose.
It's funny how the more one gets burned the more one becomes the kooky old fart the cliche requires us to be...
I did the exact same research and came to the same conclusion. I wouldn't have been prompted to do it without F-Droid
This sort of application acquisition game happens on ios as well and is part of the reason I am experimenting with a graphene OS phone sans any Google. I guess daddy Google is trying to come fuck me too.
> F-Droid's curation saved me at least once when I wanted to upgrade my Simple™ apps and couldn't find them in F-Droid anymore, which led me to learn that SimpleMobileTools was sold to a company that closed sourced the apps[1] and that there's a free fork called Fossify[2].
> Had I installed these through Google Play, they wouldn't have cared about this particular change and I would've gotten whatever random upgrades the new owners pushed.
sheesh. I've spent my whole mobile device life on iOS and am just now learning an Android device. While I feel I have more control over the finer details of my personal privacy and security, this ecosystem is a total minefield if you care about avoiding spyware and malware.
I'm glad I trusted my instincts and only installed F-Droid first before any apps from the Play Store. Just now found the Isolation app so I can create a Work Profile and separate personal life from the life that the relentless data vacuums are constantly trying to pull from the simplest apps these days.
Neither mobile OS is perfect, but I feel like I was correct about Apple having the user's personal privacy still much more of a priority than Google. There was never any question if those were the two options, IMO. But it does seems like now, finally, Android might be ready to deploy as a mobile operating system for the public. I'm fairly certain that this Android ecosystem that's used its users for so long as guinea pigs (not just Android, but the full unrefined and frankly unsophisticated media sphere as a whole that's been figuring out how to effectively work on us) has harmed the last generation or two beyond repair.
This became all too clear when the first thing I did on my first Android device a few weeks ago was install an offline keyboard from devs with my privacy interests in mind. Spent a few minutes thinking about what it would have been like living with this shitty keyboard system on iOS and realized that honestly, I am lucky that I stuck with iOS through all of this and feel like my mental health is much better than it would have been had I been fighting a malware-riddled Android device this whole time.
edit: I'm not saying you shouldn't use Android or that it's a bad idea, I do think that it is solid enough now (and maybe has been for a while, I don't know) that I can safely protect myself after learning. But ask yourself if all Android users would take the time to properly learn? What about kids?
We use Nara to track our baby's food intake and sleep.
A couple of months ago I noticed Little Snitch complaining about the app making new connections to malware domains. Thankfully I can run the app on macOS and noticed it.
When confronted with how this violated their Privay Policy, they gave a condescending reply. When I contacted Apple about this new update to the app, they ignored my report.
So… no, we're not safer on iOS. Perhaps the barrier to entry is a bit higher to discourage some low-hanging fruit, but Apple does very little for the 30% commission it takes.
They mean safer from apps like NewPipe which threaten their margins by giving users their attention back.
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> Perhaps the barrier to entry is a bit higher to discourage some low-hanging fruit, but Apple does very little for the 30% commission it takes.
As someone who is diligent about staying on top of these things, I thank you for sharing this because this is what I'm talking about: it is not clear at all to an average user who is trying to do task X with their phone (note that's *not* "do task X securely while protecting personal data").
I figured Apple didn't do a whole lot, but I still feel the policies must do something. Please do tell if you know specifics though. And I am very disappointed with all the near-literal shit that's flooded the iOS app store the last few years. Overall, my opinion about it all is that we need to take some time to think about everything we've learned and rebuild something new from the ground up. GrapheneOS seems promising.
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:( Would you be willing to share Nara's full reply?
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Would you even find out if an app has been sold to another company on iOS app store? It's confusing to see all of that diatribe when it doesn't even do much (if anything it almost lulls you into a false sense of security), and you just have less options to choose from to get around being locked out of using your device for apps you want.
> Would you even find out if an app has been sold to another company on iOS app store?
On this particular issue, no. But I also make a habit of not leaving old apps that I don't use lingering around on my phone. And I'm pretty sure I know all of those haven't been bought out by a data predator, apart from 23andme.
I just trust what Apple has done in other areas for my personal privacy and security, and I know they have insanely high and probably unreasonable standards for their app stores. and I don't install obviously predatory garbage apps. I feel like I could have only achieved this level of confidence in my mobile device with iOS. And to be clear that's just an opinion :)
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"What about kids?"
They usually have someone more mature watching over them as there are also other dangers in life except malware on their phones.
(Also, when I was a kid there was no one to explain me the internet, so I learned on my own and understood it better then those responsible for me.
But it was a different internet back then. )
Don't know about a mature but I wanted to play pokemon yellow on my mum's phone and I was in 2nd grade iirc and my brother just told me to search pokemon yellow rom myself and learn how to download/pirate it. He didn't help me at all, even though. he had pirated it earlier.
Made me learn pirating which went into more and more technical untill I think nowadays I dabble in playing pirated games in linux and linux scripting and just general coding.
There was no mature watching over me. I was downloading everything dude, heck I had once downloaded hollow knight as an apk to play it and I am pretty sure that it was a malware which i had quickly deleted as it wasn't working but now yes we've even migrated over from the phone.
So in a way my mature watching over me was saying, Idk learn it yourself, fuck around and find out.
I kinda think that grapheneos would be really nice for protecting your phone from something like malware from what I've heard.
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Odd take. On iOS there is no F-Droid so your options for simple apps is the same ad riddled “in app purchases” crap it is on GPlay.
Apple has made policy changes and changes to the app store to make it clearer which apps to avoid. Apple really cares about my privacy, or they tell me they do and I believe them. I think they do because they know how important brand loyalty is to their customers. It's pretty much the thing Apple lives on, never losing the customer's trust. Google clearly leaves it more or less up to nature.
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The topic of kids is a whole another debate - whether or not it is wise to give them an Internet-connected device - beause the same general concerns regarding the Internet exist on iOS as well.
Regardless, if I had to give them a device, it'll definitely be a Linux-based one.
Billions of people use android phones without malware, you are exagerating slightly.
I had never seen Android malware until my mom showed me her phone. I think she's barely ever installed an app on purpose in her life, but there it was this malware that looked like the husk of a legit app repurposed to show banner ads after every phone call
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Depends on your definition of malware.
If you consider adware to be malware, which I personally do, then I would estimate close to zero Android phones are operating without malware.
I don't really see how you can guarantee your Android phone doesn't have malware, I feel like you may be exaggerating here.
I also don't mind the downvote, but if you would please tell me how you are able to guarantee your Android phone doesn't have malware, please tell me instead of hiding behind a downvote. Otherwise my solution is don't use an Android device.
wow, downvotes on all three comments! thanks, stranger.
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