Quartz:
When you install an app on an Android smartphone or tablet, it asks for access to data such as your location or address book. If you say no, you can’t install the app.
Apple handles things differently. On its mobile operating system, iOS, apps don’t ask permission when they’re installed. Instead, iOS takes some permissions as a given—internet access for instance—but for more sensitive data, such as your photos or location, the app has to ask for access when you use it. That more closely relates the decision to grant access to the reason for asking for it.
That there should be a difference between Android and iOS, which between them control 96.3% of the smartphone market, isn’t surprising. They have different overarching philosophies: Android is free for any smartphone maker to use while iOS is for iPhones only. Developers can freely upload their apps to the Google Play Store while Apple has tight gatekeeping. Android is easily customized; iOS is not.
But both Apple and Google are making big changes to the nuts and bolts of how permissions work, and they’re moving in opposite directions: While Apple is making it harder for apps to get access to your data, Google is making it easier. Most users may not notice; compared to the design, functionality, choice of apps, and price, privacy often comes last in people’s decisions about which phone to use. But these little-noticed details will have a profound impact on how widely your data are shared with other companies.
I’m a longtime fan of Apple products. But I am not immune to change. Three things keep me from experimenting with Android. First, there’s simple aesthetics. Apple keeps making products I like, so I’ve got no reason to drift.
Second, there’s the approach to privacy that’s the center of the linked article. It’s a small thing, perhaps, but I prefer Apple’s more granular approach.
And last, but certainly not least, there’s the issue of malware. Even the most neutral of security blogs make the case that device fragmentation is a security issue for Android. Apple controlling the hardware and software makes all the difference.
Googl now no longer warns about some permissions like the Internet permission, and will automatically update an app that adds malicious permissions without asking the user.
Reason #4
Not true. Android prompts the user before installing updates that use additional permissions.
What? This is definitely not the case on my phone. What phone are you using that you’re seeing this on?
Isn’t Google’s approach the one that’s more granular? You get a much better picture of what an app actually does on Android; for example, on iOS, apps just get access to the Internet, to bluetooth, and so on, by default. I wish Apple would adopt Google’s approach with its fine-grained permissions.
Although we live in a world where there is no longer any privacy, I would prefer to keep my own address book out of the equation
no.
Does a website ask you for permission to “connect to the Internet”? No. Does that make it a privacy threat to open a site?
Internet access is not a privacy concern. It becomes a concern when it’s combined with access to your data.
And since connectivity is not the problem in itself, adding it to the list of permissions just adds noise to the picture.
So it’s not a “much better picture”.
Android does only one thing for Google: it generates mobile ad revenue.
97% of Google’s revenue comes from ads. Never forget that.
That inconvenient little fact explains everything Google does.
This is incorrect. New permissions require approval before updating.
Privacy settings and transparency are tough to solve. Technically both companies have good solutions. As usual both have taken different paths from a user experience point of view.
iOS apps ask for permissions when they need them. It’s a lighter approach and in the context of the situation. Personally I prefer this. It helps the user make sensible choices at the right time.
The Android approach is on install or update. It’s shotgun, all or nothing. Certainly you can go in and change them later, but like all settings in Android are difficult for the average user. It’s like all the fine grained controls Facebook gave users at one point – baffling and never used.
It’s only tough if you’re trying to monetize the data most generated when people use their devices.