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Anything on f-droid is going to be good. Last time this story came up I saw a comment saying there was two prominent apps there. It's scary how many people don

Anything on f-droid is going to be good. Last time this story came up I saw a comment saying there was two prominent apps there. It's scary how many people don't immediately go for the open source alternative before checking the Google play store. Most people publishing on f-droid use their real name, have verifiable open source activity, have a professional reputation to maintain and have their apps open to world to be scrutinised. Checking F-Droid should be your first choice everytime.

judge2020 6y ago
> Anything on f-droid is going to be good I fail to see how an app being on F-Droid inherently mean it’s going to be privacy-friendly.
- BelenusMordred 6y ago
  Android SDKs themselves can be leaky and are incredibly widespread, this is a clear flaw in mobile appsec and not that well known. That said basically everything benefits from the sun shining in on it. F-Droid alerts you to anything dodgy under the hood, has reproducible builds[1] and in general has none of the complete shitshow that is playstore. In my 5EYES country Google's playstore has to secretly insert malware if the government wants it and there's no way for the end user to tell if that's the case. Tell me a common use for a mobile app and we can compare what is available on both play store and f-droid. [1] https://f-droid.org/en/docs/Reproducible_Builds/ https://f-droid.org/en/docs/Reproducible_Builds/
  - judge2020 6y ago
    I’m more pointing out how it’s not a silver bullet (and how a silver bullet for app privacy doesn’t exist); nothing is perfect and f-droid is no exception, even if it is better than Play Store. Nothing is stopping an app from uploading user data for a good purpose then selling it to third parties.
    - BelenusMordred 6y ago
      > nothing is perfect and f-droid is no exception, even if it is better than Play Store Not wearing a seatbelt isn't perfect, and yet we all still do it :)
      - Ntrails 6y ago
        > Not wearing a seatbelt isn't perfect, and yet we all still do it :) Provably false.

judge2020 6y ago

> Anything on f-droid is going to be good I fail to see how an app being on F-Droid inherently mean it’s going to be privacy-friendly.

BelenusMordred 6y ago
Android SDKs themselves can be leaky and are incredibly widespread, this is a clear flaw in mobile appsec and not that well known. That said basically everything benefits from the sun shining in on it. F-Droid alerts you to anything dodgy under the hood, has reproducible builds[1] and in general has none of the complete shitshow that is playstore. In my 5EYES country Google's playstore has to secretly insert malware if the government wants it and there's no way for the end user to tell if that's the case. Tell me a common use for a mobile app and we can compare what is available on both play store and f-droid. [1] https://f-droid.org/en/docs/Reproducible_Builds/ https://f-droid.org/en/docs/Reproducible_Builds/
- judge2020 6y ago
  I’m more pointing out how it’s not a silver bullet (and how a silver bullet for app privacy doesn’t exist); nothing is perfect and f-droid is no exception, even if it is better than Play Store. Nothing is stopping an app from uploading user data for a good purpose then selling it to third parties.
  - BelenusMordred 6y ago
    > nothing is perfect and f-droid is no exception, even if it is better than Play Store Not wearing a seatbelt isn't perfect, and yet we all still do it :)
    - Ntrails 6y ago
      > Not wearing a seatbelt isn't perfect, and yet we all still do it :) Provably false.