4 ms·

While I'm not sure if this change to Google Maps has been or will be widely rolled out, you may want to look into what GrapheneOS is working on with their Googl

While I'm not sure if this change to Google Maps has been or will be widely rolled out, you may want to look into what GrapheneOS is working on with their Google Play compatibility layer [1]. It basically lets people use Google's services inside Android's standard app sandbox. That means they don't get access to privileged system APIs and can only access what the user chooses. It can also be used without a Google account. GrapheneOS is working on a way to redirect the Play services location APIs to an open source implementation of those APIs which uses standard Android location APIs [2]. It's expected to be available in an upcoming release [3]. [1] https://grapheneos.org/usage#sandboxed-google-play https://grapheneos.org/usage#sandboxed-google-play [2] https://developer.android.com/reference/android/location/LocationManager https://developer.android.com/reference/android/location/Loc... [3] https://twitter.com/GrapheneOS/status/1486182874567122945 https://twitter.com/GrapheneOS/status/1486182874567122945

citizenpaul 5y ago
I wondered how long before google will have a reason for grapheneOS to suddenly stop being supoorted on the pixel. Now i know it will be soon and i get to tell everyone i told you so
- dragonelite 5y ago
  They are creating custom silicon and a new operating system, wouldn't be surprised that will be the cutoff moment.
- tristan957 5y ago
  Google is moving all Android distributors to upstream Linux, so I guess it is us telling you so :).
ForHackernews 5y ago
> to an open source implementation of those APIs Is this MicroG? https://microg.org/ https://microg.org/
- jdiez17 5y ago
  No, microG is a partial reimplementation of some of the functionality in the Google Mobile Services (GMS) app. Unfortunately, this approach has significant drawbacks. In order to install microG, your version of Android OS needs support for spoofing the cryptographic signatures of apps. Some OSes like LineageOS and CalyxOS allow this. See [1] for some pointers about why this is considered harmful. There was also a recent fairly serious infoleak bug in microG [2] that in my opinion was caused by its broad scope. The way it works in GrapheneOS is that the OS redirects Binder connections (an IPC mechanism in Android) to a trusted, bundled app (GmsCompat) which will only implement the Play services location API in the foreseeable future. The rest of the Google Play functionality is implemented by GMS itself. [1] https://madaidans-insecurities.github.io/android.html#microg-signature-spoofing https://madaidans-insecurities.github.io/android.html#microg... [2] https://github.com/microg/GmsCore/issues/1567 https://github.com/microg/GmsCore/issues/1567
  - jesprenj 5y ago
    Speaking of signatures, google play now requires developers to submit the private keys we used to sign apps with. Without submitting a key I can't issue updates. Out of protest I stopped pushing updates to apps via Google Play.
    - jdiez17 5y ago
      Yes, that is fairly concerning. The last news I had about this was that using Google Play Signing (their key escrow and app signing service) was only mandatory for new apps as of August 2021. Not sure if that has changed recently. But everyone can see it coming a mile away, that Google will only continue tightening that grip. To be honest, I understand the potentially good intentions behind Google's push to manage keys for app developers. It is not trivial to (1) keep private keys secure, and (2) not lose access to them over a long enough period of time. So Google can store them in HSMs in their datacenters and provide backups and access controls and such. But it also gives them the ability to deliver app updates with "extra stuff" for targeted individuals. See Figure 1 of [1]. That doesn't look very nice to me. [1] https://developer.android.com/studio/publish/app-signing https://developer.android.com/studio/publish/app-signing

citizenpaul 5y ago

I wondered how long before google will have a reason for grapheneOS to suddenly stop being supoorted on the pixel. Now i know it will be soon and i get to tell everyone i told you so

dragonelite 5y ago
They are creating custom silicon and a new operating system, wouldn't be surprised that will be the cutoff moment.
tristan957 5y ago
Google is moving all Android distributors to upstream Linux, so I guess it is us telling you so :).

ForHackernews 5y ago

> to an open source implementation of those APIs Is this MicroG? https://microg.org/ https://microg.org/

jdiez17 5y ago
No, microG is a partial reimplementation of some of the functionality in the Google Mobile Services (GMS) app. Unfortunately, this approach has significant drawbacks. In order to install microG, your version of Android OS needs support for spoofing the cryptographic signatures of apps. Some OSes like LineageOS and CalyxOS allow this. See [1] for some pointers about why this is considered harmful. There was also a recent fairly serious infoleak bug in microG [2] that in my opinion was caused by its broad scope. The way it works in GrapheneOS is that the OS redirects Binder connections (an IPC mechanism in Android) to a trusted, bundled app (GmsCompat) which will only implement the Play services location API in the foreseeable future. The rest of the Google Play functionality is implemented by GMS itself. [1] https://madaidans-insecurities.github.io/android.html#microg-signature-spoofing https://madaidans-insecurities.github.io/android.html#microg... [2] https://github.com/microg/GmsCore/issues/1567 https://github.com/microg/GmsCore/issues/1567
- jesprenj 5y ago
  Speaking of signatures, google play now requires developers to submit the private keys we used to sign apps with. Without submitting a key I can't issue updates. Out of protest I stopped pushing updates to apps via Google Play.
  - jdiez17 5y ago
    Yes, that is fairly concerning. The last news I had about this was that using Google Play Signing (their key escrow and app signing service) was only mandatory for new apps as of August 2021. Not sure if that has changed recently. But everyone can see it coming a mile away, that Google will only continue tightening that grip. To be honest, I understand the potentially good intentions behind Google's push to manage keys for app developers. It is not trivial to (1) keep private keys secure, and (2) not lose access to them over a long enough period of time. So Google can store them in HSMs in their datacenters and provide backups and access controls and such. But it also gives them the ability to deliver app updates with "extra stuff" for targeted individuals. See Figure 1 of [1]. That doesn't look very nice to me. [1] https://developer.android.com/studio/publish/app-signing https://developer.android.com/studio/publish/app-signing