Sorry for a kinda clickbait title but it is what it is. I just watched a video about Android 15 changes and a lot of them are either not important or straight up bad.
I want to specifically mention increased background sensor usage (such as microphone) and the Find My Device network. These are serious privacy issues that just make lives of custom ROM developers and users harder by having to disable more and more stuff (that’s turned on by default of course), as well as a contribution to ewaste generation and general decrease of battery life.
I guess we are getting into the era of complete death of digital privacy and absolute surveillance. This is scary but not too unrealistic I guess. I just hope the devs of privacy-focused ROMs will be able to do something about it and purge these changes.
When the Find My Device network came to my device I was literally asked if I want my device to be part of it, so even though by default it’s an opt-out feature, everyone whose device can be connected to the network is asked if they want that to happen.
Seems like it’s just another switch toflick off and forget about
It doesn’t look like it’s going to ask the user on first setup of new phones though
it’ll be covered on screen 73 of the ‘agreement’ required to use the device.
Looking forward to the “Make all apps dark” setting
Afaik it already is in Android but it’s hidden. Also such changes won’t make Android a decent OS to store private information on or bring the device with you. It’s getting more and more privacy-hostile and imo it’s much more important than visuals
They treated us like cattle and most of us take it.
Google is already angling to gut AOSP IMHO
They got what they want out of it.
Reading up on the blog posts and technical overviews for the new Find My Device network all of it seems well anonimized and local device to device coms not using GPS, and can be declined if needed.
I mean, it’s still Google, but honestly I’ve been looking forward for this feature despite being very privacy conscious. I really want to use trackers on my bike, suitcase, etc.
Android OS updates have been somewhat lackluster since Android 8/9. The OS and smartphones in general are increasingly becoming mature products with little true differentiation.
They will try to leverage “AI” to accelerate upgrade cycles, but we’ll see how that goes.
Yep, and as someone that has carried a work iPhone and a personal Android for years now, they’re pretty close to the same too.
I mean, as far as usage/usability they do sort of what we want at this point.
Literally the only reason I use android is because of custom launchers and the ability to use a file explorer. Everything else is just the same
