So much for Sirius XM.....a good thing...and simultaneous Android app security post

[Guest TankerHC]

After deciding to delete all my apps, then the other thread from mcordell and the post on Root from jonathan1289, I know a little about computing, but I am pretty much just a user when it comes to Smart Phone OS's, I had better school myself. So I did (Some).

 

First, jonathan is completely right in his short post. The first thing I did was check on lifehacker to see what all these usage requests were used for. Sure enough, a lot of them are just shotgun blast usage requests. If you click on the approve your giving them permission to access anything they requested, including your data and photo's and anything else that they ask for and with that permission they can post it anyhwere and you have no say in the matter short of uninstalling the app. But some developers need those permissions to run the app, of course, but here is what I found.

 

First I checked to see if there was an auto Root app defense against the mandatory app usage requests. There are, the best one according to lifehacker is permissiondog. So I re-installed all of my apps, installed permissiondog and here is what I found.

 

At least half of the popular apps who had shotgun blasted permission requests had not only requested, they were using them on my phone, as I was holding it!

 

Example of usage. The facebook app was the worst. 49 requests, phone data, pictures (Even those I wouldnt want public and in the MSD card, all of them, were being accessed. Even my camera and video! Everything was in use. Permissiondog showed them (FB App) as rated a 4.9 out of 5 as a dangerous app. It shows this with a red exclamation point, and gives you a drop down menu to show what your app is doing, On the other hand, Tapatalk had a low but caution rating (2.9), on that its a matter of personal security. 

 

So, two clicks FB gone, Tapatalk stays. At the same time, each request is explained (In permissiondog) and it will show you which apps are using that permission and why they are using it. For example: Request: Read contacts: This request allows the apps to save contact information including phone calls, emails and other forms of communication (skype for example) frequency of calls etc. Reason: Aquamail, uses that to store my email info and pop up most accessed users, lookout security and scloudstarter both use it because if they didnt they could not save data that I need. On the other hand, Android Scout also uses it, along with my camera, why does a GPS Navigation App need to store my phone calls and emails? Permissiondog rated it as dangerous with a 4.9 and it was using 29 functions on my phone, about 19 of them had nothing to do with navigation. Scout GONE, the other three stay.

 

Damn good app, and free too. (permissiondog)

 

Along the way of "Getting myself informed", I came across what has to be the greatest fricken app of all time (For me), TuneIn. I quit Sirius last week. I can listen to the news on terrestrial radio with commercials without paying $200 bucks for it with commercials. Tunein, 70,000 free Radio Stations from all over the world...Free. And works perfectly. With my BT, I have any radio station I want, over my car radio. Listen to Alex Jones? (I dont) But he is there 24/7. One of my favorite shows, Kim komando, almost always miss it because I can never catch it on time, 24/7 on TuneIn, same with Coast To Coast, 24/7 and one channel of all the old Art Bell shows from years ago. Everything I have ever listened to, I now have for free. Stern I can watch on Youtube and listen over BT on the car radio, free. (He is not available on TuneIn). First thing TuneIn did when I launched it was to pull all the local stations and out to Knoxville, Nashville and Chattanooga.

 

Not all are live radio of course, but many are. Not live for example, I listened to an entire Eddie Murphy Album on a comedy channel, live they were broadcasting a Bruce Springsteen Concert. 

 

Note that this app is really Data heavy and is only good if you have an unlimited Data plan.

 

"Because of the couple of members above" I decided to get myself somewhat informed on what I was seeing. Thought I would pass it along. 

 

 

 

 

[TripleDigitRide]

I use TuneIn a lot. iHeartRadio is another good one. I keep SiriusXM in my work truck so I can listen to Howard. Plus, I'm often in the middle of nowhere, where decent terrestrial radio stations are lacking. That, and I hate 15 minutes of commercials for every 3 minutes of content.

[vontar]

I use Tunein almost daily m-f at work.

 

I will have to check in to premissiondog though

[Wiljo05]

Good work tanker! I can elaborate a little more on permissions. And the security app is a good idea, but it can be read into a little more than necessary. But in the case of the Facebook app I agree.

For example, an app that gives you free wallpapers realistically needs access to these portions of your device: internet(to download), storage(to save it), contacts ( to in app assign it to a contact), camera (allowing you to upload a new photo), as well as few others...

When it gets sketchy is when you download a calculator app and it requests all the permissions (shotgun blast as you called it) since we know there is not a lot of interface a simple calculator app should have with the main root of the device.

I work in the wireless industry as a Data Consultant, so if anyone has more in depth questions I'm more than willing to help, just let me know.


Edit: permissiondog, as well as others are great for identifying what is being requested as far as permissions go, but I'm usually hesitant on using them as they can have a tendency to drain resources of the device (battery, processor, ect)

And yes TuneIn is the cats a$$! Since Bob and Tom lost Nashville I can still listen every day. I will try to come up with a list of some top apps that might be relevant to most here, or just in general and post it up. Then we all can add to it as we have our own favorites. Edited September 15, 2013 by Wiljo05

[Defender]

IS there something like this for iOS?

[Wiljo05]

IS there something like this for iOS?

It isn't near as critical on the apple platform simply due to the heavy policing that apple does of the App Store. I know that most malicious apps are recovered within 24 hrs. Mainly checking the reviews, makes it a fairly safe environment. I still shy away from all password keeper type apps though...

[Guest TankerHC]

BTW, I wasnt saying "I discovered" TnueIn, I did "For Me" because after 3-4 years of Droid, I had never heard of it and it has 50 million downloads. 

[Mike.357]

why would anyone pay full price for Sirius?  If you let them turn you off or if you call to cancel they will make you much less expensive offers.

[Guest TankerHC]

why would anyone pay full price for Sirius?  If you let them turn you off or if you call to cancel they will make you much less expensive offers.

 

They will, the first two or three contracts. Once they know your hooked, forget it. I have been using it since the day it launched. Had one of the portable boxes with the big antennas that you had to mount that you had to mount on your vehicle like a CB antenna with the magnet. Referring to tripledigits post, back then there were no commercials. Today, other than channels ike 60 on 6 and 70 on 7, the commercials on Sirius have gotten just as bad. Remember back in the early late 70's, early 80's when cable was "Commerical Free TV" because we were paying for it. Sirius evolved the same way Cable did. No need to pay for Channels on Sirius like Fox, CNN, The left (I listen to the left to hear what the opposition is doing), when I can just listen to it for free and get the same thing. As for Patriot Radio I can get that info from just reading their websites and listening to free podcasts the next day. If there was a Howard only option, Id pay for it. 

[Mike.357]

I have had Sirius for ten or eleven years.  Never paid full price for it.  None of the music channels have commercials but other channels have always had them.   The sound quality is not very good.  I installed a second USB port in my truck and have a thumb drive with music on it in the glovebox.  I was amazed at the difference in sound quality.  Kind of hard to go back to Sirius now but I will when they offer up 6 months for 25 bucks. And that will be coming.  It only took them three days of my expired service for them to offer a year at 86 dollars.

 

buying Sirius is like shopping at a yard sale, the price is totally negotiable.

Edited September 15, 2013 by Mike.357

[TripleDigitRide]

They will, the first two or three contracts. Once they know your hooked, forget it. I have been using it since the day it launched. Had one of the portable boxes with the big antennas that you had to mount that you had to mount on your vehicle like a CB antenna with the magnet. Referring to tripledigits post, back then there were no commercials. Today, other than channels ike 60 on 6 and 70 on 7, the commercials on Sirius have gotten just as bad. Remember back in the early late 70's, early 80's when cable was "Commerical Free TV" because we were paying for it. Sirius evolved the same way Cable did. No need to pay for Channels on Sirius like Fox, CNN, The left (I listen to the left to hear what the opposition is doing), when I can just listen to it for free and get the same thing. As for Patriot Radio I can get that info from just reading their websites and listening to free podcasts the next day. If there was a Howard only option, Id pay for it.

Yeah, I don't listen to much more than Howard and a few music channels. I attempted listening to some of the news channels, but the commercials were as bad as terrestrial radio and TV.

They do need an À la carte option.

[TNMTBik3r]

Way to dig in and research what was running. Permissiondog is good, and there are a few others that work similarly to show you what apps are actually doing in the background. Unfortunately on a stock phone there isn't much control except uninstall the app.

Rooting your phone keeps the factory OS, but gives you full administrator access (android is based on Linux, root is Linux admin). With root access you can break your phone so use caution if you look into it. But it opens up "hacks" and some apps that let you control app permissions, use a firewall to block network access, etc.

I have the Samsung Note 2, rooted and running a custom ROM. A custom ROM replaces the factory os version with a developer custom designed build with better performance and more customization options.

As noted, Apple devices are very locked down and the app market is tightly controlled by Apple. There is little user control available - you get what Apple and the app developers give you.

[Guest TankerHC]

I have had Sirius for ten or eleven years.  Never paid full price for it.  None of the music channels have commercials but other channels have always had them.   The sound quality is not very good.  I installed a second USB port in my truck and have a thumb drive with music on it in the glovebox.  I was amazed at the difference in sound quality.  Kind of hard to go back to Sirius now but I will when they offer up 6 months for 25 bucks. And that will be coming.  It only took them three days of my expired service for them to offer a year at 86 dollars.

 

buying Sirius is like shopping at a yard sale, the price is totally negotiable.

 

Then you remember the little boxes before the internal receiver antennas. You would also remember that there were zero commercials on the channels that they did have. Might also remember that support was in New York, now its in India or Pakistan and the fact that Sirius, just like Cable, promised commercial free radio. I dont need music channels. Primary for Sirius for me, news channels, loaded with commercials, Sports, loaded with commercials, Stern, same think "Got to take a break", always over the time limit. 

 

Then there is the fact that Stern is the reason Sirius is so successful anyway. And has gone to 3 days a week (Sometimes). I dont mind listening to their reruns because I can still hear interesting stuff from the old shows from 25 years ago. But I can do that free, without commercials.

 

I like radio, more than TV. Started listening to Alan Christian back when I was probably 5, been hooked ever since. 

[Guest TankerHC]

Way to dig in and research what was running. Permissiondog is good, and there are a few others that work similarly to show you what apps are actually doing in the background. Unfortunately on a stock phone there isn't much control except uninstall the app.

Rooting your phone keeps the factory OS, but gives you full administrator access (android is based on Linux, root is Linux admin). With root access you can break your phone so use caution if you look into it. But it opens up "hacks" and some apps that let you control app permissions, use a firewall to block network access, etc.

I have the Samsung Note 2, rooted and running a custom ROM. A custom ROM replaces the factory os version with a developer custom designed build with better performance and more customization options.

As noted, Apple devices are very locked down and the app market is tightly controlled by Apple. There is little user control available - you get what Apple and the app developers give you.

 

Figured that part out when I got my second smart phone and was wondering if I could play with and change the OS. After the first time I enabled debugging and went into developer mode, I left it at that. Didnt want to destroy my phone. But I still keep it in debuggin mode because I use PdaNet to tether. 

[Mike.357]

aside from using Sirius to listen to Bengal games I don't ever really recall listening to anything other than music on it.  I don't recall Sirius claiming to be totally commercial free, just commercial free on music channels.

 

My original Sirius radio stuck to the windshield and weighed a ton.  When that crapped out I  got one that was a lot lighter and clipped to the A/C vent.  Both had the magnet antenna.  Routing wires sucked.  Both had issues with finding a clear channel to play them through.  Especially when travelling.  

[Guest TankerHC]

aside from using Sirius to listen to Bengal games I don't ever really recall listening to anything other than music on it.  I don't recall Sirius claiming to be totally commercial free, just commercial free on music channels.

 

My original Sirius radio stuck to the windshield and weighed a ton.  When that crapped out I  got one that was a lot lighter and clipped to the A/C vent.  Both had the magnet antenna.  Routing wires sucked.  Both had issues with finding a clear channel to play them through.  Especially when travelling.  

 

In 98 when Sattelite Radio was launched (I didnt have it, it wasnt readily available), XM started promoting "Commercial Free Radio". Not Commercial Free Radio on some channels". Not sure which box you had but mine was smaller than my wallet. In 04, I dropped it altogether, was too expensive, I couldnt afford it, and they took ALL of the stations, including the music stations commercial. They had ads running constantly, the deal they made with Clear Channel, the company Stern is always bitchin about. (Or used to). Then they started losing customers, in 06 they took the music channels back to no commercials, in 06 I got back on it, enough customers complained about all the commercials. I bought an 06 Tundra and it didnt have XM or Sirius, so I had to get one of those recievers from Radio Shack. With BT and smart phones, no reason to have it just for Commercial free music. (BTW, I buy my music, dont want anyone thinking I rip off the artists). 

 

BTW, not arguing with you, thinking about it, not sure exactly what point is now of this part of the discussion (Kinda like when me and my wife would argue and forget what we were arguing about). I no longer have Sirius. I found better, free options. Anyone that likes it, good. I only like it for Stern. 

Edited September 15, 2013 by TankerHC