Surely everyone has 10-20 third-party applications installed on their phones. Many do not think about personal safety and safety of their data when installing the next program or game. And it would be worth it.
Consider one program Exodus Privacy – this application monitors the security of your device. It collects all information about installed programs and games: what permissions and what actions they can perform on the smartphone.
Download Exodus Privacy from the Play Store. After installing and running the application, it collects all information about the set permissions for programs.
For example, let's launch AliExpress. The program has 4 trackers, where it “merges” information about us: this Facebook and Google. Additionally, the program has a bunch of permissions, some of which are dangerous:
- Disable hibernation.
- Change or delete the contents of the SD card.
- View network connections.
- Change system settings.
- Audio recording.
- Reading the contents of the SD card.
- Close other applications.
How to disable / enable permissions for an app?
In Exodus Privacy, select the application you want and click on the gear in the upper right. Permissions are available to us:
- Autostart. Can be enabled or disabled.
- Basic permissions: using the camera, determining your location via gps, recording audio through a microphone, reading and writing files in the phone's memory and on a memory card, viewing contacts and SMS on the phone.
- Other permissions: turn Wi-Fi on and off, create shortcuts on the desktop, display on the lock screen, launch an application in the background, show notifications.
- Receive notifications.
- Using a network connection to the Internet (Wi-Fi, 3G / 4G mobile Internet.
- Activity control. Here you can choose a smart mode that will set everything up for you. Or set strict restrictions for your own safety, but at the same time the program's operation may be limited.
And so you can view each installed application on your phone. You will be surprised how many permissions they have (and for the user these are security holes), how much information they send to the advertising servers of Yandex, Google, Facebook, Instagram, VK and others.
Therefore, always think about what programs you install on your phone, what permissions you give them to run.