automatically turning on new (creepy)feature with no single click to disable them - eviltoast

there’s just this vague recommendation to “turn it off in settings.” no link, no toggle, nothing.

had to hunt for the relevant setting in the app(even their settings menu is down under in the list when you tap on your avatar.


image transcription:

a screenshot of Google play store which has a popup that can only be disabled by pressing OK button at the bottom.
the popup contains the following text:

Google is optimising app installs with your help
Google Play makes apps faster to install, open and run based on what people are using most. The first time that you open an app after installing, Google notes which parts of the app you use. When enough people do this, your apps will install faster. App install optimisation is automatically turned on, but you can turn it off in settings. Learn more

    • henfredemars@infosec.pub
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      11 months ago

      They did add a link to a more detailed description. The link points here on my device.

      It’s still not as technical as I’d prefer, but I don’t think keeping the technical level down implies Google is trying to hide something. Consider that overwhelming technical detail that’s wrong could also be used as a way to lie to users.

      For the most technical look, AOSP publishes the source code of almost the whole profiling system. I linked to the source code in another comment that shows how the data is collected.