{"id":652989,"date":"2013-04-17T15:32:49","date_gmt":"2013-04-17T19:32:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gigaom.com\/?p=631951"},"modified":"2013-04-17T15:32:49","modified_gmt":"2013-04-17T19:32:49","slug":"aclu-carriers-leave-consumers-exposed-by-withholding-android-updates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/652989","title":{"rendered":"ACLU: Carriers leave consumers exposed by withholding Android updates"},"content":{"rendered":"

The mobile industry\u2019s practice of slowly parceling out Android smartphone updates has earned the ire of the American Civil Liberties Union. On Tuesday, the ACLU filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission<\/a> to investigate the major U.S. carriers for not updating their customer\u2019s phones whenever new security patches are available and for not warning consumers of the dangers that exposes them to.<\/p>\n

In the ACLU\u2019s blog<\/a>, Principal Technologist and Senior Policy Analyst Chris Soghoian wrote:<\/p>\n

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“Google\u2019s Android operating system now has more than 75% of the smartphone market, yet the majority of these devices are running software that is out of date, often with known, exploitable security vulnerabilities that have not been patched. For consumers running these devices, there is no legitimate software upgrade path. The problem isn\u2019t that consumers aren\u2019t installing updates, but rather, that updates simply aren\u2019t available. Although Google\u2019s engineers regularly fix software flaws in the Android operating system, these fixes aren\u2019t packaged up and pushed to consumers by the wireless carriers and their handset manufacturer partners.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

As the ACLU hints in that last sentence, carriers aren\u2019t the only culprit here. Before they can send out an Android update, carriers have to wait until handset makers tweak Google\u2019s code for their own purposes<\/a> since no one \u2013 save Google \u2013 is running a generic version of Android on their devices. Recently, Android device makers have gotten faster at releasing updates<\/a> for their phones, but it\u2019s by no means instantaneous.<\/p>\n

Still, carriers are definitely a large part of the bottleneck, often asking for Android features to be removed from a build for competitive reasons. A case in point is Verizon\u2019s disabling of Google Wallet<\/a>\u00a0on its NFC-capable phones. The fragmentation and politics of the Android ecosystem has led my colleague Kevin Tofel to call for Google to take back control of Android\u2019s distribution from carriers and device makers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Getting timely updates for services and features is one thing, but the ACLU is saying that critical security fixes are getting lost in the shuffle. Carrier industry group CTIA didn\u2019t comment directly on the ACLU\u2019s accusations, but it did imply that the threat of security vulnerabilities in the U.S. was overblown. In a statement, CTIA VP of Cybersecurity and Technology John Marinho said:<\/p>\n

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\u201cBased on recent reports, U.S. wireless networks are among the most secure in the world because the carriers and the overall mobile industry are vigilant in preventing and protecting against malicious attacks. In addition, most U.S. wireless users shop at trusted application stores, which is why we have an app infection rate of less than 2 percent. Meanwhile, many other countries have app infection rates that are more than 10 times greater, and in the case of Russia, the app infection rate is reported at more than 90 percent.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Image courtesy of Shutterstock<\/a> user gosphotodesign<\/em><\/p>\n

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