0:00 – Mishaal Rahman: Is Google killing Android by restricting sideloading?
0:03 – C. Scott Brown: And should Google have been forced to sell off Android to a competitor?
0:08 – Mishaal Rahman: I’m Mishaal Rahman.
0:09 – C. Scott Brown: And I’m C. Scott Brown, and this is the Authority Insights podcast where we break down the latest news and leaks surrounding the Android operating system.
0:18 – Mishaal Rahman: Now, before we dive into the stories for this week, just a little bit of insider baseball. If you’re wondering why there wasn’t an episode last week, I was actually on vacation. I forgot to inform you guys on episode 3. My bad. First time like handling a podcast on, you know, doing all the post-production and stuff like that. But next time we do have a break, we will let you know ahead of time. Or if you want to know like in real time, just follow us on social media. But in any case, like we’re going to be doing things a little bit differently this week because in lieu of actually covering, you know, some of the Authority Insights posts that we’ve been doing every week, we figured it might be worth talking about some of the bigger news stories because there were some massive Android related news stories dropped last week and also this week, like, they’re way too big for us to ignore. And also we do feel like we have some, you know, special insights to offer on these stories. And to compensate for that, we will also cover a third story that will be exclusive to the podcast. So like, I have not talked about this anywhere else. There’s no article on it. We have never mentioned it in any tweet or anything else. This is the first time we’re ever going to be revealing this little bit of information. So stay tuned for that. But the first story I wanted to highlight is something that kind of took the Internet by storm last week and it’s kind of funny because like Google dropped this on me on I was like it was Sunday night, like literally at like 10:00 P.M. I got an email from my PR contact at Google saying, “Hey, we got something we’re going to announce tomorrow morning.” I was in the middle of playing a game of REPO. It’s this game on Steam with my friends. And I got this message from him like, “Yeah, what’s up? What is it?” And they said, okay, you agree to the embargo, we’ll send you the stuff in the morning. And this was, mind you, I was going on vacation last week. So they sent me all this stuff hours before my flight. And I’m like, oh my god, this is huge. I have to cover this. So, what exactly did Google announce? Well, a huge announcement. Starting September 2026 in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand, users will only be able to install apps from developers whose identities have been explicitly verified by Google, even if those apps are coming from outside of the Google Play Store. And then starting in 2027, this restriction will globally roll out. Now, before I dive deeper into the actual implications and what’s changing, Scott, like, what did you see that in terms of the reaction to this story, this news that Google put out?
2:56 – C. Scott Brown: So, it was obviously a big deal on all the Android things that I normally would look at, you know, including the comments on Android Authority articles and stuff like that. But honestly, the most negative loud reaction that I saw was from the emulation community. They are flipping out. Like they were flipping out when it happened. They’re still flipping out right now talking about the death of Android, talking about how, you know, they’re not going to buy Android phones anymore because they’re so against this move. And, you know, they’re upset because a lot of them sideload apps from outside of the Play Store. And a lot of those apps are made by people who don’t want, you know, don’t want their name out there because they’re creating something that is legally gray. I think most courts would agree that emulators are legal, but 99% of the time, emulators are used to play pirated content. So, you know, with the stuff going on with Yuzu and other Nintendo Switch emulators, I think a lot of people, a lot of developers of emulators are scared, rightly so. And now they come out with this news and they’re really upset. So that was the loudest news, you know, the loudest reaction that I saw for sure.
4:17 – Mishaal Rahman: Right. So what exactly are developers and users scared of? Well, to be more precise, what exactly Google announced is that they will begin verifying the identity of developers, but they won’t be checking the contents of apps or their origin. But, you know, verifying the identity is itself enough to scare a lot of developers away who don’t want to say, they don’t want to upload their personal information to Google. They don’t want to submit their name, their address, their email address or their phone number to Google because then Google has that information on store and they can tie that to a specific application. So if you’re doing something that’s kind of in the gray area, you know, you don’t want that tied to your information, you want to remain anonymous, but Google will no longer allow that to happen starting next year. And although one distinction should be made, at least in terms of anonymity, your personal information that you submit to Google through this new Android Developer Console, it won’t be shown to users like it is on the Google Play Store if you download an app from there. But still, Google will have this information on store. They will know who you are when you submit an application for distribution even if it’s not through the Play Store.
5:23 – C. Scott Brown: Yeah, I can just imagine developers, you know, who once again who are making applications that maybe they don’t want Google to know about. That doesn’t make them feel any better that it’s not publicly listed on the Play Store. Like they, you know, they know that Google knows and, you know, Google has zero incentive to protect that developer, especially if they’re doing stuff outside of the Play Store. As far as Google’s concerned, they’re in the wild West. So, yeah, I mean, I can understand why they would be hesitant to want to give Google this information.
6:00 – Mishaal Rahman: Right. I mean like imagine a scenario where, you know, Google, if a journalist is asking to unmask the identity of a developer distributing an app, right? They’re not going to do it. But if say a powerful government asked them, them, like demands this information, is Google going to say no? Are they going to stand down and say, okay, we’re not going to release this information to you? Even if the government threatens to say, okay, we’re going to ban Google services instead, like are they going to say no in that situation? I don’t think they would, right? So there is a risk there. If you’re doing something that could be potentially controversial in a certain region, you know, that your identity could be unmasked whereas previously you could basically be completely anonymous by distributing by creating and then distributing an app online.
6:48 – C. Scott Brown: Yeah, and obviously I brought up I brought up emulation and that’s, you know, that’s its thing, but you know, it could be something that’s a little bit more has a little more weight to it. It could be somebody creates an app for helping a certain subgroup of people, you know, get whatever, some sort of, you know, protection from the government or protection from the military, you know, whatever. Something that is clearly breaking a law of a different country but for good reasons. Even then, like Google has zero incentive to protect those people. So yeah, I can understand why a lot of people would feel that this is a fundamental, you know, like a backslide of the Android operating system. What was once completely open and free and you could do whatever you want pretty much is now closed off. And I can understand why people are really upset about that.
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