[sohei]

A corollary of your question. If Google can lawfully install arbitrary apps on ordinary users' phones, can it also run arbitrary code on the personal devices of government officials investigating it for price fixing in the ad market?

[GavinMcG]

"Arbitrary" is doing a lot of sneaky work here. You're implying that the law would somehow allow Google to manipulate investigators. But the law has broad allowances and exceptions in lots of areas, and competing permissions/denials that together weave specific allowances. There's little reason to think that the law couldn't allow app installation in general and also disallow either targeting of individuals or collection/manipulation of certain kinds of data.

[pydry]

>You're implying that the law would somehow allow Google to manipulate investigators.

Not the law. Google having root access on 2.5 billion android devices.

The law didn't allow Uber to greyball either. It did though.

This is a risk Google fully recognizes - it's why Google prevents f droid from updating apps one by one without user input. That's a privilege reserved exclusively for google play services.

[sohei]

Another question worth asking is "what is the governing law?" It is almost certainly contract law via Google's ToS. Government phones probably have different ToS, but government employee' personal phones have the same ToS we have.

If Google is asserting non-contractual rights, I'd like to know what they are.

Edit: I edited this comment because it was rude, and that was not my intent.

[GavinMcG]

[Edit: the comment originally said their question wasn't implying anything] Of course you're implying something. If nothing else, you're implying the one might imply the other, and that the implication is worth attention.

The governing law that would protect people is a lot of things, and ToS is the least of it. The Wiretap Act applies, for example.

[sohei]

> ToS is the least of it

I'm afraid I disagree. Google running code on your phone implies it believes you have consented to that. That consent was not given in the app store, so it must have come from the ToS.

Consent is an exception to virtually every protection that exists: Wiretap Act, state wiretapping laws, the CFAA, and state computer trespass laws. Remember, consent is the difference between a home invasion and a dinner party.

So it seems that Google would have to cook up a pretty implausible stopping principle to argue that whatever allows them to do this does not also enable the hypothetical I described above.

[GavinMcG]

If you've got a stock Android device you've obviously consented to Google running some code, and even updating to add new code after you bought it. On the other hand, apps are restricted based on permissions, and Google bypassing that would belie a consent theory.

You're making out like code is code and there aren't already existing lines and stopping principles, which just isn't true on its face.

[dragonwriter]

> If Google can lawfully install arbitrary apps on ordinary users' phones

Of the partners in this, I think that the source of authority waa almost certainly the other one. It’s not Google, but the State of Massachusetts, whose authority is likely involved.

[notacoward]

That also means it's going to be hard to sue over this, because the courts where you might do so are part of the same Commonwealth that authorized the action. Even if you could get a case on the docket, they'd just say the magic words "sovereign immunity" and it would disappear.

[danuker]

> personal devices of government officials investigating it for price fixing

Anything in the name of "improving our services".