[ajross]

The article is link bait. The Android Open Source Project ("AOSP", for those who weren't aware of the acronym) doesn't, to my knowledge, have anything that could be considered spyware embedded. The Google Android platform, which they sell to OEMs, included a bunch of non-free applications like Gmail, Maps, Play Store, etc... does indeed collect usage data (it also tells you about it and asks you to opt in).

Things based on AOSP (Kindle Fire, Cyanogenmod-without-gapps, this thing, many budget tablets, etc...) are, essentially, Google-invisible.