Home » Are apps like WeChat secretly visiting photo albums really that rebellious? -Tencent WeChat

Are apps like WeChat secretly visiting photo albums really that rebellious? -Tencent WeChat

by admin

I don’t know if my friends remember that in the previous two days’ push, we posted a WeChat news in the background to read the user’s photo album in the background. This incident also caused a lot of discussion on the Internet at that time. That night, WeChat left a message in the background, which was regarded as horrible…This incident was first exposed by a blogger named Hackl0us. He found that the WeChat, QQ, and Taobao apps on the mobile phone appeared repeatedly in the background. The act of fetching the user’s photo album.

According to the blogger, he used an app called “Privacy Insights” and combined with the new feature of iOS 15 “Record App Activity” to read the App’s permission usage records.

As a result, he found that WeChat would read the user’s album in the background when it was not in use, and the time for each reading ranged from 40 seconds to 1 minute.

WeChat also responded later, stating that the iOS system provides developers with a function called “Album Update Notification Standard Capability”. When the album content is updated, the App will be notified, so that you can make preparations in advance, and this kind of preparation behavior will be It is recorded as a read album.

Simply put, WeChat wants to predict our operation, but this operation will be considered by the system to be reading the photo album, and it happened without the user’s knowledge…

On October 9th, the blogger posted again, saying that the WeChat team had contacted him and said that he would change the image selector.

Shi Chao went to the App Store to take a look and found that WeChat was really updated, but there was a small update with the same version number.

So Shichao felt that the messengers should not be too panic. According to the official WeChat response, combined with the functions to be implemented by this operation, it is really possible for everyone to misunderstand WeChat…

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Because this operation performed by WeChat is done locally, and most of the functions implemented are when you click the plus sign, you can quickly pop up the photos you may want to send.

But this can only show that this operation of WeChat is predicting our photo-posting behavior, and it is not enough to say that it is peeping at the album evidence.

And in Apple’s official document, there is also an article mentioning that there is an interface for observing album changes in iOS.

The function of this interface is that when the iOS system finds that the album is updated, it can wake up the App when the user is not using the phone, and let the App wake up in the middle of the night to predict the photos.

But if we want to discover their small movements, it is actually very easy.

This incident was achieved through App Privacy Insights with the new feature of iOS 15 “Record App Activity”.

First download the privacy insights, and turn on the privacy “Record App Activity” in the settings.

Next, click “Store App Activity” in the privacy options, and then select “Import to Privacy Insights” to see which permissions the apps have used.

Shi Chao glanced at it, and the WeChat interview records were indeed as reported in the news, and many of them were reading photos.

On the Android side, the behavior of users viewing the App will be simpler, because now many domestic manufacturers have implemented the privacy protection function directly in the system.

For example, MIUI 12 can not only view and modify the permissions of all applications, but also directly read all application behavior records, and it will be displayed in the form of a timeline. It is clear at a glance which App uses which permissions.

Let’s take a look at the next door ColorOS. The authority management inside is also very detailed, from positioning to floating windows can be set separately, if you are not satisfied with the authority requirements of an application, just turn it off.

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ColorOS now also supports viewing detailed permission usage records. Shi Chao did not find that WeChat was viewing the album, but it often “trying to read location information”…

Shi Chao usually doesn’t post his location very much, and he doesn’t add positioning when posting to Moments. The only thing he can think of is to make Moments ads more accurate…

Next is Flyme, the master of privacy management, which not only has application behavior records like MIUI, but also can set sensitive permission reminders.

It can be seen that the above systems are really good in terms of privacy. They can all list what each application has done like the Privacy Insight App.

This is also one of the best improvements made by domestic manufacturers in the system in the past two years. Even if I can’t control you, I have to tell users what you have secretly done.

But you can actually do more than just check the records. Sometimes you can minimize your privacy risk by simply setting it up with your fingers.

Believe World Super, it’s really easy to manage App permissions…

For example, in iOS 15, you can set the access permissions of the App separately in the settings, such as only allowing access to selected photos, or turning off the background App refresh.

You can change some apps that do not require frequent use of positioning to require asking every time you use it, or simply turn off the precise location.

If you are an Android user, it will be easier to handle, because the privacy management level of current Android phones is actually higher than you think…

For example, you can not only view all application behavior records through MIUI 12, but you can also use many tools to protect privacy.

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You can also set the permissions of an App in detail. For example, in ColorOS 11, World Super can change the location information of WeChat from “Allow when using” to “Ask every time you use”.

Nowadays, mainstream mobile phone systems almost always have such setting options. If you think that the permission of an App is unnecessary, you can change it to ask when you use it, or just turn it off.

If you think it’s too much trouble to ask every time, if it’s a big deal, you can change it back~

For example, Huawei’s HarmonyOS also has a more detailed special access permission. You can find some rarely used permissions here, but you can set it up. This wave of operations should be praised.

This in-depth and detailed permission setting is not unique to HarmonyOS. Different systems have different permission settings. Friends can go to the phone settings to go around and turn off a few unnecessary permissions.

So to sum up, today’s mobile phones have actually made great progress in privacy, especially the domestic customized system, which almost achieves the all-round management of application permissions at the system level.

However, many users are not clear about this, and they are still arbitrarily “slaughtered” by the App. In fact, you can completely avoid some unreasonable requirements of the App.

This is not to say that hooliganism can be completely eliminated, but it can reduce the risk of privacy leakage to a certain extent, and it can also save the power of the mobile phone and ensure the user experience.

But no matter how much mobile phone manufacturers and users do, Shichao can also determine that this privacy debate is not the first, and it will definitely not be the last.

related articles:

WeChat iOS pushes version 8.0.15 update: the function of frequently reading albums in the background has been disabled

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