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Comment by josu | Hacker News Reader

The Spanish football league app turns on the microphone to listen if a game is playing and reports back to La liga with the exact location to find bars and restaurants with pirate broadcasts.

https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/12/spanish-soccer-app-caught-...

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Wow, surprised this hasn’t generated more coverage. They’ve turned a giant chunk of their userbase, likely completely unknown to a majority of users who understandably won’t read the small print, into snitches/whistleblowers.

This presumably also inadvertently returns the home address of anyone opening the app while watching a game in their own living room? Not a huge stretch to move from pursuing public places without the correct licensing to pursuing individuals for pirate streams.

> "It also specifies that the feature is only deployed in its Android app."

Probably because this nonsense would cause a hellstorm in App Review on iOS.

It was even on the news in Sweden so it has generated some coverage at least.

> Probably because this nonsense would cause a hellstorm in App Review on iOS.

Or because it wouldn't be approved in the first place. Say what you want about walled gardens, but at least someone is policing the ecosystem.

I think that's what he meant by "App Review":

"App Review - We review all apps and app updates submitted to the App Store in an effort to determine whether they are reliable, perform as expected, and are free of offensive material."

https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/

And this sort of crap is exactly why I won't install your Android app unless I specifically need it and (usually) it's open source. Android permissions are terrible and practically designed for abuse.

They're exactly the same as the ones on iOS. For years now. Apps that did that can no longer be published or updated on Play Store.

Cut this misleading crap out.

This “feature” was present at least June 2018-?, and only in the Android version.

Indeed - parent is not incorrect in saying that a more mature permissions model has been available for years. However, only for the last couple of months has it been mandatory to actually use that model in your Android app. It is now enforced (by requiring target of at least api26) when submitting updates or publishing new apps: https://developer.android.com/distribute/best-practices/deve....

I specifically said Android app because I don't have an iPhone and don't feel qualified to comment on iOS. I think you read more into my comment than I wrote.

It's still interesting that AFAICT there's still little questioning from users to install an app of that nature which needs microphone permission.

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