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Comment by curiousgal | Hacker News Reader

This is why I root my device and only allow apps I trust internet access.

Root and then get flagged by Google's SafetyNet, preventing you from Netflix, banking apps etc? That's a brave but big sacrifice

Systemless root + root hiding is a thing.

I run a custom rom and pass safety check and have access to all my apps including banking.

This is why people need to start rejecting closed ecosystems. If you own the hardware you can control everything that happens on it including companies trying to force their will upon you

more people would reject them if there were alternatives, but the only things on the horizon are pinephone and purism (neither which are really shipping/working)

Any information on this. I thought rooting was essentially dead

I have an S5 with Magisk. It passes the safetynet checks, and I can choose to specifically hide root status from apps, which has worked well so far.

Google can turn Safetynet validation up or down w/o updating your Droid. Currently it is possible to bypass SafetyNet, but they did turn it up a notch lately, and if they require strong "Key Attention" then neither Magisk nor custom "rootless root" will work (and it will also mean that custom roms Will fail SafetyNet).

https://developer.android.com/training/articles/security-key...

Not with Magisk.

>Netflix

Hah. If properly paying for films requires you to install quasi-rootkits that spy 24/7 on your personal life, and pirating gives you a high-quality .mkv you can play anywhere you want, I damn fucking well know which one I'll choose. "Brave but big sacrifice"? That's just devaluing those words.

You forgot to add that your choice is damaging the innocent content creators.

Maybe those innocent content creators will think twice at contract renewal time, then.

Or just ... buy the DVD / other content type legally available?

And then you still need to “root” the DVD-player so you get to skip the commercials and legal threats...

Which is what I did for a long time, but now I don't even own a disc player...

The piracy is really incidental. No one who chose privacy over Netflix would suddenly reverse that choice if they couldn't pirate content. Especially given that we are talking about phones, does anyone find watching Netflix on their phone actually ideal?

Can SafetyNet calls be proxied to another unrooted phone?

Doesn't that permanently disable some features on Samsung? I read they use a goddamn eFuse for it

I am using a Google Pixel device. I have no idea whether Magisk works on Samsung phones.

Yup, IIRC that disables Knox features and secure folder permanently (trips an e-fuse so there's no turning back). I don't remember if Samsung also intentionally degraded camera quality like some other vendors (Sony at least used to once you unlocked your bootloader).

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