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Thanks for finding that. The Ars Technica article is actually informative journalism. The The Register article just leaves you confused about what's real and seems to focus more on who's involved than what's happened.

Really creepy that Google is willing to work with governments to force install apps like that. Makes me think nobody should run stock Android.

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Stock Android has nothing to do with it, the same Play Services exist on every Android phone on the (western) market.

Ah good point. I didn't realise that. I need to look into MicroG again. Any Android running Play Services basically has a massive backdoor.

Google controls the entire operating system, and in some cases the hardware, so it's a backdoor into the house they already own

Stock android has everything to do with it. Non-stock options allow you to remove Google Apps which include Play services.

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