I was waiting for fdroid's voice about this. Google's move is as bad as I initially thought.
This makes me a bit sad honestly, android development is getting worse every year.
I wonder if the same will happen to web as well.
Not that I want that future, but it's not like China has banned all user-administrated devices from the web. Seems odd to say this is necessary when, axiomatically, China has China's level of internal control over communication.
There's a part of me that really wishes that we could have policies around things like age verification that implictly understand the existence of workarounds and accept them. If we're going to have these policies, anyways.
Well mostly, aside from some exceptions like (allegedly) Apple's AirDrop limitations.
Many Chinese brands still support unlockable bootloader: https://github.com/melontini/bootloader-unlock-wall-of-shame...
Although going forward, there's a strong incentive for manufacturers to follow Google and lock their devices.
There are draft documents across a range of services including search, social media and internet carriage.
The most relevant ones for Android are:
- app distribution services https://onlinesafety.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/CLEAN...
- manufacture supply of devices (including operating systems) https://onlinesafety.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/CLEAN...
The future is looking bleak for open computing and open hardware. They have gone from being a place of education, freedom and empowerment to a loophole in regulation.