A look into Oppo App Market
This app annoyed me earlier today so I've decided to break it apart to see if it's spyware.
Intrusive Behavior
Settings
Android App Links
The app annoyingly has Android App Links registered. I can turn it off and it does not matter at all, since the app somehow still bypasses it.
Basically, an Android App Link is a way for apps to open specific links associated with them within the app instead of a browser. An example of this is clicking a Youtube link on your phone should normally open the Youtube app, instead of playing in the browser.
Maliciously, it seems the App Market has both play.google.com and market.android.com as Android App Links links. When turned off, thankfully the app only still targets play.google.com links.
User and Privacy Statement Analysis
The privacy statement claims that the app collects a number of things. Most of these are normal things apps and websites collect however some of the other stuff is questionable. The statement claims this information is collected for analysis and "fraud prevention"
- IP Address
- ColorOS Version
- Android Version
- App/Browser(?) Version
- Langauge Settings
- Device Type
- IMEI
- OpenID
- Advertising ID
- Timezone
- When Phone is Used ("the active hours of your device")
- "websites visited" (unclear what it is referring to)
- ISP
- Info from referrer and "exit" pages
- Info from website logs