Android 17 restricts uninstalling "system" apps that live on the read-only partition

[AnonymousWP]

• reddit post on r/degoogle: "Google has locked down ADB too now"
• Permalink to Consumer Rights Wiki article section

quoting @Rudxain [source]:

In the UAD-NG guild, "Alpert7" ( u/Alpert33 ?) was the 1st to report this issue (May 25th), and samo_lego confirmed it; so we've known for a while, but didn't make an announcement due to lack of info

[Marko-98]

I expected this at some point.

[Wakelock]

"You'll own nothing and you'll be happy".

[hollow-frenk]

Root is not affected?

[AnonymousWP]

No, root will continue to work. Disabling will continue to work as well.

[Marekk2k]

What is wrong with Google?! If they aren't blocking the ability to install apps from other sources, now they're blocking ADB tools. I think I'll have to switch to iOS soon. Bloatware is a nightmar especially considering how many manufacturers install it on their Android devices, not to mention that the amount of it keeps growing year by year.

[AnonymousWP]

For me, iOS is the last platform I'll switch to. 🙂 I generally dislike iOS, the lack of features, and most of all: the greediness of Apple and their non-innovative hardware. Sideloading is also still possible on Android, for now... I hope for a good Android competitor, something like GrapheneOS, but that's also being slowly killed thanks to Google.

[Marko-98]

For me, iOS is the last platform I'll switch to. 🙂 I generally dislike iOS, the lack of features, and most of all: the greediness of Apple and their non-innovative hardware.

@AnonymousWP Same here. iOS is way more locked down than Android. Android is open-source and there'll always be a loophole allowing us to do what we want. Google can't lock down the Android completely because the sole purpose of Android is it being open.

I hope for a good Android competitor, something like GrapheneOS, but that's also being slowly killed thanks to Google.

Not really a competitor considering it is based on Android, which is controlled by Google. But sure, we'd benefit from having multiple custom ROMs like back in the days. The only problem is more and more phone manufacturers are locking the bootloader completely with very few of them allowing us to do whatever we want.

[AnonymousWP]

Android is open-source and there'll always be a loophole allowing us to do what we want. Google can't lock down the Android completely because the sole purpose of Android is it being open.

The problem however is that Google is starting to shift development to something more private, see https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/03/google-makes-android-development-private-will-continue-open-source-releases/

Not really a competitor considering it is based on Android,

Yeah my bad, I worded it wrong. What I meant is that we need something like GrapheneOS as a separate OS from Android as core, but that'll take a lot of effort/time of course. We can only hope for either a good competitor of Android and iOS, or just hope Android is not being killed off in terms of freedom.

[Buggem]

Good luck with that I guess, enjoy finding out how more locked down iOS is

[Rudxain]

I'm seriously considering going back to a "dumb phone", while using my laptop for everything else. The only app that keeps me chained is WA, because of college-groups and my contacts. There's also the banking app ("Qik"), but I can switch banks

[AnonymousWP]

Sounds like an extreme measure to me to reach a goal. It's not the end, yet. We can still sideload, use ADB to disable packages, etc. That's the most important thing for me.