I'm sure security is part of the reason for the ever increasing locking-down of android ... but I'm more sure it's an excuse and that security FROM the user is a huge factor in google's thinking.

I agree & I don't.

I'm sure that being an app store owner exposes you to the absolute worst just most constant stream of really really awful people doing the worst things, like, forever & ever.

There are some warped incentives too, for sure. But I do think Occam's razor explains why app stores get to be worse & worse & worse: because they are responding to horrors.

I'd love to see some better mechanisms for trust emerge. Software as it is is basically unobservable. You grant or don't grant some permissions & otherwise have no idea what's actually happening. So app stores are the only arbiters of trust.

You have to weight the aggressive security posture against the fact that there are nearly 1.5 billion smart phones sold every year. [0]

In addition to having ridiculous computing power and storage capabilities, they carry microphones, cameras, WiFi, Bluetooth, NFC, lidar, radar...

If you can grasp not just the power of the device but the scale of its reach the only responsible and ethical action is to security harden it every chance you get as much as you can.

0: https://www.zippia.com/advice/us-smartphone-industry-statist...

I get it, but building a prison for computing is a horrible fate to trap us in. Bad use constantly being used to consign us all to worse & worse forms of computing is a godforsaken trend.