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The privacy-focused bitcoin portfolio Samourai is forcing his hand on Google.
According to a blog post by Samourai, the wallet provider is disabling privacy features that are critical to its design before its latest version, 0.99.4, arrives tomorrow at the Google Play Store. The functions removed include the invisible mode of Samourai, the SMS commands (SMS) and SIM Switch Defense (a measure to be protected against sim swaps).
The privacy restrictions apply only to the version of the portfolio available on Google Play. To circumvent these restrictions, users can also download what Samourai calls "non-nerfata version" of the latest version of the wallet client directly from the project's Github. Along the way, the team also hopes to have the wallet, fully enabled privacy features listed on F-Droid and other alternative open-source app stores.
"In October, Google announced changes to its SMS and Dialer permissions policies that apps can use, the way our Stealth mode, remote SMS commands, and the SIM Switch Defense feature require the use of these. authorizations, "said a spokesman for Samourai Wallet Bitcoin Magazine in an e-mail correspondence.
Samourai proceeded to file an exemption request, but were informed of the rejection of their exemption only "a few days ago", according to the representative.
"Unfortunately, they did not tell us anything in particular, we learned everything through automated e-mails that could not be answered," they continued.
Samourai is only available for Android, partly because it is not able to define iOS developers who "are willing to work for the passion of it on profit," the representative indicated. The project has "not had much luck with iOS developers so far", but is "committed to bringing some version of Samourai to the iOS store," they said.
With these restrictions, Samourai has complained about the change in the Android landscape in the latest versions. These changes have, in the words of Samourai, created a "walled garden", something that the supplier of portfolios discusses in his blog post and reiterated in our correspondence.
"Very severe changes in background data some versions ago meant that Samourai users would no longer receive notices about incoming payments unless we had routed all alerts via Google's servers." Of course we decided not to do it, but was – in our opinion – the beginning of the walled garden under construction.The latest changes to the rules on SMS and Dialer authorizations show a marked change in strategy for Google, which brings it closer to the Apple iOS Store like never before. "
If users decide to download the wallet directly from Samourai's Github, the team warns that they must "verify the integrity of the downloaded APK by comparing the SHA-256 hash of their APK with the hash SHA-256 published on Github. "
At the time of publication, Google had not responded Bitcoin Magazine & # 39; s request for comment
