App Lounge: Data Privacy from Google?

/e/OS Foundation & Community Data Privacy
6

Hi @Manoj, and thanks for responding.

I see the connections in the Blokada 5 tracker-blocking app. Besides the usual mtalk.google.com, which if I’m not mistaken is unavoidable, even on /e/, Blokada noted all these:

  • Opening App Lounge, a connection is made to clients3.google.com and android.clients.google.com.

  • Selecting Anonymous Login within the app triggers a connection to play-lh.googleusercontent.com.

  • Checking for updates to installed apps, calls clients3.google.com again.

  • Clicking to App Lounge Home sends android.clients.google.com again.

  • Searching for a specific app calls play-lh.googleusercontent.com again.

  • Opening the landing page of the searched-for app sends to clients3.google.com again.

  • Clicking on a category, e.g. “Medical,” within the Categories tab calls clients3.google.com again.

  • Clicking on Terms of Service calls clients3.google.com again.

  • Closing the app calls clients3.google.com again.

I was connected to my home WiFi during this test, but interestingly my Pi-hole application didn’t register a single one of these. (Only mtalk.google.com.)

I’m not qualified to say if these represent anything nefarious or exploitative, but I instinctively distrust any connection to a Google domain, so I would be appreciative of any clarification.

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