Yes, this permission allows that. Docs say: “Allows applications to open network sockets.”[1], full description seems to be[2]:
> Allows the app to create network sockets and use custom network protocols. The browser and other applications provide means to send data to the internet, so this permission is not required to send data to the internet.
Chromecast and Netflix have done this for a while now to facilitate some sort of hand-off.
I don’t have the details handy, but a few years ago I was `adb shell` into my device to debug something untreated and did a quick `netstat` and noticed a few ports that were open / did not expect. Tracked them down to Netflix, specifically.
Yes, I rely on this for my internal app to serve scriptlets to ublock origin. I hope they won't take it away, at least make it possible for the user to keep this behaviour..
I also rely on this for another internal app that opens a rsync server..
For iPhone users, the last point in the article’s FAQ addresses iOS; excerpt below:
> No evidence of abuse has been observed in iOS browsers and apps that we tested. That said, similar data sharing between iOS browsers and native apps is technically possible. (…) It is possible that technical and policy restrictions for running native apps in the background may explain why iOS users were not targeted by these trackers.
It’d be difficult to make work reliably on iOS due to how it handles background processes. Processes can’t just hang around forever, they’re expected to quickly and efficiently finish their task and close until their next scheduled run (which is determined by the system — devs can request to run whenever they want, but processes that are badly behaved get downranked and run less often). If its task is taking too long the system unceremoniously kills the process.
This is limiting and makes implementing programs like Syncthing more challenging but also helps keep the battery eaters and eternal listeners until control.
omfg, just comfort yourselves that every sane company track and will track. they will. move on from this topic. it is not conspiracy theory. it is a sane way to make business. live with it.
This article is a counterexample to the helplessness you advocate. This research forced Meta to stop doing it. There is no cosmic law that says they must track or that we have to allow them to do so.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44169115
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44182204
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44235467