Is using Android with GApps as bad as running Windows on your PC?

It’s worse. You are giving the planet’s largest and most powerful ad selling platform access to every aspect of your life. Windows doesn’t know where you are every second of the day or read your texts. Google is terrifying.

But but they don't sell your data /s

Yeah silly it's too valuable, they hoard it and sell services that are powered by your data.

It's a great income stream. Google charges oems a fee for running Android. Then charges consumers a fee when they spend money on apps or buy things with Google pay. Then charges for ads using your private data, and ads are reported to be the biggest income stream overall for the company, including search on desktop.

Google puts telemetry in the default keyboard app. Let that sink in for a moment.

Good moment to plug this open source alternative https://github.com/Helium314/HeliBoard First usable one imo

Worse, probably, because your PC doesn’t have a lot of the sensors your phone does. But I guess it depends on what you’re trying to keep private.

It's even worse because phones have cameras and microphones and I believe Google uses the latter for tracking for ad related purposes.

I think it's been proven that Google doesn't listen in to your conversations. While there are a lot of real privacy issues, the microphone theory is just conspiracy fear-mongering
- at my last job during every break my fb-addict coworker would always get ads on facebook on her iphone that were exactly about what we were discussing a few minutes earlier. became very clear there was some eavesdropping going on.
- I have proofs of them listening good enough to believe it's true.

i think they are both equally privacy intrusive by default but if you take the time to get rid of telemetry and the gapps then android will be better then running windows on your pc

Eh, kinda. It's not quite as easy to escape from GApps as it is to install Linux, though, so it's understandable.

My advice is to look into LineageOS, DivestOS, and GrapheneOS and see if your device is supported by anyone. If not, it's possible to remove GApps using ADB, and you can use NextDNS to block tracking.

I'm gonna go with no, because of containerization and permission management. On your computer, any program can do pretty much anything, unless you explicitly take measures against this. On a smartphone, you get a lot of control over your apps. In newer Android versions you can even completely disable cameras and microphones (even if only in software).

I would use a throwaway account and avoid giving Google any personal data tho. Of course they could still figure stuff out, but it's harder and unreliable, not to mention super-duper illegal (at least in the EU), so I kinda doubt they go the extra mile.

The answers in this thread are all over, but it's towards this direction I'm leaning

Yeah that's a fairly reasonable comparison.

I want to go google-less, but I do have paid apps from google play that I must sign in to download.

Anything you "purchase" on the Play store is more of a rental.

With that being said you could look into MicroG and Aurora store. It may work it may not
- I am using MicroG which works fine, I have tried Aurora, but wont recognize paid apps (have the option to purchase again).
  
  Anything you “purchase” on the Play store is more of a rental.
  
  So ... arrrr?

I believe that Google services collect a lot more data. You can also turn off telemetry in windows by disabling the service and such, so I'd probably say the big G is less private then Microsoft. Microsoft also has a slightly less tracking business model.

Its a pretty low bar but Android is going to be more private then Windows. Google having privileged access to your phone is still terrible but Windows doesn't really have any privacy protections by default. Android at least does things such as sandboxing its non privileged apps. It also provides a lot better hardware security for your data then most Windows devices would...outside of secure core pcs its pretty trash for hardware privacy in the Windows world.

I would say it's almost the same, but you have less control of what your android is doing with the data it collects, I would go for https://e.foundation/e-os/ if you care about privacy. Instead, Google Drive, you will use Nextcloud.

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