Apple’s security and privacy are still seen as huge differentiators between iPhone and Android—but the surprising number of radical updates Google has just revealed could narrow that gap. Is Google really about to beat Apple at its own game ahead of its iPhone 16 and iOS 18 launch this fall…
Android goes all out on security and privacy
Google had a mountain to climb to address Android’s security issues—and few expected it to realistically narrow the gap with iPhone. But it’s doing an impressively good job of exactly that. It has been helped in part by Apple’s DMA-prompted changes, but in the main it has done all the hard yards itself.
Not to say it has all been plain sailing—this week’s privacy backlash over AI call monitoring to flag scams in real time is a case in point. But Android is now a significantly more secure proposition than it has ever been. And some of Google’s upcoming innovations go beyond what even iPhone can do.
For Android to focus this heavily on security and privacy is a major surprise—we have not seen anything like this before from Google, and it shows just how its battle with iPhone is narrowing down.
Take “advanced cellular security,” for example. This pushes IMSI-grabbing and intercept detection to a new level for mainstream devices. If a phone drops down to a lesser than expected level of network encryption, perhaps signaling it has connected to a spoofed base station, then users will be warned. Similarly, if a network pings for device identifiers more than expected, users will also be warned—that could also be a precursor to location tracking or even an intercept attempt.
I covered the implications of these new advances here. Suffice to say it’s a huge step forwards for those likely to come up against low to medium sophistication levels of tracking—dissidents, journalists, activists. It won’t protect against top drawer technology—but that’s much more restricted.
One interesting factor of this new feature is the need for a technically compliant modem with the right capabilities to work in tandem with the phone’s OS. This means new devices only, it also means OEMs like Samsung will beed to decide whether to play. Pixel will certainly be first out the blocks. “We expect OEM adoption to progress over the next couple of years,” Google says.
If that update pushed Android beyond iPhone, the next update is a straight lift and shift. Android’s new theft protection will broadly mirror what is now available on iPhone. Better protection and recovery tools in the event of a theft, but more critically the use of AI to detect when a theft has likely taken place.
Android dials security up to 11
“If a thief forces a reset of a stolen device,” Google says, “they’re not able to set it up again without knowing your device or Google account credentials. This renders a stolen device unsellable, reducing incentives for phone theft.” Just like iPhone. Android will also limit security changes, resets or disabling its new FindMy network on a device when it’s potentially in a stranger’s hands.
Google’s update includes automatically locking a phone when the AI suspects it has been snatched. “If a common motion associated with theft is detected, your phone screen quickly locks – which helps keep thieves from easily accessing your data.”
Just as importantly, an innovation that applies normally as well as in the event of a theft is Google’s new Private Space, which gives users a locked down area of their device to store the kind of sensitive data they would want to protect at all costs from a thief—as well as (maybe) from friends and family!
This concept of locking down parts of devices is a key theme for Android’s new security and privacy focus. Limiting media access and shielding passcodes and login screens from screen grabs. Similarly, restricting apps from running in the background and accessing foreground activity. All of these changes seek to shut down avenues knowingly abused by malware.
Talking of which, one of the biggest changes and best security applications of AI will be Android’s new “live threat detection,” which uses Google Play Protect’s on-device AI to “analyze behavioral signals related to the use of sensitive permissions and interactions with other apps and services. If suspicious behavior is discovered, Google Play Protect can send the app to Google for additional review and then warn users or disable the app if malicious behavior is confirmed.”
Google says this processing will be done on device to maintain user privacy and that many OEMs are already onboard. “We are expanding Play Protect’s on-device AI capabilities with Google Play Protect live threat detection to improve fraud and abuse detection against apps that try to cloak their actions.”
Of course, the use of on-device processing doesn’t resolve privacy problems all on its own—just look at the backlash against the use of on-device AI to monitor live phone calls for scams.
Android 15 and the changes to the Play ecosystem ahead of its release signal a huge change for Android. With the two ecosystems also set to battle it out on AI come Apple’s updates in the fall, the duopolistic smartphone world is about to change forever…
