That sub-$100 Android slab you got on Black Friday? RIDDLED with holes, say infosec bods

$$$???

We use pounds in this country. We're not part of the USA, yet, thank fuckery.

In related news

It was revealed today that the Pope is Catholic and Bears shit in the woods. The problem isn't that the sellers of dirt cheap items cut corners, of course they do, that's the reason they are dirt cheap. The problem is when premium ones do the same!

Don't ruin the fun

All these vulnerabilities allow for easy rooting of the tablet/smartphone and they make life easy for Sunday afternoon Android hackers like myself. What's the fun of a 50€ tablet with an almost unwatchable LCD screen if you can't customise it and hack its firmware?

Until recently, most of the no-name tablets I had in my hands were giving a root shell right away from adb shell and I LIKED that. How's that for security? ;-)

On a separate rant

"The latest Lollipop build, version 5.0, fixes many of the problems found,"

... and creates many problems too.

don't trust mobile period

I don't do any online banking, any e-commerce transactions (outside of google play store for a few apps, no movies/music/whatever else they have) on my mobile devices (all Android Samsung Note 3 and Toshiba tablet though I wouldn't do it on IOS either).

I am very very cautious not to install any privacy invading applications either.

anything that needs security gets done on my linux laptop.

exception is I do occasionally login to work VPN from my phone.

in general I think the risk is quite low for me, but I don't do it anyway. There's never been a time where I felt "I have to do this *now* (and can't wait till I get to my own computer)"

also maybe goes without saying I don't use public wifi hotspots (except the very occasional hotel but that is rare I prefer to use my phone's mifi which I pay $50/mo for already).

huh.

Considering that all the people asking about these are interested in just casual gaming, low rent media, and such, I really think the manufacturers have rationally qualified their customers. Sorry fellow securobods but not everything needs Knox-level, even Google-level security. Not that either have fulfilled promises made.

I haven't played with this tablet in about six months, but I may have a rooted, malware infested 7 inch tablet, or I may have the most secure android tablet I've ever seen. I don't know because I've been unable to get root. If I install root utilities it seems to go well, but every rootchecker says I don't have root. Flashing the flash memory with a newer OS simply doesn't work. I've installed a new ROM on a couple android tabs and everything went well, but this one refuses to cooperate. If I didn't already own an ipad and another android tab, then I'd forget about it. But damn, I should be able to crack it.

FYI - it says allwhinner - not allwinner. So, a clone of a clone?

It is all very well saying manufacturers should update the software but there is little motivation for them to do so as once the unit is sold there is no financial benefit for them to keep it up to date (unlike with Microsoft or apple who make money from app sales after). If Google want updates pushed they need to take over more of the patching. Something like saying if you bung on 4.2 we will push out security updates for that point release for x years.

System updates

Yeah, I always assume any phone or tablet I get will have the capabilities it has NOW. Too many vendors never ship any updates.

Not just the Chinese vendors; I've never had a phone yet that got an actual Android update... my Droid 2 Global got an update from 2.2 to still 2.2... I got it up to 2.3.something using Cyanogenmod. My previous phone got no Android version update at all, but updated the LTE radio firmware. My current phone got updated from 4.1.2 to still 4.1.2, but using a newer radio ROM.

So.. if I get a phone *assuming* it'll get an Android update or two, I'll be sorely disappointed when it doesn't. If I make sure the version it *ships* with is at least "new enough", then I can't be disappointed, but may get a pleasant surprise if there's a nice upgrade down the road.

(Of course, the "Google phones" are the exception -- since Google *will* ship updates for them for a certain length of time, I wouldn't sweat buying one expecting future updates.)

Has anyone got a suggestion for a cheapo Android tablet that has average security & average browsing experience over wifi ?