1) Provided my company DUNS number etc. once to create the payment profile. I did this some times ago, don’t remember the details but it was an involved verification process and it is marked as verified business payment profile.

2) Later on the payment step verified myself with a passport and bank statement to be able to actually pay with a proper HSBC bank card. Not shady pre-paid card or something, those are not accepted anyway.

3) After I paid I was told that now I need to verify my identity once more but this time with the passport and the incorporation certificate or some other company document.

fingers crossed that in few days it will be verified. While waiting, it tells me that there are still website and email verification to do once the previous step is done. I already verified my e-mail a few times before paying.

It’s painful, slow and annoying because if you fail at a step(i.e. needs verification that takes days and you are told about it at the payment step) you have to start again with the forms.

I just remembered why I never use Android. It seems like no one owns the process and as a result you get unpolished shitty experience that fulfills the requirements of god knows how many people who work in the same company but don’t talk to each other.

Google has seemingly never seen an elderly person's phone, where it is completely infected with crap including literal popup ads (that somehow overlay other apps), yet all of it was downloaded from GPlay.

I've been using Android since 2010 because it was open in ways that the Apple ecosystem wasn't. I do not want this and imagine hardly any other power users (for lack of a better term) do. I'm already using a mostly deGoogled device but this really seals the deal. I have been longing for a true Linux phone for years and now seems like a good time to get serious about the search and migration plan.

This intro immediately tells me that whatever comes after will be horrible for users and developers. Surprise surprise, I was right. Software to "verify" side loaded apps is a bad, anti user idea.

Also the person is not the company, why is Google making the developer identify oneself while many apps are released under a company? My understanding is that Google has been mishandling this for a while but with the verification linked to a government id that just seems like another can of worms.

A few scenarios to consider:

- The developer is fired/resigns and the company does not want to be associated with the developer, for example if the developer is convicted for something.

- The developer is fired/resigns and the developer does not want to be associated with the company, developer found out about certain practices of the company they don't condone.

- The developer and the company part in good faith, however one of them is being exploited/pressured by a third party to abuse the relationship to the app.

- The developer or the company is on legal hold due to legal issues, arrests, malpractice etc.

- The developer passes away or the company ceases to exist.

- How does this work if you are making an app as a developer for hire, when entering into a contract with a publisher for example. Who will verify and how will that work (especially on small scale apps).

> Starting in April, Android Developer Verifier will be installed on devices.

so they're rolling out a system app that will call home to check whether any sideloaded apps have been "verified" with the developer's government ID? and this process will happen regardless of whether the user has enabled the "advanced flow" in Developer settings?

If I get a phone with preinstalled Graphene OS (like the upcoming Motorola phone), then does it avoid this stupidity? Or even with Graphene it prevents me from installing apks?

Really glad I have done that - I've been a 'boiled frog' of sorts on Android for a while now. Not happy with being continually more and more locked down, but not quite unhappy enough to shift. Feels like a breath of fresh air to have software that's built to serve me, rather than just to serve me ads.

I submitted my government-issued ID and bank statements multiple times. Each time rejected, no specific explanation why. After several rounds I gave up, assuming my developer account would at least stay dormant until I felt like trying again.

It didn't. Google deleted the account entirely. No warning, no refund of the €25 registration fee or whatever it costed. When I eventually wanted to publish again, I had to create a new account and pay again. The second time around they accepted my driving license - the same type of document category they had rejected before.

So the real cost of a bad verification experience isn't just time. If you give up and walk away, you lose your fee and start from zero. That's the part that stung, at least for me.

https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2025/08/elevating-...

> The scale of this threat is significant: our recent analysis found over 50 times more malware from internet-sideloaded sources than on apps available through Google Play

Bald face lies are getting baldier.

As it stands, Android Developer Verification (ADV) is a death sentence for F-Droid, Obtainium, and other competitors to the Google Play Store, both commercial and non-commercial. We are disappointed that they are still trying to steamroll this through in the face of overwhelming public opposition.

There are numerous reasons to object to the program, but a few of the top ones are:

1. You own your computer, and you should be the sole decision-maker for what software you can install on it.

2. "Malware" means whatever Google says it means, and their terms and conditions change daily; today malware is banking scams, tomorrow it is … ad-blocking? VPNs? Their decisions are un-reviewable and opaque, and they have obvious commercial incentives to block certain kinds of (otherwise-legal) software.

3. Centralizing global developer registrations through a US corporation makes it subject to the rules (and whims) of the current regime. Citizens of sanctioned countries or members of sanctioned entities (like the International Criminal Court) will be legally barred from registering, blocking them from creating and distributing software _anywhere_ in the world (not just the US).

4. Scenarios that Google claims ADV will protect against — such as high-pressure phone calls manipulating vulnerable users into installing scam apps — have _already_ been addressed by incremental improvements to Android security over the years, such as "Enhanced Fraud Protection" introduced in Android 13 (and expanded in Android 15). Android has incrementally improved its security features over its near 20 years of existence. There is no evidence that anything has suddenly changed to justify such a disproportionate and extreme lockdown.

5. Being required to pay Google for the privilege of uploading your government identification so that you might be permitted to contribute to the Android software ecosystem is such an abominable insult to the developers that helped build the platform. It deserves all the utter contempt that has been heaped upon it thus far, and begs regulatory scrutiny from those few countries that still have the courage to stand up to these bullies.

We emphatically recommend against developers signing up for this program or endorsing it in any way.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47354917

Has anyone seen the report for that analysis. I bet most people here would love to read it too.

  1. enable developer mode
  2. confirm you aren't being coached
  3. restart your phone and reauthenticate
  4. come back after 24 hours and unlock device
  5. install app from unverified developer, option of enabling for 7 days or indefinitely

Personally I am hopeful that people work toward a completely new, non-Android OS. 15 GB of space on my phone, and 1.5 GB of RAM, is dedicated to Android OS alone. This design, and the control this company (and the mobile providers, and device manufacturers) have over the mobile world, is ridiculous. Let's start over.

So, we have a sideloaded app now. Which has been increasingly tricky for our users to install. The warning they get is hard to understand. Does this mean essentially the end of sideloading?

"Those who give up freedom for security deserve neither."

So, what I'm being told is; there's lots of malware on Google Play? Thank goodness for f droid (for now).

Does anyone here have experience using Ubuntu Touch? That's the closest thing I've seen to "generic touchscreen linux" for mobile phone hardware. I'd love a device that works for multimedia, navigation, web browsing, and a handful of APKs like various chat apps (and really anything can can arbitrarily use the hardware), but it seems like tying a cellular modem to this ends up fucking up the whole dream because of carrier and manufacturer motivations/compensations.

Oh and my three personal apps that I installed via adb (not released on playstore) - the moment they stop working on my phone or hassle me about verification, I will get in my car and go buy an iPhone.

Next will be to degoogle the rest of my life, which is luckily only gmail. Guess how long it will take me to port out? Less than two days.

I only let companies violate me once. Then I'm out.

Play store is the biggest piece of trash malware system that exists today, but us normal businesses have to pull teeth and spend days jumping through hoops to get an app out, but the playstore is filled with infinite garbage that rot childrens brains.

Wake up.

Will bypassing this bureaucracy be just a matter of buying a Chinese Android phone?

My dad on the other hand, who worked for Control Data in the 1980s regularly installs some of the scummiest apps imaginable, and they're all from the Play Store proper.

Launchers that don't actually launch things and serve ads. Apps that launch full screen ads while you're doing things saying your device is infected. Absolute trash.

Like maybe just maybe put some energy into going after the stuff in the Play Store first. As the Play Store exists now, it is unsafe.

This is a case of companies forcing things on us "for our own good" and them knowing better than us what is good for us or not.

So what's the solution then? At the same time, I'm curious how this ends up happening to end users. Enabling unknown sources is trivial in a way (it's just one check box and if you try to install an APK from, say, Firefox, it'll take you right there), but how are people even getting to that point??

These two statements contradict. When something is public, it is not entirely safe; and to make something safe, there is exclusion of practices, behaviors, and often people.

> So as an extra layer of security, we are rolling out Android developer verification to help prevent malicious actors from hiding behind anonymity to repeatedly spread harm.

1. Well, then, surely Google can't be in charge of this process, because they are a malicious actor, known to manipulate social media search results and engage in mass surveillance of its users. And that's in addition to analyzing their personal data to try to manipulate them into buying things; which is called "targeted advertizing", but I would also characterize as harm.

2. To be slightly less tongue-in-cheek: Imagine that a two would prevent entry of unverified people - you know, to prevent malicious anonymous actors from bringing harm. That would be ridiculous - nobody should be able to restrict public space. Well, the space of computation and communications via our handheld phones/computers is enough of a public space to merit the same principle. Which means that it is not acceptable for it to be under Google/Alphabet's control. Government regulation could mitigate this problem, but then, governments collude with large corporations and often approve of such restrictions.

I stuck with Android for years as a dev as I once did Android apps and occasionally do tinker.

This is my last Android phone and Jolla is my next phone.

Maybe not expose potential internet users to such as high obstacle if your goal is to get their eyeballs to buy your advertised product???

I stopped because Pixel AOSP phones were actually decent.

Now I guess i'll be buying phones based on which I can flash with custom roms again.

I guess I can sort of manage to keep my head above water and keep buying secondhand phones which I unlock and install a supported version of LineageOS. But it's cumbersome, it gets more difficult and more restrictive every time. And I literally have a doctorate in computers for crying out loud! Is there any hope for Granny? For a kid? For >99% of people? Of course not.

This is so clearly a matter for government oversight: prevent abuse, monopolies, protect the citizen's safety, rights, welfare, etc. It's not reasonable to expect consumers to figure out if the meat they buy is tainted, just as it's not to figure out if their phone spies on them, manipulates information, or sells their data (especially when there's a duopoly). That's why we have laws and food inspectors, paid for by the public, working for the public. Same thing with digital rights.

   For students and hobbyists: To keep Android accessible to everyone, we're building a free, no government ID required, limited distribution account so you can share your work with up to 20 devices. You only need an email account to get started. Sign up for early access. We’ll send invites in June.

Especially in countries like Thailand or Brazil were it is implemented now, just imagine that if Trump decide to go crazy any day, suddenly you would not be allowed to create or have user install your apps normally, just like that...

This is a major course correction that doesn't kill F-Droid. A one time 24 hour hoop to jump through and then never again is monumentally better than losing F-Droid forever.