> Google Play receives absolutely no special access or privileges on GrapheneOS as opposed to bypassing the app sandbox and receiving a massive amount of highly privileged access.
It doesn't mention IMEI here, but hopefully READ_PRIVILEGED_PHONE_STATE is included in "privileged access."
That one lists:
ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE
ENFORCE_UPDATE_OWNERSHIP
FOREGROUND_SERVICE
FOREGROUND_SERVICE_SPECIAL_USE
INSTALL_PACKAGES
INTERNET
POST_NOTIFICATIONS
QUERY_ALL_PACKAGES
RECEIVE_BOOT_COMPLETED
REQUEST_DELETE_PACKAGES
REQUEST_INSTALL_PACKAGES
UPDATE_PACKAGES_WITHOUT_USER_ACTIONThere is no READ_PRIVILEGED_PHONE_STATE mentioned there.
> That's also incorrect, because the gmscompat app is just a helper app.
Hmm, ok. I was reasoning the helper app was needed to get around the default assumptions from Google Play Services. > Those permissions are handled by the OS under the play services app
Yes, but I assume you don't mean that as that GOS makes special hard-coded provisions for the play services. GOS claims to run Play Services like any other unprivileged app, and so any additional permission it would want would have to be consented by the user and should be visible to the user. If not, then GOS wording would be quite a bit unfortunate at least.EDIT: "GmsCompatConfig is the text-based configuration for the GrapheneOS sandboxed Google Play compatibility layer. It provides a large portion of the compatibility shims." [1] This seems to indicate that the permissions requested by Play Services are being honored with the shims from the helper app. That would alleviate the permission problem.
1. https://github.com/GrapheneOS/platform_packages_apps_GmsComp...