Better encryption
for backup data
You know all that data Android saves from your d
device and
then makes available for restoring when you sign into a new
phone or tablet — OS-level
level settings, app
app-oriented info, all
that sort of stuff? The data's always been encrypted, but
with Android P, it'll start using a client
client-side secret for its
encryption.
What that means is the encryption will be protected with
something specific to your phone — something derived from
your PIN, pattern, or password — and the whole process will
take place directly on your device.
That, in turn, means it'll be tougher
gher than ever for anyone to
access that info when they shouldn't be able to.
(This element is not yet present in the initial Android P
developer preview, by the way, but it'll show up in a future
update between now and the final P release.)
More privacy with
network connections
When you connect to a Wi-Fi
Fi network from an Android device today, the network is able to see your
device's MAC address — a unique and consistent number that identifies your phone or tablet. And while
it's a bit out there, that means there's the potential, in theory, for your location to be tracked as you
connect to different networks throughout the day.
"Anywhere I go, if I connect to a network, the owner of the network will know my MAC addre
address," Xin
explains. "If those people were then to collude, they could figure out where I go."
Android P addresses this possibility by allowing the system to generate a new and random MAC address
for every single Wi-Fi
Fi network you connect to. The address wil
will l stay constant for that one network over
time, but you'll get a new and different address for each other network you use — so there's no
permanent and device-specific
specific ID that follows you everywhere and leaves a lasting mark.
This option is starting out as an off
off-by-default
default "experimental" feature in the earliest Android P
developer preview build.
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