Now we know that Google is not going to settle for controlling in the Play Store which applications access the delicate accessibility permission that gives full control to the device. Also they will restrict access to accessibility services to unknown apps.
Malware will have a harder time with Android 13
Accessibility services is currently one of the main security problems of Android and the permission that most malicious apps like viruses Flubot that via SMS pretended to be our bank or a transportation agency to invite us to download an APK that would then take full control of our device and steal our data.
The user is always who you have to agree to allow an app to access accessibility services, but many users believe that the APK is reliable and accept all the permissions that the app downloaded from an SMS requests, ignoring the operating system’s warnings. Well, in Android 13 unknown apps they will not be able to apply for such permission.
It seems that Google it will limit access to accessibility services, and therefore the sensitive permission that gives full control, to applications downloaded from Google Play and trusted stores. Apps downloaded from unknown sources like untrusted website will not be able to access accessibility permission by default.
When an unknown app tries to get the user to activate accessibility permissions, Android 13 will say with a warning that it is a restricted fit and is currently not available. Therefore, a malicious app will not be able to gain full control of the device.
In the current Android 13 beta, there is a way to bypass that limitation. In the ‘Application information’ section the user will be able to allow restricted settings to be able to activate accessibility services for any application, with which the user would continue to be completely free to install and use applications downloaded from any source, although it is unknown if this option will reach the final version of Android 13.
Via | wait
In Engadget Android | Google prevented more than a million malicious apps from being published on the Play Store in 2021