Oh, well I guess I wasn't aware of the scandal around it, nor of any security flaws. I hope it isn't something that is putting my phone at risk though. I feel bad for the guy that put the work into it, but am still glad that there was an app released that allowed me to root so easily.
I'm like you, when I found it, I loved that it made it easy to root. Most people don't know about the why's and who's around the drama of all of this, and I wonder how many care. I found out about it, I got it, it works. The other product isn't out yet so I know nothing about it. As long as the program works, I will use it. When it quits working, I'll wait for a fix, or switch to something that does. Its not like I run this thing daily to root. Once was enough to root my phone.
Okay, maybe you're not getting the point -- once you're rooted you've opened the gate that was previously locked. You've slain the dragon and rescued the maiden fair.
The problem is the maiden isn't always faithful and the dragon made it to be an old dragon by being very, very tough.
The method this program used to root your phone exploits a flaw
in the phone itself that allows a program to have access to the most important parts of the operating system, and it does so in a manner that if a program has the same code it could potentially seize control of the phone, wipe the OS, mine data, capture passwords, or store stuff on the SD card that we'll call unsavory and leave it at that. It's not repeatedly running the application that's the problem, it's whether or not that part of the program could be hacked and/or exploited. I've seen and heard zero evidence that Easy Root is anything but exactly what it promised to be, but that doesn't mean the program itself isn't risky.
Once your phone is rooted you are at risk. The program itself has a bad history and it doesn't do the best job of rooting phones, though there is some question about if 90+% of those bad roots are simply user error.
At the moment the best method to root isn't the easiest, but it's free, it has no controversy surrounding it, and it has the advantage of getting you familiar with programs and tools that will pull your phone back from the brink of unusability and a $600 replacement cost.
As for people who don't care, well, that's their prerogative. That's one reason why I say "if it matters" a lot. It matters to me, but I'm one of those strange people who believe in personal responsibility and that ripping someone else off for personal profit is somehow wrong. I don't pass judgment, however, I just make sure people know what they're doing.
DroidMod had to clean up a mess and stop people from using the leaked DMUpdater because the program wasn't ready for primetime yet. Maybe the reason why is because that part of the app wasn't encrypted and getting access to it was too easy, and once you had access to it the exploit could be spread around. I don't know, and they're not talking -- which is their prerogative.
If anyone finds out that Easy Root is a problem (other than for Verizon and the people who got bad root-jobs from it
) it will be posted here as soon as possible. Till then, you're probably fine, but the fact remains that there are issues associated with this app. An informed consumer, and all that.
But, let's not be angry. Have a dancing banana.
:icon_ banana:
