Google will be checked that all Android application developers will check their identity from next year

Android’s open nature Define it from the iPhone while the era of touch screen smartphones started almost two decades ago. Little by little, Google has exchanged part of this opening for security, and its next security initiative could make the biggest dealerships to date in the name of blocking bad applications.

Google has announced its intention to start verifying the identity of all Android application developers, not just those that publish on the Play Store. Google intends to check the identities of the developers, it doesn’t matter where they offer their content, and the applications without verification will not work on most Android devices in the years to come.

Google did very little conservation of the Play Store (or the Android market, if you come back far enough), but it has long sought to improve the reputation of the platform as being less safe than the Apple App Store. Years ago, you could publish real exploits in the official store to access Root access to phones, but now there are several magazines and detection mechanisms to reduce the prevalence of malware and prohibited content. Although the Play Store is still not perfect, Google claims that applications to the outside of its store are 50 times more likely to contain malware.

This, we are led to believe, is the impulse of the new Google developer verification system. The company describes it as an “identity check at the airport”. Since all Google Play applicants have been checking their identity in 2023, he experienced a precipitated drop in malware and fraud. Google play players have moderated anonymity to distribute malicious applications, it goes so that the verification of application developers outside Google Play could also improve safety.

However, ensuring that it happens outside of your app store will force Google to take a page of the Apple game book and to bend its muscle in a way that many Android users could find intrusive. Google plans to create a rationalized Android developer console, which developers will use if they plan to distribute applications outside the Play Store. After checking their identity, the developers will have to record the name of the package and the signature of the keys to their applications. Google will not check the content or functionality of the applications.

Google says that only applications with verified identities will be installed on certified Android devices, which is almost all devices based on Android – if it has Google services on it, it is a certified device. If you have an Android non -Google construction on your phone, none of this applies. However, it is a disappeared fraction of the Android ecosystem outside of China.

Google plans to start testing this system with early access in October this year. In March 2026, all developers will have access to the new console to be checked. In September 2026, Google plans to launch this feature in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore and Thailand. The next step is still blurred, but Google Target 2027 to extend the verification requirements worldwide.

A seismic change

This plan arrives at a major crossroads for Android. The current antitrust google play case made by Epic Games can finally force changes to Google Play in the coming months. Google lost its call from the verdict several weeks ago, and although it warns to appeal the case before the Supreme Court of the United States, the company will have to start changing its application distribution program, with the exception of new legal maneuvers.

Among other things, the court has ordered that Google must distribute third -party application stores and allow the content of Play Store to be redesigned in other windows. Giving people more ways to get applications could increase the choice, what Epic wanted and other developers. However, third -party sources will not have the integration of the profound system store system, which means that users will be put next to these applications without Google’s safety layers.

It is difficult to say how a real security problem is. On the one hand, it is logical that Google is worried – most of the main threats of malicious software for Android devices spread via third party applications. However, the application of a white installation list on almost all Android devices is heavy. This requires everyone to make Android applications to meet Google’s requirements before practically, everyone can install their applications, which could help Google keep control as the applications market is opening up. Although the requirements can be minimal at the moment, there is no guarantee that they will remain like this.

The currently available documentation does not explain what will happen if you try to install an unaccussional application, or how the phones will check the verification status. Presumably, Google will distribute this white list in reading services as the implementation date approaches. We have contacted more details on this front and we will report if we hear something.

This story originally appeared on Ars Technica.