Google May Make Android's Root Store Updatable Via Play Services On Android 14: Report

Root certificates are primarily based on trust, and the new mechanism could allow Google to pull back this trust when needed.

Written by Anees Hussain, Edited by Richa Sharma | Updated: 24 December 2022 15:16 IST

Google May Make Android's Root Store Updatable Via Play Services On Android 14: Report

Photo Credit: Bloomberg

TrustCor has been accused of having links to a company providing spyware intelligence

Highlights

Google is dropping TrustCor Systems as a root certificate authority
Microsoft, Mozilla have also announced similar moves
Android may take some time to introduce these changes

Google is reportedly working on making Android's root store updatable via Google Play Store on Android 14. The search giant's current mechanism updates root certificates only as part of full system updates, which could potentially render devices running on older Android versions unable to connect to the internet when the expired root certificates not being recognised.

According to a report by AndroidPolice citing a tweet by Mishaal Rahman on Twitter, Google could be working on root certificate modules to be introduced via Google Play Services updates. Root certificates are used for authenticating connecting Android system devices in order to establish secure connections. The introduction of root certificate modules via Google Play Services will allow Google to push these updates as and when needed while preventing older models from completely falling off the trust grid.

The development could have been triggered with one particular root certificate authority, TrustCor, being in the news for allegedly having links with a company that is known to provide sypware intelligence services. Google has since started removing support for TrustCor's certificates on its devices.

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Google Chrome version 111 update for desktops will mark the dropping of root certificates issued by TrustCor as trusted. However, in the case of Android, the change could take more time, as its root certificates cannot be updated independently, added a blog post by Mishaal Rahman.

The latest development seeks to change this with the search giant working on bundling root certificate updates to its Google Play Store Services updates which are pushed out as and when needed by the company.

However, it is important to note that there has been no official confirmation from Google on its plans to push routine root certification updates via Play Store Services.

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