14 DAY TRIAL // A common practice most smartphone manufacturers submit to is installing proprietary software on their devices before shipping them out to consumers.
Some people refer to these apps as bloatware and companies like Samsung has been notorious for cluttering their devices with countless such unwanted applications.
Anyhow, if you think excessive bloatware is the worst thing that can happen to you, listen to the next story.
According to an enraged Reddit user, Indian company Micromax has been apparently remotely installing apps on his smartphone. Come again?
Micromax is doing shady things behind users' backs
Redddc25 swears in front of the whole world that he found his entry-level Micromax Canvas Fire phone loaded with applications he has no recollection of installing.
Since his phone has low internal storage capacity, he proceeded to uninstall them from his handset, only to find them appear yet again.
Now, we have two scenarios here. Either something akin to a ghost in the machine scenario is happening or Micromax is indeed accessing the phone remotely and cluttering it with apps they think might “benefit” the user.
But this odd happening apparently has an explanation too. The folks of the xda-developers discovered this is possible due to a third-party OTA service the Indian smartphone market is using.
Unlike Google’s OTA updates which are safe to use, Micromax offers a gateway to install apps silently without the user’s consent.
The Reddit user reports that 8-10 ads are displayed on his handset at once and when he tried to see which applications are responsible for the happening, he stumbled upon a system app called “Software Update.”
What to do if you're in this situation?
So if you own a Micromax handset and you’re experiencing the same symptoms, what can you do about it? An option suggested by xda-developers would be to Root your device, Get adb set up and Disable the Software Update application.
This is just a temporary solution and Micromax has been contacted to comment on the matter, but for the time being the device maker is completely silent.
