You can believe what you want. I didn’t hear it from a conspiracy theorist, I heard it from Edward Snowden, and this was actually old news when he mentioned it, but his revelation on national TV made it even more widely known.
“Coincidentally” it was right around the time Snowden blew the whistle that Android manufacturers started switching over to non-replaceable batteries.
Yes Apple are greedy fucks and it’s obvious that forcing iPhone users to get their phones repaired by a ‘genius’ was a part of their strategy from the beginning. But Android manufacturers who didn’t have a repair store they could force their users to use and wouldn’t benefit from that were happy to continue letting users replace their own batteries, because it was a legitimate benefit for the consumer and way to differentiate themselves from Apple.
I’m sure that phone manufactures save a few pennies by forcing users to either buy a new phone or pay an expensive repair bill, but I’m pretty sure that isn’t the only reason it’s done.
Edit: Even if you ignore their ability to wiretap you when your phone is ‘powered off’, the fact remains that the government can and does track you by you cell phone and removing the battery is a great way to stop that.
Of course, it’s not the only way- If you feel like you don’t want to be tracked for any reason a Faraday bag is a decent option. It makes your phone less useful, but so would removing the battery.
You can believe what you want. I didn’t hear it from a conspiracy theorist, I heard it from Edward Snowden, and this was actually old news when he mentioned it, but his revelation on national TV made it even more widely known. “Coincidentally” it was right around the time Snowden blew the whistle that Android manufacturers started switching over to non-replaceable batteries.
Yes Apple are greedy fucks and it’s obvious that forcing iPhone users to get their phones repaired by a ‘genius’ was a part of their strategy from the beginning. But Android manufacturers who didn’t have a repair store they could force their users to use and wouldn’t benefit from that were happy to continue letting users replace their own batteries, because it was a legitimate benefit for the consumer and way to differentiate themselves from Apple.
I’m sure that phone manufactures save a few pennies by forcing users to either buy a new phone or pay an expensive repair bill, but I’m pretty sure that isn’t the only reason it’s done.
Edit: Even if you ignore their ability to wiretap you when your phone is ‘powered off’, the fact remains that the government can and does track you by you cell phone and removing the battery is a great way to stop that.
Of course, it’s not the only way- If you feel like you don’t want to be tracked for any reason a Faraday bag is a decent option. It makes your phone less useful, but so would removing the battery.