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Android Is (Or Was) Insecure? Don't Panic

After news broke the other day that Google's Android handset development library had several vulnerabilities that could be exploited by an attacker, I braced for a flood of "Told you so!"-type announcements.  Frankly, the fact that these problems have shown up at this stage in the development process isn't a bad thing. This is the best possible scenario.

The first and most obvious thing to get out of the way is that the Android libraries are all still very much a beta product.  Nobody's created a commercially available device that uses the library (yet), so any attacks that could be carried out wouldn't affect anyone except the people doing development.  In fact, this problem already has been fixed in the most recent release of the platform build.

The fact that problems have turned up at this stage isn't a bad thing.  When the development of a project this large and attractive is done out in the open, instead of behind closed doors, there are that many less mysteries about what might go wrong -- and what could be used against the people who depend on it.  It also means the developers are beholden to the public as a whole to fix these problems, not internal pressures.  The system's working as intended, and that's the best news of all.

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