Important reason to upgrade from your older device!

[B. Diddy]

If you have a device that's older than Nougat 7.1.1, read this:

https://www.engadget.com/old-androi...-websites-in-2021-224728196.html?guccounter=1

 

[hallux]

I find it interesting how one of the arguments in favor of iOS is the length of update support for older devices, going back as far as devices released 5 years ago, yet this support being dropped for devices 5 years old and older is possibly an issue because of lack of updates on devices. At the time when Android 8 came out, that might have been an issue, but at this point these devices are FIVE YEARS OLD and will be six by the time this happens!

We'll need to be ready with "that's because your device is running an OS older than 7.1" when people complain about apps failing to work...

 

[B. Diddy]

Yep -- we certainly see people routinely asking about Lollipop and even KitKat devices still in use right now!

 

[mustang7757]

Thanks for posting this

 

[smvim]

While this is a significant issue, there is a more practical approach to this. It's not
all doom and gloom and it's not like anyone using a pre-Nougat device will be locked of online access. Keep in mind that
this is Let's Encrypt web certificate matter, so the scope is actually limited and conditional affecting only some web
sites and when using a Chromium-based browser.

-- Let's Encrypt has a healthy and growing usage base, but its market share numbers are still dwarfed by the
long-standing, conventional CA (Certificate Authorities) suppliers. Even scumbag GoDaddy is a bigger player in this
market. Most web sites are still using certs supplied by the long-established, conventional CA's,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Certificate_authority
At 0.2%, that's in one aspect not much, but that's also 0.2% of a massive number, the issue being there are billions of
web sites out there so even a tiny percentage still involves a lot of web traffic.
-- This is a web browser security certificate matter, so it will be limited primarily to web browsing, and only when
trying to access web sites relying upon Let's Encrypt certs. Also, Let's Encrypt is taking this issue seriously so it
remains to be seen if any kind of workaround might come about.
-- Most other apps (i.e. your email app, your calendar app,Instagram app, etc.) use their own integrated authentication
scheme, not the host operating system web browser certs. The problem is tied to the fact that Chromium-based web
browsers rely upon the host operating system's web certs -- that's why using a Firefox web browser won't be affected by
this either -- it's always used its own, integrated security cert store instead.

So if you are running an older Android device, this is going to be a serious issue but not likely to be as bad as some
media sites are claiming it to be. But it is adding yet another incentive to upgrade to a new
or newer device. The Internet has devolved into a real messy place so intentionally running outdated devices and
software is a risk.

 

[B. Diddy]

Thanks for the clarification, that's good info! From a general security standpoint, though, I would still recommend anyone using a pre-Nougat device as their daily driver to upgrade. But it's helpful to know that people using these devices won't necessarily be completely hamstrung when it comes to browsing the web.

 

[Morty2264]

Wow, this is good to know! I too see users posting about Kitkat software! Thanks for sharing!