Paranoia: ES File Explorer

I have just read this thread through and it made me join the forum to comment.

There are small teams of developers all around this planet of ours. Producing quality output for many reasons. The fact that these guys are based in China is irrelevant. All you are showing is a bias about a country you know little about.

No matter which country it was. What do you really think they would want with YOUR login details to dropbox etc? You are not going to be important enough to actually want to steal any of your data. Your paranoia is misplaced.


What amazes me is, if you are paranoid, why are you using a Google product? These guys are well known for their advertising slant to the world and the way they will build up a profile on you to aid selling you more product, or passing you to a third party to sell you more product. Remember Google are an advertising monster of a company. You would be amazed at what they already know about you.

Are you on Facebook? Twitter? etc? Why do you trust those companies?


I don't know what country you are based in, but if you think the US is any more trustable than China I think you need to read a bit closer as to the level of monitoring that has occurred since the Patriot Act and similar have been brought in... "The war on terror" has been an excuse for a massive level of watching the innocent population.


The best way of dealing with your paranoia is to get more technical. Learn more about firewalls and monitoring as suggested in the thread. Learn how to write your own code and what is really possible and you can then better direct your paranoia.


(Please don't think I am bashing the US here. I am in the UK, which also has a horrendous level of monitoring in place now. I am just trying to say - don't be scared of a country you know nothing about.)

BarryTheSprout said:

What amazes me is, if you are paranoid, why are you using a Google product? These guys are well known for their advertising slant to the world and the way they will build up a profile on you to aid selling you more product, or passing you to a third party to sell you more product. Remember Google are an advertising monster of a company. You would be amazed at what they already know about you.

Are you on Facebook? Twitter? etc? Why do you trust those companies?

Click to expand...

Unfortunately, some of us don't have a choice. When Dad needs a phone, he goes to T-Mobile. T-Mobile just happens to sell Android, and Dad buys Android without thinking about Google branding. Eventually every family is using them, and really, if Google ever does decide to transform into a malicious BEAST, there will be many to point the finger at.

I can tell you right now; my Dad has no idea his phone is a Google phone, or that the Free Slot Machine game he is playing, is free for a reason.

Now when it comes to Facebook.. it seems the general public has already lost that battle, and it's often hard for me to swallow that fact. To provide integration with your peeps, many sites will require a Facebook password for login. Even worse, they'll scrap their entire website in support of a Facebook page, so that almost every facet of life is eventually run by Facebook in order to pave way for Likes. Ask yourself, when you drive down the freeway, what logos do you see on those billboards? How about your television commercials? --Facebook and Twitter logos? You wouldn't be too far off.

BarryTheSprout said:

I don't know what country you are based in, but if you think the US is any more trustable than China I think you need to read a bit closer as to the level of monitoring that has occurred since the Patriot Act and similar have been brought in... "The war on terror" has been an excuse for a massive level of watching the innocent population.

Click to expand...

I'm sorry, even with all the patriot act...domestic spying mumble jumble, I still trust the US way more than China. And this is coming from someone who is chinese :O

This discussion is going nowhere but in a big fat circle. Lunatic59, an experienced developer, has provided an explanation, and in any case the decision to use an app (or not) ultimately rests with the end-user. If you're not confident with it then uninstall.... problem solved. This is certainly not an appropriate forum for geopolitical debate - we've got a lively Politics & Current Affairs forum for that.

As a footnote, ES File Explorer has been around for at least as long as I've been using Android devices (> 3yrs) and has been included in many custom ROMs from respected developers. Any nefarious behaviour would surely have come to light long before now, and the app would certainly have been removed from the Play Store by Google.