Why I built an open-source Android Phone Checker
An unprompted app installation by a pre-installed manufacturer store, and why taking control of your phone shouldn't cost money.
One afternoon, a notification popped up on my personal phone announcing that a new application had just been successfully installed.
I had not downloaded anything. I had not opened an app store, clicked an installation prompt, or given consent. When I checked where it came from, the culprit was clear: a privileged, pre-installed manufacturer store app that shipped with the operating system out of the box. Because manufacturer system packages often hold elevated installation privileges, it had silently pulled and installed software onto my device without asking.
That notification sparked an investigation. I connected the device and began digging into the packages, permissions, and system processes running under the hood. What I found was frustrating: layers of pre-loaded bloatware, background telemetry daemons, and services holding sensitive permissions that I neither wanted nor needed.
I wanted a clear, safe, and transparent way to see what was actually happening on my phone—without needing to root the device or run unsafe exploit tools. So I built Phone Checker.
The tool runs directly from your computer over standard ADB (Android Debug Bridge) via USB. It audits thirteen distinct permission groups, uncovers pre-installed bloatware, identifies apps running in the background, and gives you a clean overview of your device’s security posture. Crucially, every check is read-only by default, and no modification is ever made without explicit confirmation.
Why open source?
When deciding what to do with the project, two things were immediately clear:
First, this is not an isolated problem. Many Android users find themselves in similar situations—dealing with pre-installed bloat, opaque manufacturer permissions, and unwanted background activity on hardware they ostensibly own. Having a trustworthy, inspectable tool to audit that environment is something people genuinely need.
Second, I firmly believe that this should not be a paid app. You should never have to buy a subscription or pay a gatekeeper just to audit permissions and clean the clutter from your own personal hardware.
For those reasons, I decided to put the project out there for free.
You can read more about what the app does on the Phone Checker project page, or inspect the code, build it yourself, and contribute directly on GitHub.