Control which apps may access the Internet on your Android device
Apps are one of the cornerstores of smartphones. They extend the phones functionality, provide you with the means to customize it, or provide you with entertainment in the form of games.
Apps may request permissions during installation or upgrade, and one of those permissions is to access the Internet. It is likely that most Android users do not go through the list of permissions that an app requests before it gets installed, similar to how many Windows users do not pay attention to the setup steps of a program they install on their system.
Once you have installed an app, it may make use of those permissions as it sees fit. If you have allowed Internet access, it may connect to servers on the Internet, often without you knowing about it unless you run monitoring software on your system.
NoRoot Firewall is a specialized app for Android devices that puts you back in control. What makes the app special is the fact that it does not require root access for its functionality.
It uses an ingenious workaround for that, as it makes use VPN functionality to do so. Basically, all traffic flows through the app once you have allowed it to create the connection.
The app does not create a "real" VPN connection though, and no data is sent to servers on the Internet in the process.
Once done, you will be informed about connection attempts that applications make on your phone. It is up to you to allow or deny the connection. Note that all pending attempts are blocked automatically until you allow the connection to go through.
Notifications are displayed whenever a new app tries to establish a connection to an Internet server. You can open the pending access tab of the app to go through all apps that have tried to connect to the Internet, and either allow or deny them individually here.
The apps listing on the other hand displays all system and user-installed applications. Permissions to access the Internet using WiFi or a wireless connection are displayed here, with options to allow, block or remove the permissions right on this page. You can use it to monitor permissions that you have added, or whitelist or blacklist applications whenever the need arises.
Another interesting feature of NoRoot firewall is the global filters option. You can run filters before or after individual app filters apply. A filter provides you with options to allow or block connections to specific addresses and ports on the Internet.
A pre-filter would overrule any app specific filters or post-filters that you have created. This can be used to block access to specific servers for all apps, or whitelist servers instead.
NoRoot Firewall ships with an access log that is interesting as well. It logs all connection attempts of all apps, displays the server IP address and host name the connections are made to, highlights time and day, and informs you whether the connection was allowed or not.
You can configure the app to run on boot, so that it is always active on the Android device.
Verdict
If you want more control over apps and their Internet connections, but do not want to root your device, then you may find NoRoot Firewall more than useful for that task.
The app leaves little to be desired in terms of functionality. It needs to be noted that it does not work if you need to connect to VPN servers, as its own will block that from happening. It is also not supporting LTE right now.
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Thanks for the tip Martin.
It is for these kinds of posts that I follow GHacks.
What’s up with the generic comment, are you a bot?
2G?
Where on the planet is that still in use? I was forced to give up using my RAZRV3 years ago because 2G was phased out by AT&T.
Everywhere 3G has been turned off and you don’t have LTE coverage, and believe me there are many developed countries where this is the case and if it weren’t for 2G you wouldn’t even be able to make a phone call.
Maybe I missed it, but I don’t believe tha term “2G” is in the article. Perhaps you are referring to “AGM G2”??
@Martin
Your website has gone insane.
When I the post button I then saw my comment posted on a different article page. When I opened this article again, it is here.
@Tachy @Martin Brinkmann
” Your website has gone insane. ”
Same here. Has happened several times.
@Tachy,
@Martin P.,
For over two weeks now,
I’ve been seeing “Comments” posted by subscribers appearing in different, unrelated articles.
https://www.ghacks.net/windows-11-update-stuck-fixed-for-good/#comment-4572991
https://www.ghacks.net/windows-11-update-stuck-fixed-for-good/#comment-4572951
For the time being,
it would be better to specify the “article name and URL” at the beginning of the post.
@tachy a lot of non-phone devices with a sim in them rely on 2G, at least here in europe.
Usually things reporting usage or errors/alarms on something remote that does not get day to day inspection in person. They are out there in vast numbers doing important work. Reliable, good range. The low datarate is no problem at all in those cases.
3G is gone or on its last legs everywhere, but this stuff still has too much use to cancel.
Anyhow, interesting that they would put that in. I can see the point if you suspect a hostile 2G environment (amateur eavesdroppers with laptop, ranging up to professional grade MITM fake towers while “strangely” not getting the stronger crypto voip 4G because it is being jammed, and back down to something as old ‘stingray’ devices fallen into the wrong hands).
But does this also mean that they have handled and rolled out a fix for that nasty 4G ‘pwn by broadcast’ problem you reported earlier this year? I had 4G disabled due to that, on the off chance that some of the local criminals would buy some cheap chinese gear, download a working exploit and probe every phone in range all over town in the hope of getting into phones of the police.
>”While most may never be attacked in stingrays, it is still recommended to disable 2G cellular connections, especially since it does not have any downsides.”
The downside would be losing connectivity. I spend a lot of time way out in the countryside where there’s often no service or almost none. My network allows 2G, and I need it sometimes. I have an option on the phone to disable 2G, I may do that when I’m in the city and I have good 5G connectivity, but not out in the country.
I would imagine that the stingray exploits, like most of the bad things in this world, are probably things you will run into in the crowded big cities.
I stopped using it in a mobile (Wi-Fi line) environment, so I’m almost ignorant of the actual situation,
But the recent reality in Japan makes me realize that “the infrastructure of the web is nothing more than a papier-mâché fiction”.
https://www.ghacks.net/2023/08/17/google-chrome-to-enable-https-first-by-default-for-all-users/#comment-4572402
It is already beyond the scope of what an individual can do.
What we should be aware of is the reality that “governments and those in power want to control the world through the Web”, and efforts to counter (resist and prevent) such ambitions are necessary.
Why do you want people to disable the privacy features? Hmmmmm?
Now You: do you plan to keep the Ads privacy features enabled?
I’d like to tell you, but apparently if you make a post critical of Google, you get censored. * [Editor: removed, just try to bring your opinion across without attacking anyone]
@Martin
You website is still psychotic. Comments attach to random stories.
@Martin please do fix the comments, it’s completely insane commenting here! :[
@Martin
The comments are seriously messed up on gHacks now. These comments are mixed with the article at the below URL.
https://www.ghacks.net/2023/08/18/android-how-to-disable-2g-cellular-connections-to-improve-security/
And comments on other articles are from as far back as 2010.
What does this article has anything to do with all the comments on this article? LOL I think this Websuite is ran by ChatGPT. every article is messed up. Some older comments from 2015 shown up in recant articles, LOL
The picture captioned “Clearing the Android Auto’s cache might resolve the issue” is from Apple Carplay ;)
How about other things that matter:
Drop survival?
Screen toughness?
Degree of water and dust protection?