An incoming update to Play Services has some big security implications. Currently, Google verifies apps at a few different points, but there is no “always on” feature. With the update, Google will continue to verify your apps continually, in the background. Take that, malware.
You likely won’t notice the update, either. Coming by way of Google Play Services, the update will probably just happen in the background without your having done anything. Once implemented, you probably won’t even know it’s there — unless you have an app acting nefariously.
With Google’s current method, an app is scanned when it goes live on the Play Store, and later when it’s updated. They compare it to known malicious code, and act accordingly if it’s found to house malware. The issue there is that an app Developer may be ahead of the curve, and sneak some code in ahead of Google’s knowledge of said code.
By running in the background, Google app verification ends the chess match. Once Google knows, Play Services knows, and the app is scanned and checked all the time. The entire scheme still depends on Google knowing about the code, but it’s still a big leap forward for mobile security.
Source: Computer World
I hope it’s something that can be disabled. Not too keen on having something like that constantly running and eating up memory/processing power.
“Constantly running” is probably a misnomer. Much more likely is that it runs periodically. I doubt it’ll have much impact on battery life.
It probably scans new apps/updates like before, then rescans everything whenever Google updates the malware database.
When I see my Google Play services start trending at the top of battery stats, I know there is an update coming. in a week or two. Check it out yourself.
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