Google did eventually fix the permission granting system on Android but for a long time you had to more or less agree to everything before you could use a typical app.
Naturally Facebook and others took full advantage of Android’s permissiveness to vacuum up all the information they could from people’s phones. I was quite vocal about this garbage policy at the time and I am happy that Google belatedly followed Apple’s lead in user security.
The delay however was a disaster for users of the Facebook app. Google like other evil corps has too often taken the side of intrusion and surveillance instead of defending the rights of Android and web users.
John Hardy Developer 
Both Apple and Google allow apps to “phone home” (e.g. to data.flurry.com) and thus to “vacuum” a nice bunch of data too. That’s no excuse for Facebook’s actions, but neither Apple nor Google are in the best position to point fingers at other data-dealers.
And let’s not start to talk about google-analytics.com, googleapis.com, google fonts, etc. ;-0
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Convention over configuration?
I remember that the application permissions list was quite long which is why I didn’t want it and certainly told others that I knew to be using it what they were granting.
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I’m not sure how they ‘fixed’ anything. From where I sit, permissions are still demanded in absurdly broad and entirely confusing ways without explanation or closely-described reciprocal commitment. What user security is really possible in such a regime? The system has always been, and remains entirely and in every respect nothing more than a legal fig-leaf protecting Apple, Google, and app purveyors. It’s an insult to users’ intelligence.
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“The most important part of apps and services that help you make connections is to make it easy to find the people you want to connect with,” says a Facebook spokesperson.
But if they’re in my Contacts, I’ve already connected with them. And it’s easy to find them. They’re in my Contacts.
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These services are wrong from the get-go. “The most important part of apps and services that help you make connections is to explain to you very carefully that the ability to make connections cannot be conferred by a piece of software, but is dependent on consent and human relationship-building based on judgments about the value of potential interactions, ostensible social capital and other cues. Remember: Fools’ Names and Fools’ Faces are Often Seen in Public Places, and nobody likes a self-promoter or a button-holer. Go read a god damn BOOK!”
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