Rooting your Device: Android users have been rooting their devices to gain full system access to their devices and to run certain types of apps which require a root access. The ‘root user‘ is basically like the ‘Administrator‘ user in windows who has access to the entire system. He has full permission to do whatever he wants. On a rooted android device, you can perform many advanced tricks. The famous Titanium App for backup can be used only on a rooted device.
A rooted device enables you to not only disable but completely remove the bloatware (unwanted built-in apps) from your device. Rooting gives you low-level hardware access as well as full file system access. It enables you to manage permissions for apps. And more importantly, the thing for which it is most famous for, is that it allows you to block ads. Now that seems a good idea.
But generally speaking, rooting is not everybody’s cup of tea. Do it only when you are a tech person and know how things work on your phone’s operating system.
More Harm than Good (Rooting):
Unless you are a person with technical know-how, rooting could do your device more harm than good. And I would sincerely advise you against it. Basically, on an android device, each app has access only to its own data. It cannot access the data of another app. But when you root a device and run an application as root, the app then has access to the entire system. It can even access the data of other apps.
Now if your device gets affected by a malware, it can do much more damage making use of the root access. An app with root access can run things in the background without you getting a clue of it. It can extract certain confidential information from other apps such as your account information and it can even delete your critically important system files. It’s like you are breaking out of the security model of your android device, so it could, therefore, have serious consequences.
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Other than the malware, you could yourself, mistakenly, delete some critical system files or some critical apps. This could cause your device to function improperly. However, you could possibly avoid being attacked by a malware on your rooted device if you download only trusted and authentic apps.
Phone’s Warranty in Hot Waters:
In fact, in some cases, rooting your Android device could even void your phone’s warranty. Most of the manufacturers claim that even in the warranty agreement. So if you want to get your phone repaired, you should definitely consider unrooting it first before sending it for repair.
Think again:
So if you are thinking of rooting your device, my advice to you is to think again. In fact, now Google has introduced so many features to Android that initially required a root. They too are trying to eliminate the reasons for rooting.
For instance, earlier you needed a rooted device to take a screenshot. But not anymore. Similarly, previously you had no option to disable or freeze the unwanted pre-installed apps on your device. But now you can easily disable such bloatware by tapping on the ‘Disable app‘ button in the ‘Settings‘ menu. This way you can easily disable the default apps.
Moreover, now you can also restrict certain apps on your phone from using cellular data. Previously this was possible only in rooted devices. But now you go to the ‘Data Usage‘ under the ‘Settings‘ menu, select a specific app and then tick its checkbox to prevent that particular app from using mobile data. Now that app will only use data on WiFi networks but won’t use cellular data.
All these features introduced by Google give you a good enough reason not to root your Android device anymore.
