Isn’t Motorola the new msnufacturer for those GraphineOS phones? And now they do THIS???
Kinda makes them feel less trustworthy to install a security based rom on.
Motorola is Lenovo, they are chinese. Of course they would try shenanigans like these to see if it sticks. Like I saw in my G23 with the Live Screen Locks shit, even we disabled it it would still change the screen lock wallpaper to a live one, had to remove the package from the user with adb.
the fact that they are chinese isn’t relevant here, since such fraudulent practices have been seen on Brave Browser too, for example.
Wao, what a narrow-minded way to look at it. Lenovo is Chinese, yeah, and only the largest laptop manufacturer in the world. The one manufacturer that has been historically Linux friendly. Are their CPUs Chinese developed? No, they are US made (Intel and AMD), which is arguably as bad, maybe even worse.
Lenovo used to bundle Israeli-made spyware with Windows for some of their laptops. Not exactly a trustworthy company tbh. Not necessarily politically aligned with the CCP on every decision but they’re not above spying on their customers clearly.
Yup, it was a very justified shitshow. That’s why, if I buy a Lenovo laptop (or any other mainstream brand from that matter) its with the intention of nuking Windows entirely (which I believe to be malware) and installing my choice of Linux distros. This is no different than my choice of Pixel phones (until the Motorola + GOS deal goes live) to install GrapheneOS immediately.
As for mainstream laptop manufacrurers spying on their customers or allowing others to do so from first boot, name one of them that doesn’t do this.
Tldr? How?
…
An app update on Motorola phones has started hijacking the Amazon app for the sake of injecting an affiliate code. To do that, tapping the app icon opens the user’s browser and immediately redirects to the Amazon app. It’s a “blink and you missed it” moment. This only happens when the user opens the Amazon app from the app drawer – not the homescreen pages.
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We verified on a Razr (2026) running an older Smart Feed v2.03.0056 that this does not happen. Our Razr Fold, with app version 2.03.0070, has started showing this behavior, so it’s the latest update that’s to blame for hijacking the user’s intent. We couldn’t replicate this on a Moto G Stylus (2026) running the same app version, though. Sideloading the app, for reasons unclear, doesn’t seem to trigger this behavior, as manually installing the updated version on the aforementioned Razr (2026) didn’t show the same behavior.
In further digging, we noticed that the URL the phone opens up is “kira-abboud.com,” a website that references fashion influencer “@kirasfashionfinds.” Notably, this exact URL isn’t listed anywhere on Abboud’s social media, and the affiliate codes don’t match up either. The redirect coming from Motorola phones is using Amazona affiliate code “sramz-kff-008-20” which is completely different from any of the codes we saw from links shared by Abboud’s accounts and linked websites.
Stock ROMs are removed immediately when obtaining a new phone
Good thing I don’t use Amazon.
They won’t get away with that sort of sh*t when they’re selling with GrapheneOS on them- assuming that deal continues to make progress.
The only mobile OS worth using at this point is Graphene if you ask me.Not sure what happened, possibly some mim, i dont think Motorola would risk reputational damage for a merely few $ through such low level highjack.
I dont think it any ill will here by Motorola.
I knew it was Joever when my phone came with something named “MotoAI”
You were the chosen one!
Did they just not see the backlash and class actions filed against PayPal/Honey, CapitalOne, etc. for this same affiliate code swapping scheme and just decided they’d do it anyway? Surely they had to have seen that, or did they think it was a good idea done blatantly and are trying to be sneakier about it?
Any chances to block that at DNS level with something like a pi hole or NextDNS ?
I don’t think it even needs to get that complicated.
Until they issue a patch you can just open the Amazon app from the home screen. It only does the affiliate nonsense when you launch it from the app list.
Also, you can disable the Smart Feed app. That apparently fixes it too.
Sure, the domain is listed in the article. Most blocklists include affiliate and tracking passthrough domains already.
No
