Wednesday, January 18, 2017

OnePlus: OxygenOS 4.0 Doesn’t Use a Debug Kernel

Some people have felt that OnePlus rushed out their official Nougat OTA update for the OnePlus 3 and OnePlus 3T just to meet the deadline they set for their customers. Recently, there was a vulnerability that was discovered which let you to change SELinux to permissive mode with a simple Fastboot command. Then someone found a kernel debug notice inside their kmsg log when they were trying to submit a bug report for the company’s new OxygenOS 4.0.1 update.


This has led to even more speculation about whether or not OnePlus rushed out the update just to meet their deadline. We’ve been in contact with OnePlus about the SELinux issue, and they informed us that it would be fixed in their next OTA update — it’s also worth noting that this vulnerability wasn’t related to the Nougat update, but the timing didn’t help public perception. That was almost one week ago and in fact OnePlus did announce a 4.0.2 update for the OnePlus 3T yesterday. We haven’t been able to confirm whether or not this vulnerability was patched just yet, since the 4.0.2 update could have already been finalized before they made that announcement.


Seeing this debug kernel notice isn’t a reassuring thing to see in your logs as these can sometimes be susceptible to attacks. However, OnePlus has confirmed with Android Central that this message is just an error and that it isn’t anything we should be worried about. The company has said the kernel used in OxygenOS is a “proper release kernel to match the consumer-ready software running on the phone.” OnePlus says this message was triggered by Systrace tools and that OnePlus is not using a debug kernel in their official releases.


Just like with the SELinux issue, we’re told by OnePlus that this will be resolved in a future OTA update. This debug kernel message will be removed from the code entirely so there isn’t any additional confusion caused in the future.


Source: Android Central

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