The Founder of Epic Games had some bitter things to say about Google’s security flaws report on Fortnite Android. Tim Sweeney believes Google adopted a rather “cheap” approach to gain user trust by putting Epic Games at fault. Sweeney further said that the Fortnite Android security flaws reported would only facilitate the hackers instead of users.
The reason behind this conflict arising seems to be the decision made by Epic Games to launch the Fortnite Android version separately from the Google Play Store. Fans had been anxious about an Android port for the battle royale game. To speed up the process of providing to the needs of gamers, Epic Games exclude Google’s store from it. However, this also meant that Google won’t be getting the basic 30% from the sales of Fortnite Android port.
On the other hand, when an application is installed from outside the Play Store on Android devices, it requires the user to grant permission to the device to install APK files from unknown sources. Google decided to publish a report on this matter imminently, which highlighted the risks of software hijack through fake APKs by hackers.
Epic Games had asked Google to give them a time limit of 90 days to resolve this issue but as it turns out that didn’t happen. Sweeney opened up on Twitter:
We asked Google to hold the disclosure until the update was more widely installed. They refused, creating an unnecessary risk for Android users in order to score cheap PR points.
Some people on Twitter debated that Google couldn’t risk the safety or security of their users for that long:
Use the Google ecosystem, or expect them to publish the vulnerabilities to protect Android users.
Tim Sweeney responded to this tweet by saying:
The word punishment is very appropriate here, but how does rapidly disclosing the technical details of a security flaw to hackers do anything to protect Android users?
Sweeney further established that the security flaws report is not doing the users of Fortnite Android any good:
The word punishment is very appropriate here, but how does rapidly disclosing the technical details of a security flaw to hackers do anything to protect Android users?
One might say that Google just followed their routine protocol, which is meant for any other application developer. Nonetheless, this scenario differentiates to others in the sense that this time Epic Games decided not to obey Google’s typical principles.
On the whole, Sweeney Tweeted that Google failed to stick to their responsibilities and took the matter into their hands just to belittle the independent development of Fortnite Android port:
Android is an open platform. We released software for it. When Google identified a security flaw, we worked around the clock (literally) to fix it and release an update.
The only irresponsible thing here is Google’s rapid public release of technical details.
The APK file for the Fortnite Android was reported to have been leaked by Hackers earlier. Besides, you can check out the new 5.30 content update including the shockwave grenade if you’re looking forward to whats next in the game.
