At the core of #AndroidDeveloperVerification are a couple potentially useful ideas. #Google has entirely wrapped them in a pile of anti-competitive garbage designed to defend their massive #monopoly profit margins, but nonetheless, those specific technical ideas might still be useful. #iOS's "notarization" is basically the same. That leads me to ask the key question:

What would a #FOSS-respecting system of #verification look like? What #identity info is useful for trusting the #developer?

Hi @eighthave,
being the same as last time and taking responsibility for the product.

So individual trust can build over time.

Translates to: install is visibly signed by the same dev-generated key.

@mro I agree, highlighting the role of the signing key seems key. An app signing key is in effect a pseudonym. The hard part is that there is that there is no concrete way for users to verify what the key management practices of the developer are. Judging that from the outside means looking for any signs that the signing key was misused. If a dev wants to hide misuse of their signing key, that is pretty easy to do. For example, they could sign malware and only ship that to targeted users