Android 5.0 is a tragedy: automatic encryption makes the system super slow

On November 24, in response to the endless requests for users' personal data by US intelligence agencies and users' criticism of "privacy leaks", Google and Apple officially announced the launch of automatic encryption in mobile devices a few months ago, which means that Google and Apple themselves cannot obtain user data, and future government requests will be worthless.

However, this policy, which is apparently beneficial to users, has unexpected negative effects. Compared with the iOS system, Android has always been known for its slow performance, and industry insiders have found that in Android 5.0, which is automatically encrypted by default, the system responds even slower, with the data reading speed of the mobile phone storage media dropping by up to 80%.

In terms of automatic encryption of user data, Google has followed the lead of Apple. According to reports, Google's Android system used to have the function of encrypting user data (setting a password), but it was an "optional option". Starting from Android 5.0, the phone will be automatically set to encrypt when it leaves the factory.

In this way, even if the user's personal data, including emails, text messages, and address books, is requested by government agencies or stolen by hackers, it will not be cracked due to the encryption. The FBI and other agencies expressed strong dissatisfaction with the actions of Apple and Google.

The latest well-known device equipped with Android 5.0 system is the Nexus 6 smartphone manufactured by Motorola Mobility under the commission of Google . According to the recent report of technology news website AnandTech, the performance indicators of Nexus 6 have dropped significantly, and the culprit is the default automatic encryption.

All user data is automatically encrypted, which means that two operations, encryption and decryption, will be added when saving and reading data. Professional tests have found that in the Nexus 6 phone using the Android 5.0 system, the "random read speed" of reading the phone memory has dropped by 62.9%, and the "random save speed" has dropped by 50.5%.

What is even more surprising is that in terms of "sequential read speed", the drop was as high as 80.7%.

It should be pointed out that the biggest impact of automatic encryption is the read and write operation speed of the mobile phone storage medium, and it will not affect the performance of the application processor in the mobile phone (for example, the Qualcomm Snapdragon 805 processor is used in the Nexus 6 mobile phone).

However, just like in personal computers, if the hard drive read and write speed drops, it will lead to an overall drop in CPU and system processing speed. In smartphones, a drop in storage media read and write speed will also cause the overall speed of smartphones and tablets to drop.

Analysts said that the impact of encryption on data reading and writing speeds was expected, but the specific amount of the speed drop was still surprising. So far, there have been no reports of automatic encryption having a negative impact on the overall performance of Android phones.

If the performance of the newly purchased Android 5.0 phone or tablet is poor, it is likely related to the automatic encryption adopted by Google. However, it should be pointed out that if the mobile device is upgraded to the Android 5.0 system in the past, automatic encryption will still not be used.

Media analysis pointed out that automatically starting encryption in Android 5.0 may be Google's response to outside concerns that "Android is not as secure as iOS."

Some comments pointed out that although it is understandable to automatically encrypt Android user data from the perspective of protecting user privacy, the current solution has brought about an "unacceptable" decline in mobile device performance. Therefore, Google should either reconsider whether to continue automatic encryption or make technical improvements to reduce the negative impact on mobile phone performance.

Apple has already enabled automatic encryption in its latest iOS 8 operating system. Users can use their personal passwords to lock various private information. Apple said that from now on, Apple will never be able to bypass users' passwords and obtain personal data. In the future, even if the US government asks Apple for user data, Apple can only say "I'm sorry, we can't do anything about it."

However, so far, there have been no reports or reports indicating that enabling automatic encryption will have a performance impact on Apple iOS 8 hardware devices.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.