Skip to Main Content

aSpotCat Shows All Your Android Apps' Permissions, Services That Cost You Money


Android: aSpotCat is a free app manager that lists apps by the permissions they require, such as making phone calls or accessing your Google accounts. Knowing your apps permissions can help you better safeguard your privacy and security and prevent unauthorized charges.

The app is very straightforward to use. In the "List apps by permission" section, you'll see groupings by permissions category, such as: Hardware controls, network communications, phone calls, and—one of the most useful ones—services that cost you money. That category includes apps that can make calls, send SMS messages, and automatically start at boot.

You can bookmark apps and permissions categories that interest you the most, so that in the future when you want to review permissions again or if you've downloaded new apps, you can just jump to your bookmarked apps or permissions.

Click on an app name to get full details on all of the permissions allowed for that app, with protection level indicators "Dangerous" (for things like full Internet access) or "Normal" (for things like view network state).

aSpotCat serves a similar purpose as previously mentioned PermissionDog, except it doesn't do the real-time app scanning or rate apps for danger level. Aside from canine or feline personal preference, which should you use? aSpotCat's bookmarking feature is very handy if you only care about a few specific permissions categories and apps to monitor, and its permissions grouping is easier to use (PermissionDog also is a little glitchy with the back button). If you want to see all your apps' permissions levels at once, PermissionDog will do that for you and also monitor them in real-time. Cat or dog, the choice is yours.

aSpotCat | Android Market via How-To Geek