With the release of Android 13, some users have found that Google’s new clipboard security and privacy protection is not compatible with apps that allow users to share device clipboard data. Android with their desktop computers.
Android 13 introduced clipboard protection that alerts users when an app accesses the clipboard, and automatically clears the clipboard after about an hour. This protection is intended to prevent apps from poking around in recently copied data. Apple rolled out a similar clipboard control in iOS 14.
Although Android 13’s feature aims to prevent unwanted access to the clipboard, Android Police found that Android users cannot automatically share a clipboard with another desktop or browser at the same time. help of Android applications such as Join and Tasker, created by developer João Dias.
In contrast, for iPhones and Macs users, Apple offers Universal Clipboard, which allows users to share clipboard data between iOS and macOS devices, as long as they are signed in with the same Apple ID.
Google does not intend to change this option
In Android 12 advanced users could use developer tools to achieve something similar to Universal Clipboard, but Android 13 does not allow this.
As Android Police explains, Join relied on background access to device logs to enable automatic, passive synchronization of clipboard data between devices. With Android 13, the user has to copy the text and then share it manually with the Join app, which eliminates the convenience of the service.
In Android 13, after copying text, the operating system displays a small square at the bottom of the screen containing the copied text, which can also be edited, along with a share icon.
Google confirmed in its Android issue tracker that it won’t change Android 13’s clipboard behavior, explaining that “disallowing background access is working as expected.”
Logcat
João Dias discussed the issues that Android 13’s clipboard controls were having on Join and Tasker in a Reddit post. In previous versions of Android, Tasker was able to access “Logcat”, a central location in Android where the operating system and apps put their logs.
“But now Google has decided that whenever an app needs access to the logcat, a system popup will appear asking for ‘one-time’ access permission like this:
But Google advised against any automation relying on Logcat.
“We would discourage any type of automation testing relying on logcat. Trying to communicate with Logcat without developer/user interaction is not an intended use case,” Google states in the issue’s follow-up.
Source: ZDNet.com