PlatformControl: Token Dispenser

This project is part of PlatformControl: https://github.com/TrackerControl/PlatformControl

Stores email-password pairs, gives out Google Play Store tokens and GSFid. This helps the download of Android apps at scale.

This repository ports the https://github.com/yeriomin/token-dispenser to Python. This is due to problems with using the existing API.

A random couple (login, password) from passwords/passwords.txt is used, to load balance over multiple accounts, mitigating account ban possibilities.

Usage

1. Set up passwords/passwords.txt.
2. Run python3 token_dispenser.py, creating a token dispenser at http://localhost:8080/.
3. If required, the address, port, locale, timezone, and used device can be changed directly in the Python code.

Troubleshooting

Often, the token generation will fail. In these cases, one has to manually visit (sometimes multiple times) the following website, after which the process can continue:

https://accounts.google.com/b/0/DisplayUnlockCaptcha

Citation

If you use this project as part of your academic studies, please kindly cite the below articles:

@article{kollnig2022_iphone_android,
      title={Are iPhones Really Better for Privacy? A Comparative Study of iOS and Android Apps}, 
      author={Konrad Kollnig and Anastasia Shuba and Reuben Binns and Max {Van Kleek} and Nigel Shadbolt},
      year={2022},
      journal={Proceedings on Privacy Enhancing Technologies}
}

@article{kollnig_before_2021,
      title = {Before and after {{GDPR}}: Tracking in Mobile Apps},
      shorttitle = {Before and after {{GDPR}}},
      author = {Kollnig, Konrad and Binns, Reuben and {Van Kleek}, Max and Lyngs, Ulrik and Zhao, Jun and Tinsman, Claudine and Shadbolt, Nigel},
      year = {2021},
      journaltitle = {Internet Policy Review},
      volume = {10},
      number = {4},
      issn = {2197-6775},
      doi = {10.14763/2021.4.1611}
}

@inproceedings {kollnig2021_consent,
      author = {Konrad Kollnig and Reuben Binns and Pierre Dewitte and Max Van Kleek and Ge Wang and Daniel Omeiza and Helena Webb and Nigel Shadbolt},
      title = {A Fait Accompli? An Empirical Study into the Absence of Consent to Third-Party Tracking in Android Apps},
      booktitle = {Seventeenth Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security ({SOUPS} 2021)},
      year = {2021},
      isbn = {978-1-939133-25-0},
      pages = {181--196},
      url = {https://www.usenix.org/conference/soups2021/presentation/kollnig},
      publisher = {{USENIX} Association},
      month = aug,
}