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I'm trying to fake some information that are shown on the status bar (I'm doing this for a good reason, for example when a thief steels the phone, he doesn't deserve to know the status of anything: battery, WiFi, 3G, GPS, etc...)

I know that this is possible somehow without creating a ROM, see this app in the Android market: CSB Fake at 2:26 in the video, he fakes the battery level IN THE STATUS BAR!

I really need to know how is this done. There are only two ways I can think of

  1. at some desired time, change the icon in the system (using superuser permission)
  2. just send wrong information to the status bar, and it does the rest, for example, send to the status bar that the GPS is not working while in fact it is

Is it possible to do it without rooting? (that app seems to do it on no-rooted devices) How to do such a thing? is there any references or some sites that most likely has the answer?

Yi Jiang
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himura
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  • I think you probably are interested in looking at broadcast recievers. Maybe it is possible to catch the systems broadcast about the battery level and change it somehow, although this is just a guess ;) Not sure how the battery status works. Maybe this SO question could be a startoff point for you: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3661464/get-battery-level-before-broadcast-receiver-responds-for-intent-action-battery-c – DecodeGnome Feb 17 '12 at 08:55

2 Answers2

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That screen shown in app for battery you can make that...by making the app full screen mode and show your custom title bar like with wifi level battery level time icons and also pop up one custom dialog for battery low as same as android pops up.

MKJParekh
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  • hmmmmmmmm I see, so there's no way around it i guess,,, too bad – himura Feb 17 '12 at 09:15
  • @JoxTraex Yeh it's, but user asked in Question "I'm trying to fake some information that are shown on the status bar (I'm doing this for a good reason, for example when a thief steels the phone, he doesn't deserve to know the status of anything: battery, WiFi, 3G, GPS, etc...)" – MKJParekh Feb 17 '12 at 11:43
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This must be done at build time. The reason for this is because the base level of android has the statusbar code. YOU MUST recompile the ROM there is NO way around this. These are system level broadcasts that are broadcasted within the phone. You cannot control this, even with root its still impossible.

Once again, to do this properly you MUST have code that will allow you to recompile your source code of your phone. A custom rom would suit this.

JoxTraex
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  • But could this app do it? _https://market.android.com/details?id=it.android.mio.csbfake_ is it possible that this requires a custom ROM? – himura Feb 17 '12 at 09:13
  • Looking at the permissions shows that its not injecting events, its just mimicing them. – JoxTraex Feb 17 '12 at 09:16
  • hhhhh, sorry for arguing so much :), but please have a look at this: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1936742/replacing-the-battery-indicator-android, there's an answer that says that it is possible with only rooted phones. I think that it is wrong right? – himura Feb 17 '12 at 09:18
  • Even CommonWares said its not possible to do it. A rooted phone implies a custom rom. So it just further confirms my point. – JoxTraex Feb 17 '12 at 09:19
  • so we can't either trigger showing wrong information nor change the icons without a custom ROM – himura Feb 17 '12 at 09:22
  • ok is there a way to hide certain icons? the battery indicator for example? – himura Feb 17 '12 at 10:13