@Sticky_PRP 🇩🇪 — thanks for the practical tip. That route does work for removing the package after it has already installed something, and it’s worth knowing. The reason I’m still pushing on this though is that the issue isn’t really “how do I clean up after the fact” — it’s “why is the cleanup necessary in the first place on a device I paid for.” Appreciate the help regardless.
@eteled — your post is important, and I want to highlight it for anyone still reading this thread who thinks the original post was overblown or user error. You experienced the same thing on a CMF Phone 1: six apps installed without permission, including Temu, after an update. Crucially, you say the apps installed even after you unselected all of them, and that the interface used a “must have” section designed to look as if those apps could not be unselected. That is not a misunderstanding on the user’s end. That is a textbook dark pattern, and the fact that apps installed despite an explicit “no” tells us the consent flow is either broken or deliberately ignored.
For context to everyone else: I also wrote to Nothing customer support about this. The reply confirmed two things on the record:
App Services is the component responsible for these installations.
Nothing is “working on adding support to fully uninstall App Services in a future OTA update, similar to Meta Services.”
Companies do not commit to removal patches for problems that do not exist. So we can put the “are you sure this is Nothing’s fault” question to rest.
What support did not address — and what eteled’s post makes impossible to ignore — is the consent question. Their reply told me that if I was “uninterested” in the pop-up, I could “simply swipe left to dismiss it.” But eteled actively unselected the apps and still got six of them installed. I dismissed the pop-up with the system home gesture and got two installed. Neither of us consented. Both of us got apps anyway.
That means the official support explanation does not match the actual behavior of the system on at least two different devices. I’ve followed up with support asking for clarification on this specific discrepancy and will share what comes back.
The broader concern I raised in my follow-up email, which I think is worth surfacing here too: I noticed Temu and Candy Crush Saga because they are obviously out of character for me. I have no way of knowing whether other apps on my device were installed by App Services in ways I never noticed — apps that happen to align more closely with my actual interests would have gone completely under the radar. The scope of this issue is, by design, invisible to the affected user. That is a much more serious problem than two specific apps.
