In xPrivacy, I can see that the Play Store asks for getNfcAdapter
.
What does it need it for?
The Play Store app has two main features regarding NFC, both of which require the NFC permission.
It registers intent filters such that when you scan an NFC tag with a market://
link or a link to play.google.com
, you get the Play Store app instead of a browser, the same way you would when you click such a link. This doesn't require calling the getNfcAdapter
function, but it does use the same permission.
It uses Android Beam. If you look at an app's page in the Play Store app, then bring another Android device to NFC range, you can send that app link to the other device.
[...]If it finds an AAR, it starts the application based on the package name inside the AAR. If the application is not present on the device, Google Play is launched to download the application. from:http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/connectivity/nfc/nfc.html#aar
So for example, Stores and companys can use a NFC tag to make it easy to install their APPS when you put your mobile on it and so on..
-The second and more likely possibility is that the Google Play Store checks if you can download compatible NFC Apps. The same way as it checks your Android Version.
Here is a dev sight on it:https://stackoverflow.com/questions/20063853/disable-nfc-compatibility-check-in-android-manifest