In 2017 Google removed apps that violated the Google Play policies because they were malicious, purposely copied a more popular app or served up inappropriate content.

Google’s Android security team has turned a corner with 8.0 Oreo, reducing the attack surface, compartmentalizing components and beefing up protection against rogue apps.

Google’s top Android engineer describes how the attack surface is shrinking on the mobile operating system.

Android O, due in the third quarter, figures to elevate the security of the mobile OS with new features focused on improved third-party patching, a new permission model and hardening of existing features.