You might have heard or read about 'Android Rooting' or 'Android Root'. There are many misconceptions about android rooting. Some say it is like 'Jailbreaking' in Apple iOS, some says it is difficult and only testers and developers should try these thing.
I'm here to clear there misconceptions and to tell you what android rooting is and what it is for.
What is android rooting?
Rooting is the process that allows an Android OS user to attain 'privileged access' or 'root access' on their android devices. Android OS is 'Linux' based operating system and rooting gives similar access to administrative permissions as on Linux and such operating systems.
We can root our Android devices to overcome system limitations set by device manufacturers, alter or replace system applications, run apps which requires root permissions, modify current firmware(rom), and install a new custom firmware or latest Android versions.
Rooting and jailbreaking
Rooting is often compared to jailbreaking Apple devices running iOS. These are quite different concepts. Jailbreaking is performed with a 'locked bootloader' to bypass several Apple prohibitions, to install external apps and modify system while rooting is performed with an 'unlocked bootloader' to get privileged access to install apps and modify system.
What changes rooting does on your system?
Though there are different methods of rooting for different devices, but usually they exploit firmware's one or more security bugs to skip the 'digital signature check' for
updates. Then a modified firmware update can be installed which usually have utilities to run root apps. Such as the 'su binary' can be copied to the path /system/xbin and granted executable permissions by 'chmod' command. Now a third party root governing app like SuperSu or SuperUser can give root permissions to apps and keep their log
data
How to root my Android?
Most of the popular mobile manufacturers like 'Asus', 'Sony', 'HTC' and 'Google' explicitly provide the methods of unlocking bootloader. There are a lot of easy, fast and automated methods of rooting popular Android phones or devices on the internet.
