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So I have a parasite application installed on the phone that blocks the device from booting to bootloader and bunch of other stuff. It is also set as a device administartor thus it can't be uninstalled (deactivate administartor rights is also impossible). So to fix this problem I decompiled the APK of this app and changed the code so I can deactivate the admin rights. Unfortunately recompiled APK can not be installed over the existing application.

Adb error:

INSTALL_FAILED_UPDATE_INCOMPATIBLE

So is there a way to force install the app without uninstalling it? Or if my approach is wrong can you advice me on how to get rid of this annoying app.

Arnis Shaykh
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1 Answers1

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Unfortunately recompiled APK can not be installed over the existing application.

No, because you have no access to former key that was used to sign the installed the parasite APK package.

If your device is rooted then you can try to boot to recovery like TWRP and carefully mess with system partition removing/editing files to prevent this particular app from starting (should suffice to simply remove its folder).

it blocks the device from booting to bootloader

How it does so? Most devices offer certain key combination (i.e. hold volume up + power) to boot in other modes, so unless you got it on very low level you can try that way.

So to fix this problem I decompiled the APK

If possible, I'd first backup my data (if there's any you want to backup) and simply factory reset the device. May save you some time.

EDIT

Idk how exactly it blocks the bootloader but it does (holding power, home, volume down just restarts the device)

You can always try to reboot to recovery/bootloader using adb:

adb reboot [bootloader|recovery]
            - reboots the device, optionally into the bootloader or recovery program.
Marcin Orlowski
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  • Thank you for such a detailed answer. Unfortunately the device is not rooted and the only way to root it is to install custom recovery, and the only way to install that is via Odin (it is a Samsung device) and Odin works only in Download mode (bootloader) which is inaccessible. So it is a dead end. Idk how exactly it blocks the bootloader but it does (holding power, home, volume down just restarts the device). Factory reset also does not get rid of the app and it's permissions. – Arnis Shaykh Feb 09 '17 at 11:41
  • Rebooting to bootloader from adb just retstarts the device. Recovery does work but there is nothing usefull in there. – Arnis Shaykh Feb 09 '17 at 12:10
  • Then I suggest you go to xda-developers to dig your problem further as your question starts to drift to off-topic I am afraid. And they may have better suggestions how to deal with that too – Marcin Orlowski Feb 09 '17 at 12:36