com.google.android.carrier Copy

Recorded as "Carrier Settings", this is a Google-signed, privileged telephony component rather than an app a user opens: every observation in our sample has no launcher entry. In our sample it is seen on Google Pixel devices and on motorola, NUU and isafemobile handsets, signed by one of two Google keys, and no observation is Play eligible. The job it does sits in Android's carrier configuration system. AOSP describes carrier configuration as a set of key-value pairs that change telephony behaviour, resolved by querying the carrier app first, then the platform config app bundled with the system image, then values hardcoded in the framework, with the first value found taking precedence. Those settings cover things like roaming behaviour, visual voicemail, SMS and MMS parameters and VoLTE and IMS options. The permissions our sample records for this package are consistent with fetching and applying that sort of configuration: it holds WRITE_APN_SETTINGS, MODIFY_PHONE_STATE, READ_PRIVILEGED_PHONE_STATE, CHANGE_COMPONENT_ENABLED_STATE, INTERNET and DOWNLOAD_WITHOUT_NOTIFICATION, plus its own com.google.android.carrier.permission.WRITE_VENDOR_CONFIG. Be aware of the limit of that evidence. Google does not publish documentation for this particular package, so the exact mechanism, what it downloads and when it applies it, could not be sourced, and the paragraph above describes the framework it plainly participates in rather than a documented description of this app. Treat the specifics as unconfirmed. Version note: our sample records version names from 37.0.491815192 to 61.0.881556095 across API levels 31 to 37, so it is revised often and independently of the Android release it sits on. No change of role at a particular Android version could be sourced, and given the documentation gap that is an absence of evidence rather than confirmation that nothing changed. For Android Enterprise, EMM and kiosk use it has no part in enrolment or policy, and administrators will only meet it in an app inventory. It is not on Google's list of critical system apps for company-owned devices, so an admin console may let you block it. Weigh that against what its privileged telephony permissions imply: a component able to write APN settings and modify phone state is one where interference could plausibly affect carrier configuration and so calling, messaging or data behaviour. That consequence is inferred from the permissions rather than documented, and what actually happens when it is disabled was not tested here. There is no benefit in disabling it and a plausible cost, so treat it with caution and test on a single device before doing it across a fleet.

• Carrier configuration - Android Open Source Project →
• CarrierConfigManager - Android Developers →
• Manage system apps on company-owned mobile devices - Google Workspace Admin Help →
• Package provenance for com.google.android.carrier - Android System App Database →

• Signed by Google's own signing key (the same key Google uses across devices), so it is a Google-provided preinstall that updates independently of the system image, though 2 different Google signing keys appear across the fleet. This certificate spans 3 device makes - the hallmark of a globally distributed Google key.
• Its largest observed manifest declares 17 permissions: 2 runtime (user-granted), 5 signature or system-level, 4 install-time and 6 vendor or uncatalogued.
• Never reported as user-facing, so it runs as a background or system component rather than an app the user opens.