Termux access to /data/data

[SpeedyCraftah]

I was wondering how Termux is able to access all directories under /data/data when using root, when other apps (root apps) can only see "com.google.android.gms" and the app directory itself, so how does Termux circumvent this restriction? I'm looking to be able to access data in /data/data of other apps under root in my personal app, I also checked and see some other root file explorers have this restriction as well, so surely Termux can't be special and must be using some work around to bypass this sandboxing? I would assume this is related to SELinux.

Thanks!

[Biswa96]

I was wondering how Termux is able to access all directories under /data/data when using root

Are you running termux as root? Wouldn't it be obvious that any program can access those directories with root permission?

[SpeedyCraftah]

I am, I am also running my app as root, even confirmed with a whoami. I was surprised as well that I can't see all of the data directories when running my app as root, but Termux can do it no problem, so I'm not sure what's going on here.

This also applies to some root file Explorer apps I saw, so this must be some new permission change in the Android system for newer versions.

[agnostic-apollo]

That's because of app data isolation that's engaged if an app uses targetSdkVersion >= 30 (Android 11) in which /data/data/* of other apps do not exist in the mount namespace of the app, and only its own and specific whitelisted packages like gms. Termux app uses 28 currently so it's not isolated. You can disable it for all apps by running su -c "setprop persist.zygote.app_data_isolation false" and rebooting, at the cost of privacy. Or in other apps, run su shell with the -mm/--mount-master flag.

https://cs.android.com/android/platform/superproject/+/android-14.0.0_r1:frameworks/base/services/core/java/com/android/server/am/ProcessList.java;l=2305

https://cs.android.com/android/platform/superproject/+/android-14.0.0_r1:frameworks/base/core/jni/com_android_internal_os_Zygote.cpp;l=1186

[SpeedyCraftah]

Thank you very much!

[agnostic-apollo]

Welcome.