New Android 15 Privacy Feature Could Protect You from Screen Recording Scams

Google released Android 15 Beta 1 stable this month followed by a minor update and things have been pretty stable so far. If you’ve been following closely, you may know that Android 15 has received many privacy-related features. However, recent additions to Android’s code suggest that Android 15 could soon use ways to protect your sensitive information when screen recording. Here’s how.

Since Android 13, Google has put a lot of effort into strengthening privacy when using Android’s built-in screen recorder. For example, Android 14 lets you record a particular app and not the entire screen.

However, there could still be things in an app the user could end up recording, which could pose a threat to their privacy.

That’s where Android 15’s new screen recording privacy options come in. Android expert Mishaal Rahman enabled a new option in Developer Options called Disable screen share protections. The feature’s description says “Turn off system protections for sensitive app content for upcoming screen share sessions”.

He says the toggle is tied to an internal feature known as “sensitive content protection,” which is disabled in the latest Android 15 Beta. We don’t know how apps could use this feature, but it’s possible that the feature may blur certain parts of the screen during recording or screen-sharing.

Blocking Notifications from appearing would’ve been enough. But Google, for some reason, wants to hide the sensitive content if notifications appear during screen recording. The process of hiding sensitive information could be handled by an external app like Android System Intelligence, he says.

What are your thoughts on the privacy changes to screen recording on Android 15? Are you content with the privacy changes and improvements Google has made to Android in recent years? Let us know in the comments below.