KNOX removal on rooted device. - Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

So I recently rooted my device, but forgot to remove KNOX's data beforehand. Now, KNOX warranty-void status has been activated, and I can't figure out how to remove KNOX itself. Uninstalling the app from the system itself just removes the launcher...
...but not the 9.6 gb of useless, unrecoverable data.
If anybody could point out a way to remove this useless data that is eating more than half of my phone's memory, that would be much much appreciated.
EDIT: My phone is a Samsung s5 g900w8

Are you really rooted? Your question seems irreal.. you uninstall knox as any other sys app.
Sent from my SM-N910F using Tapatalk

I am sure I am rooted. I can run superuser commands, and superSU returns that it is definitely rooted. I suppose that I could try again...
EDIT: uninstalled again, KNOX size went up 300 mb (...?)
Confusing, but uninstalling does not remove the 9.9 gb of data...

Late reply on my effort
So after following hundreds of online tutorials of how to remove My Knox data, none of them worked. My theory is that this is because of the way My Knox works. My Knox is treated as a seperate user, so simply uninstalling it would not work as it would require Knox to be unlocked, which would never be able to happen due to the Knox Warranty Void.
I ended up just backing all of my data up, and doing a factory reset, then just rerooting it. Was much quicker than attempting to find information about a lost cause; especially when nobody seems to actively want to help.

Related

Question about unrooting

I want to remove a couple of system apps from the stock P7500 ROM (Samsung HUB and HUB widget) as they are constantly causing force closes.
I will root the device and remove the apps via Titanium Backup, but what is the best way to then unroot the device? Flashing the stock rom is not an option, as it would just replace the apps.
Would removing the superuser .apk and SU binary remove root?
I think it will work, but I also want confirmation. I have deleted su first and then superuser.apk, rebooted and the root was gone. But I don't know what happens if I factory reset it. Will the device be rooted again? Kind of stupid question, I know, but I'd like confirmation
Sent from the 10.1th galaxy...
I'm going to give it a go tonight when I get home from work.
Factory reset after removing the files shouldn't be a problem - If you have removed the root the apps won't come back after resetting.
So did removing the files definitely remove root?
un rooting current ROM
I actually had the same question for our Devs. I was wondering if it would be possible to create a update script to unroot any SGT ROM after you get it to just the way you like it.
I already have the update script to root any ROM from CWM so I'm guessing all I would need is one script that does to opposite. The primary reason being that there are a number of apps that do not work if your tab is rooted. So to get around this I wouldnt mind unrooting and then rooting again when I need to.
Ill take a look at this some more but I thought I would get some info on this before I started wasting time on it.

Back up to an temp root Amaze 4G

Hi... My question is kinda tricky, first thing is I never really like permanent roots for various reasons, and that is why I go for Temp... You see if I mess up a phone I would have to worry too much I guess, anyway, my Amaze 4G will be replaced soon by a new Amaze 4G so... If I temp root, do a full bar k up to my ad card with titanium lite app, and I temp root the new Amaze and do a back up restore... Will I get all my apps, text messages, saved games, laucher, folder, apps configurations and pretty much will turn my new phone exactly the same way the old one was?... With a temp root? Is this possible? And if I reset the phone and the root is gone so will be my entire back up data on the new phone? Cannot even think on how horrible will be installing all that....
ReverseSorrow said:
Hi... My question is kinda tricky, first thing is I never really like permanent roots for various reasons, and that is why I go for Temp... You see if I mess up a phone I would have to worry too much I guess, anyway, my Amaze 4G will be replaced soon by a new Amaze 4G so... If I temp root, do a full bar k up to my ad card with titanium lite app, and I temp root the new Amaze and do a back up restore... Will I get all my apps, text messages, saved games, laucher, folder, apps configurations and pretty much will turn my new phone exactly the same way the old one was?... With a temp root? Is this possible? And if I reset the phone and the root is gone so will be my entire back up data on the new phone? Cannot even think on how horrible will be installing all that....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes - No - No - No.
You can backup certain things such as sms, call log, contacts, etc with MyBackup. You must have root to have Titanium. I can't recall clearly if temp root is sufficient. If you have a locked bootloader ANY changes made to the /system (that is anything different than the stock rom and bloatware) will be reverted/restored by a reboot. This is currently unavoidable. And you can not backup the root files on your root device and restore them to an unrooted phone. This is because they would need to be restored to /system/app and /system/bin directories. Anything with /system would need an unlocked bootloader for the changes to stick. Without an unlocked bootloader the only changes that you can make is in /cache and /data partitions of your device. Anything else will be like it never happened after a reboot.
ReverseSorrow said:
Hi... My question is kinda tricky, first thing is I never really like permanent roots for various reasons, and that is why I go for Temp... You see if I mess up a phone I would have to worry too much I guess, anyway, my Amaze 4G will be replaced soon by a new Amaze 4G so... If I temp root, do a full bar k up to my ad card with titanium lite app, and I temp root the new Amaze and do a back up restore... Will I get all my apps, text messages, saved games, laucher, folder, apps configurations and pretty much will turn my new phone exactly the same way the old one was?... With a temp root? Is this possible? And if I reset the phone and the root is gone so will be my entire back up data on the new phone? Cannot even think on how horrible will be installing all that....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can use Titanium Backup with temp-root. I restored all my data using it.
I suggest you not to mess up with system settings, though. It's tricky because restoring system apps won't stick after you loose temp-root (after reboot or after system hicup whichever comes first). But many system settings are backed up and restored with system apps/lib files. Or you can try it and find out if it works. Let us know the result.
A word of caution. Temp-root is really temp-root. I lost temp-root often even before rebooting causing bunch of errors and headaches. So I had to restore apps/data in small chunks to be safe.
I don't know why you're so much against rooting, but if that's because you bricked your phone before, you may want to go with MyBackup as Binary says. Even with Temp-rooting, you'd need to know what you're doing.
Thank you so much guys, I will back everything up, get my new phone, temp root it and restore the back up from the first Amaze 4G... God I hope it goes well...... And yeah, I bricked a PSP back then, I cry for a week, I just don't want to go thru that ever again lol
ReverseSorrow said:
Thank you so much guys, I will back everything up, get my new phone, temp root it and restore the back up from the first Amaze 4G... God I hope it goes well...... And yeah, I bricked a PSP back then, I cry for a week, I just don't want to go thru that ever again lol
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I really don't think that we can brick this phone. The best way to brick an HTC device is to flash a bad bootloader and radio combo or to tamper with the bootloader itself. Since we need S-OFF to flash a radio then that makes this phone pretty safe to root and currently we don't have a method to obtain S-OFF at this time. Another way to brick your phone is to flash a custom kernel that has permanent undesired effects like I experienced last year. So in conclusion, if you just want to have a custom rom installed, remove bloat, etc then you're better off going full root.

Is it possible? App requires all traces of root removed for Business Reasons

I know people have asked how to remove all traces of root, and people say what they've done is enough. Well for me I work in the financial servies industry where everything is highly regulated. There is an app called GOOD for enterprise that I have to have for my email and calendar sync.
Well it automatically disables and locks itself if it detects root. So I did all that should be required to unroot, and it still doesn't work. Tech says it will detect any root file or app on the phone.
I have deleted my adblocker, Titanium backup, superuser, wifi tether, and the z4root apk's I had still on my sd card. Can anyone think of anything else besides a complete reset
What sucks is that every time it locks it has to be uninstalled, reinstalled, and I have to call tech to get a new pin. which is a hassle
ChaosbyWind said:
I know people have asked how to remove all traces of root, and people say what they've done is enough. Well for me I work in the financial servies industry where everything is highly regulated. There is an app called GOOD for enterprise that I have to have for my email and calendar sync.
Well it automatically disables and locks itself if it detects root. So I did all that should be required to unroot, and it still doesn't work. Tech says it will detect any root file or app on the phone.
I have deleted my adblocker, Titanium backup, superuser, wifi tether, and the z4root apk's I had still on my sd card. Can anyone think of anything else besides a complete reset
What sucks is that every time it locks it has to be uninstalled, reinstalled, and I have to call tech to get a new pin. which is a hassle
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your best bet is just too reset to stock and be done with the hassle.
Agreed. I think wiping data/factory reset and flash SBF would save you a lot of the trouble. Or...use another phone for work...shouldn't they pay for that anyway?
You will have to do an SBF, just doing a "factory reset" through the phone won't be enough.
I am surprised an app can check for root and check for any files that are related to rooting in the first place.
Well, it worked for about 4-5 days (right after I posted this) and then I opened it and it locked itself again. I hadn't downloaded or installed anything and I had used it earlier in the day.
I used RSD Lite and the files here to unroot.
http)//www(.)holylivingfuck(.)com/ACS/SBFs/ (Can't post links)
I'm pretty sure i flashed the sbf because I had to do a bunch of OTA updates when I was done. This time when I called tech support I got a guy that knew nothing about rooting (last time I had a guy who had a rooted phone himself) and he said I can't unroot it myself, it is something that has to be done at the sprint store.
I can't imagine what else I have left to do, or what it picked up that it didn't over the course of 5 days
ChaosbyWind said:
Well, it worked for about 4-5 days (right after I posted this) and then I opened it and it locked itself again. I hadn't downloaded or installed anything and I had used it earlier in the day.
I used RSD Lite and the files here to unroot.
http)//www(.)holylivingfuck(.)com/ACS/SBFs/ (Can't post links)
I'm pretty sure i flashed the sbf because I had to do a bunch of OTA updates when I was done. This time when I called tech support I got a guy that knew nothing about rooting (last time I had a guy who had a rooted phone himself) and he said I can't unroot it myself, it is something that has to be done at the sprint store.
I can't imagine what else I have left to do, or what it picked up that it didn't over the course of 5 days
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You need a full stock and factory reset. Basicly new like you just got the phone out of the box. Not even turned on.
ZeroManArmy said:
You need a full stock and factory reset. Basicly new like you just got the phone out of the box. Not even turned on.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I took it to the sprint store to try to fenagle them to replace it and they ended up going into the dialer and doing ##786 (or some number like that) and then put in some sort of verification number. Essentially it fully reset the phone without losing any data or apps or settings.
Immediately following that the app worked, but I'm not sure for how long. Is there any way to do that full stock and factory reset without losing everything?
I used the RSDlite for restore my phone and it kept all my data and apps.
put all of the stuff you need on your external sd card, remove it, wipe/restore to factory settings and flash stock sbf and you should be unrooted with all your apps and data safely stored on your sd card

what apps are safe to get rid of?

ok, so i just rooted and unlocked my phone, and i am gonna start removing some bloatware from the phone, but am concerned because i don't want to delete an app that i think is bloatware, but it is tied into another appp and then both apps won't work.
for example, if i delete viewdini, i don't know if that will affect how i watch videos on the phone.
so what i am asking is basically if there is a list of all the stock samsung/amazon/google/verizon bloatware apps that i can safely delete?
thanks!
just downloaded the file from the cleanrom build of what scott removed... is it safe to say if i remove these i will be ok?
The pro version of titanium backup is ideal for this. You can freeze apps before you remove them to find out if they're important or not. I don't know of an official cheat sheet of what's safe to remove but if you look at ROMs and what the devs have removed, that's a good start to let you know what you can do without.
Sent from my SCH-I545 using xda premium
If you delete an application you will NOT get Verizon phone updates. It's better to freeze the applications with Titanium Backup.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2298150
this thread contains a list of apps safe that are supposed to be safe to remove. remove them at your own risk.
Excellent, thank you all for the help! I deleted the obvious bloatware last night, I will delve into the others at a later time.
a.demarco said:
Excellent, thank you all for the help! I deleted the obvious bloatware last night, I will delve into the others at a later time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Deleted or froze? If you deleted you better habe a backup or you wont get Verizon updates.
Sent from my Rooted Verizon Samsung Galaxy S4 using xda premium
steveperrry said:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2298150
this thread contains a list of apps safe that are supposed to be safe to remove. remove them at your own risk.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've just rooted my device for the first time, I'm using Titanium Pro to freeze stuff on this list (I figured freezing would be safest being a noob)...but more than half of them dont even appear in Titanium, and none of the files show .apk on them. Is there another method being used to see these files?
What is the advantage to freezing them vs. disabling them in the regular system manager?
Parafly said:
What is the advantage to freezing them vs. disabling them in the regular system manager?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Some applications can't be disabled in the system. So you have to freeze them instead. Freezing allows you to unfreeze them if Verizon releases a software update. If you delete them however you will never get a software update.
DarkMenace said:
Some applications can't be disabled in the system. So you have to freeze them instead. Freezing allows you to unfreeze them if Verizon releases a software update. If you delete them however you will never get a software update.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The only reason for a sotware uodate is if you plan on staying stock. Mind you verizon will more than likely patch root access and the loki method of bypassing the bootloader in future updates. In my experience rom devs usually stay on top of adding all must have features that would be included in ota updates without loosing root and recovery.
bhp090808 said:
The only reason for a sotware uodate is if you plan on staying stock. Mind you verizon will more than likely patch root access and the loki method of bypassing the bootloader in future updates. In my experience rom devs usually stay on top of adding all must have features that would be included in ota updates without loosing root and recovery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
True but someone will always find a new method. Voodo OTA rootkeeper might even work to restore it.
Sent from my Rooted Verizon Samsung Galaxy S4 using xda premium

Removing drivers from phone

So I've needed some windows app that will help me manage my contacts and I've came across TunesGO
I've installed it on my pc and for syncing with my s3 it needed developer options turned on and then it asked to install drivers onto my mobile and I've granted it
So now I've dealt with my contacts and I don't need TunesGO any more but I'm very skeptic about their installed stuff on my phone so I would like to remove that stuff but I don't know what has been installed, nor do I know how to uninstall it. any idea how can I do it?
If you want to make sure the phone is cleared of all files, flash a stock ROM using Odin and perform a factory wipe before booting the newly-flash stock ROM for the first time.
audit13 said:
If you want to make sure the phone is cleared of all files, flash a stock ROM using Odin and perform a factory wipe before booting the newly-flash stock ROM for the first time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Although 100% acurate, I do not dispute this advice at all and it will definitely solve the problem, the issue of trust would lie with the pc app.
To OP
When android uninstalls an app it should automatically remove any files associated along with the said app. Any redundant files will be completely useless and inaccessible to anyone. When that happens you usually get issues with googleplay not being able to install apps. If you dont have this issue then no need to worry.
The pc app however, I'd be checking that with ccleaner for remnants as that is a lot easier to have your security compensated.
If you are worried about numbers being held on a "cloud" then you should never install an app that does that in the first place as you have effectively given your privacy away when you accepted the terms upon installation.
Beamed in by telepathy.

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