If you wanna help me

Download

Get the APK from the Releases page — it is not in the file list above.

Instructions

1. Uninstall the app from the Play Store.
2. Download the APK from the Releases page.
3. Install it.

Enjoy!

If Google tries to replace the APK with the updated SafetyCore app, it will fail due to a signature mismatch.

Troubleshooting

Nearly every issue opened on this repo is the same one, in one of two shapes:

• App not installed as package conflicts with an existing package — installing by tapping the APK
• INSTALL_FAILED_UPDATE_INCOMPATIBLE: Existing package com.google.android.safetycore signatures do not match newer version — installing via adb

Both mean the real SafetyCore is still registered on your device. Android refuses to replace a package with one signed by a different key (AOSP: "a previously installed package of the same name has a different signature than the new package").

Step 1 — run the triage

adb shell "pm list packages -u | grep safetycore"
adb uninstall com.google.android.safetycore

Do not add --user 0. By default adb uninstall removes the package for every user on the device, which is what you want — --user 0 only touches the primary profile and is the reason many people get stuck.

Step 2 — read what it answered

Success → SafetyCore was an ordinary updatable app and is now really gone. Install the placeholder:

adb install -r -d Safetycore-placeholder.apk

Failure [not installed for 0], while step 1 still lists the package → SafetyCore is preinstalled in your system partition. Android never actually deletes a system package: it marks it installed=false for the user and keeps the package record and its original signature in the package database (AOSP DeletePackageHelper). Any differently signed APK is rejected from then on. There is no non-root workaround — please do not open an issue for this.

Vendor notes

Changed your mind?

To bring the real SafetyCore back:

adb uninstall com.google.android.safetycore
adb shell cmd package install-existing com.google.android.safetycore

VirusTotal flags the APK

Some engines report Android.Riskware.Repack.*. This is a false positive: the APK contains no code at all — just a manifest, see app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml. Heuristics fire because it declares a Google package name while being signed with a different key, which is precisely the point of a placeholder. Build it yourself if you prefer.

Screenshots

Changelog :

• v1: Initial release

• v2: Increased the version number to 2000000000, causing the Play Store update to become unavailable.

• v3: Removed unnecessary code and reduced the size from 5.4 MB to 35,4 kB. (This release is signed, you need to uninstall the previuos one)

• v2000000000: Fix for Obtainium users.