How to Access the /Android/data & /Android/obb Folders on the Phone without Root Access?

We can undo the security restrictions Google has implemented by uninstalling the updates to our built-in Files app.

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Video Description
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If you've had trouble accessing the /Android/data and /Android/obb directories on your Samsung Galaxy smartphone or tablet, I have a way to fix this issue.

#android #googlepixel #samsunggalaxy #androidemulation #androidemulator

So Google has been trying to block access to these two folders for a couple of years now. When this restriction was first implemented as Scoped Storage, just about every popular file manager app found an easy workaround that allowed them to continue accessing those directories.

But there have been some more strict updates going out and a lot of people are now unable to access these folders with their favorite File Manager app of choice. So today I'll be showing you a quick and easy method of regaining read and write access to those folders and all of the folders within it.

To start, we need to open up the Settings application.
Next, we're going to scroll down a bit until we see the Apps menu.
Then we're going to begin scrolling through this list until you find the Files app.
It should even have the same app icon as you see here.

This is a built-in file manager app that most OEMs replace with their own, but it's this application that Google is using to block access to the /Android/data folder and the /Android/obb folder.

And since it was an application update that added this restriction, we can tap the 3-dot menu icon up here in the top right corner.
So that we can then select the Uninstall Updates option.

This will remove all of the updates that have been installed for this application. Including the restrictions to the data and obb directories.

And once these updates have been uninstalled, you can use the file manager app of your choice.
And as long as that app has implemented the initial workaround for Scoped Storage, then it should work just like it used to.

We can test this out by opening up my file manager app of choice, Solid Explorer, and then trying to access the /Android/data folder for an application like Obtainium, a popular emulator, or whatever app you're trying to add files to.

Now I understand that some people are not going to want a system application like the Files app to be outdated.
Sometimes these app updates include security patches for some pretty critical exploits.

And while we cannot open the Play Store app to install the latest update, we can manually sideload it.

So what I recommend doing is visiting this page over on APK Mirror and downloading the latest copy of the app from there.
It's packaged up as an app bundle, so you will also need to have the APK Mirror Installer

But as you can see here, we can manually update the Files app so it has the latest changes implemented.

Even though you've updated the app, your File Manager app of choice should continue to have access to the directory you gave it access to.

But if you ever run into that issue again, a quick uninstall of those updates again will allow the workaround to grant you access to the /Android/data and /Android/obb folders again.

These steps I showed you here today may work on devices from other OEMs. I haven't been able to test this with a phone running MIUI just yet but I suspect it will work exactly the same.

One issue I have run into when testing this with other phones is that it will not work with my Google Pixel 8. This may be due to the built-in Files app always having the updated version so even though I'm trying to uninstall the updates, it's still keeping a version of the app on the phone that has the patches included.

Mentioned Links
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Files APK Download - https://www.apkmirror.com/apk/google-...


Step by Step Tutorial
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1. Intro [00:00]
2.


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