One of the biggest security holes in most operating systems (including desktop operating systems) is the access on the clipboard data. That means that every time you copy something and that something is going to the clipboard, all applications in the background have the ability to read it. If an app has a malicious purpose, it could possibly read and transmit your copied data to some server, imagine if you copy sensitive things like usernames and passwords, private keys, names and telephones. Most of us copy things from various applications without even thinking it much.
Android 10 brought a new security feature which prevents every background app from having access to the clipboard. This means that only the application that’s in the foreground can access it. Although that’s awesome, it ruined a whole category of applications, clipboard managers. Clipboard managers stay in the background and hold inside their database everything that you’re copying. That’s also very important cause sometimes you copy critical or useful stuff for using them later but it’s not possible anymore.
Hopefully there’s a way to bring back access to the clipboard and even better, for just the apps that you want. All other apps will still be unable to access it. To do this we need root access and magisk manager which i suppose you already have if you’re rooted if not, download it from their official site. Keep in mind that messing with critical files can always put your phone into a boot loop, don’t try it if you haven’t backed up your important files somewhere safe.
In this example, i’m using the Clip Stack application from F-Droid store. If you are using another clipboard manager, proceed to the next step.
INSTALLING CLIPBOARD WHITELIST
Open up Magisk Manager and go to the plugins section.
Search for Riru plugin and install it. There are many riru results, you need the one that just says Riru and nothing else.
After installing it, reboot. Now open up Magisk Manager again and search for the clipboard whitelist plugin.
Install it.
Reboot.
After rebooting you’re going to see a success message in the notification bar. Click on it to open up the Clipboard Whitelist application.
Choose the applications that you want them to have access to your clipboard from the background. In this example we just choose the Clip Stack application. Also notice the package name of the app (com.catchingnow.tinyclipboardmanager)
Now open up any text editor or whatever, and copy some data. I wrote a simple message and copy it. Let’s see if Clip Stack was able to catch it.
Success!!!
MANUALLY ADDING APPS TO THE WHITELIST FILE
This isn’t very useful to know anymore since Clipboard Whitelist plugin installs its own app to manage the apps that have access to the clipboard but a few months back this wasn’t the case, you had to add them manually to the whitelist file after installing the plugin. You have to know the package name of the app (remember Clip Stack package name just a few pics before? com.catchingnow.tinyclipboardmanager). To find the package name install for any “app info” app from the app store, i’ve used Application Info for this article.
Search for the application that you want to whitelist, you’ll find the package name under the app name.
Open up a file manager with root capabilities (I’m using Total Commander) and navigate to the File system root folder and accept the Superuser request.
Navigate to /data/misc/clipboard and you’ll find the whitelist.list there.
Edit the file and add the package name that you want to whitelist and save it (The diskette icon in Total Commander).
In case you get this message, accept it. Reboot your device and you should be fine.
WHITELIST THROUGH COMMAND LINE
In case you’re old school you can also edit the file through command line. Download Termux or any other terminal application and type su to give root access.
Navigate to the whitelist.list file folder by typing:
cd /data/misc/clipboard and press the Enter symbol.
Now insert the package name inside the file by typing (i’ve used package.name and not the actual package name):
echo “package.name” >> whitelist.list and press the Enter symbol.
Open up the whitelist.list file and the new entry should be there. Don’t forget to reboot.
That’s it!!
