Google's "Vulnerability Reward Program" has been incentivizing people to report security bugs to the tech giant for its Web services, apps, extensions, Chrome, and Chrome OS for some time now. Today the company announced that it's extending the cash-for-bugs program to its biggest operating system: Android.
The program doesn't cover any Android device, just new devices that Google is 100% responsible for: current, for sale, Nexus devices. For now, that means the Nexus 6 and Nexus 9. Google says that this "makes Nexus the first major line of mobile devices to offer an ongoing vulnerability rewards program."
Google will pay researchers not only for bug disclosures—it offers additional rewards tiers for test cases submitted with the bug, CTS tests that catch the bug, and AOSP patches that fix the bug. "CTS" is Android's "Compatibility Test Suite," the continually updated battery of tests all devices must pass in order to gain access to the Google Play Store. CTS tests ensure that a device and its software are Android-compatible and free of known vulnerabilities, ensure platform API correctness, and follow Google's mandatory (and minimal) UI practices for readability and consistency.
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