I am fully aware of what vpn services to use and not. I am not using Express VPN, I am simply doing research for a master thesis, when I came across these results from Express VPN. If you have any ideas or corrections, please let me know why a VPN provider would need to have access to these permissions.
Screenshot is from Exodus service, which let’s you view what exactly perimissions and trackers each app uses. You can check out the results and the tool for yourself here: https://reports.exodus-privacy.eu.org/en/reports/com.expressvpn.vpn/latest/
What kind of VPN would need those permissions?
The one that Edward Snowden (yes, that one) publicly and explicitly called out that people shouldn’t use. I won’t rehash it here, but it’s worth reading about.
https://www.techradar.com/news/edward-snowden-warns-expressvpn-users-to-ditch-the-service-immediately