> owner (the person/company that bought the device)

At this point I'm willing to argue that the owner of a device is whoever is legally allowed to log in as root. When I pay for server colocation, I'm the owner - and not whoever runs the building - because I decide what runs on the box, and if they tamper with it they can go to jail.

With phones it's the same, except that you pay Google for the privilege for keeping their device safe, charged, connected to the Internet, and walking it around every day with you, so they can collect better data. The only thing they can't do is snatch it from your hands, but why would they - you're doing so much useful work for them.

And of course if you try to root it, you're breaking a digital lock, which is punishable by up to 10 years in prison and $1,000,000, so the colocation analogy holds there too.