question: private static SSLSocketFactory trustAllHosts ( HttpsURLConnection connection ) { SSLSocketFactory oldFactory = connection . getSSLSocketFactory ( ) ; try { SSLContext sc = SSLContext . getInstance ( "TLS" ) ; sc . init ( null , trustAllCerts , new java . security . SecureRandom ( ) ) ; SSLSocketFactory newFactory = sc . getSocketFactory ( ) ; connection . setSSLSocketFactory ( newFactory ) ; } catch ( Exception e ) { Log . e ( LOG_TAG , e . getMessage ( ) , e ) ; } return oldFactory ; }
target:  This function will install a trust manager that will blindly trust all SSL certificates.  The reason this code is being added is to enable developers to do development using self signed SSL certificates on their web server. The standard HttpsURLConnection class will throw an exception on self signed certificates if this code is not run.