For privacy-minded people, hardware switches are a nice thing. I remember when I had a Xiaomi Mi 9T with its popup camera, and it was interesting to see that some websites would trigger said popup camera. While the camera was never actually used, the thing would go up and down. This was even with an ad blocker installed.
I have a Mi 9 t pro. Never experienced anything like that.
While I do have hardened my settings, debloat with adb etc. privacy whise and use the EU MIUI rom.
Do you rememher said websites?
My friend had one, and Instagram would often pop it out and back in quickly. That was way back when though.
Man, it has been a while, as I don’t use the 9T as the daily phone now. I think I recall The Verge as one of the sites, because I wasn’t expecting it from them. It happened only a few times, and it wasn’t site-wide. Can’t remember which pages triggered it though.
No audio jack –> nope.
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Only mic and camera? It should also turn off GPS, accelerometer, etc. Filming the inside of my pocket isn’t the biggest tracking concern. People are just afraid someone’s watching them masturbate all the time.
Better off with a used pixel and grapheneos
Poorly yes. Even though
- no headphone jack
- super expensive
- damn huge
- no SD card slot
- no hardware switches
- repairable? Idk
- yeah no headphone jack is a bummer
- a used pixel is cheaper than than
- my pixel 5 seems pretty small, but idk what they are now or what that is so you’re probably right
- even bigger bummer than no headphone jack imo
- I don’t think those are that important, a piece of tape over the camera is fine imo
- you’re probably right there too, I wish fairphone could run grapheneos 😞
Fairphones have no secure element. The devs may be annoying, but what they dont do for a second is waste time.
Hmm, camera maybe but tape? Also microphone is not that easy. GPS, phone antennas and internet antennas are also way shadier
Fairphone uses the latest snapdragon. Unless qualcomm messed up, their processors do support and have supported secure element for a while. What you probably meant was a dedicated secure element chip. That’s present on tensor but not on most other smartphones.
Fairphone uses Qualcomm snapdragon chips but they don’t use chips made for mobile phones, it’s chips for industrial use they buy, so the secure element might be missing. The reason is: they are supported for way longer which allows fairphone such long update periods. The shortlist of other phonemakers who can do the same are the ones who design their own chips: Google, Samsung, Apple.
Qualcomm does list this chip for enterprise grade use and updates for multiple years to come on android. The block diagram has a box labelled security. If the chip was as insecure as people claim, it couldn’t be used for biometrics much, if at all.
Really interesting!
Here is the product page of the chip in Fairphone’s 5th phone:
https://www.qualcomm.com/products/internet-of-things/industrial/building-enterprise/qcm6490#Overview
I wasn’t meaning to fault the grapheneos devs, like you said it’s fairphones fault for not making it possible 😞
How is a security element wasting time?
Huh? GrapheneOS is not wasting time with features or supporting phones that are not secure to their standards (meaning basically impossible to hardware-crack, which is NOT everyones requirement)
I wish fairphone could run grapheneos
They get this request a lot, see this: https://github.com/GrapheneOS/os-issue-tracker/issues/1961
and this.
Yep, my point was shaking my fist at fairphone, not the grapheneos devs
Add very shitty on-screen-fingerprint reader to that list…
Yeah I really dont want to upgrade my pixel 5 for a 6 for many reasons but that is a big one
Pixels are some of the cheapest phones
Not in my experience? A new Pixel 8 costs like 800€, thats like 600€ more than I would consider appropriate for a phone. All these prices are made up
Pretty sure he meant cheapest used
A p7p used goes for around US$400 here
Pixel 8 has full support from google until 2030. Know of any current phones going for under 800 bucks with anywhere near that support lifetime?
Also, the pixel 7a is supported until 2026 and is $500. Both prices are quite reasonable for a computing device you’re going to carry around for at least the next three years.
In this case a Pixel 8 is the only real option poorly. How can a phone just last 3 years from now on? Thats crazy…
Like other phones, this most likely won’t have open source firmware.
What are you talking about? It’s using e/OS
Firmware, as in the drivers that control the hardware, like the radio, the Bluetooth, the NFC, the SIM decryptor, etc.
There’s no better kill switch than the ability to remove battery
Fairphone 5. Just got mine. Love it. I’m now waiting for the /e/ or, at least Lineage image to be released for it.
I went with the Galaxy XCover 6 Pro instead because it comes with a headphone jack. It also has a software switch to disable microphones, but I wouldn’t put too much faith on that.
I’d still prefer a Pixel running GrapheneOS with aggressively-restrictive permissions.
I’d also like the ability to use sandboxed Google services.
Interested in the built in VPN. Is that going to a monthly cost? If not, how are they funding it?
By stealing and selling your private data, the cycle continues!
Worked well the first time, why not try again :D
Yea that’s the first thing that came to mind when I read that headline
They can take my nunchucks and they can take my Adderall… But they’ll never take my
$27!!!
No 5G is a deal breaker for me.
You just get two COVID vaccinations instead, should kind of work the same
For anyone wondering how to get the same feature on your device (not only mic-camera)
- Go to developer settings (after
)
- Quick settings developer tiles
- (enable) sensors off
- Open your quick settings
- (for Samsung) you will find the tile in the 1st row 1st position
- (for aosp) you may need to add the sensors tile
- now turn this tile on
- now your camera, mic, gyroscope, etc… are off and apps will think that there’s an error with the camera or some privacy policy rule being applied
⚪ Note: this does not turn off GPS, Bluetooth, wifi, or mobile networks
Core system services will still override that setting, just something to keep in mind
To further expand at least for samsung:
- the mic will be re-enabled for regular phone calls
- the mic won’t be re-enabled for other calls, e.g. WhatsApp, Telegram, Whatsoever
- Go to developer settings (after
Does it have a hardware switch to prevent apps from taking screenshots? I hate so much that they can do it at any time without you ever knowing.
That’s a software problem
I was being snarky
Where can I get more information? Is the software open sourced? Has it been independently audited?
Its /e/OS, a softfork of LineageOS, mostly superficial. Only GrapheneOS is extremely secure, although to be fair really degoogled LineageOS will probably be very nice too
really degoogled LineageOS
Also called DivestOS
