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Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

reuters.com

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Re: Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

#411

Post by sudosysgen »

Scoundreller wrote: post #408
sudosysgen wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can if a competitor complains. I don't know of any devices at all that get rejected on Canadian ISPs. Blocking Xiaomis would cause a lot of issues.

Just seemed strange that the radio-frequency regulator would demand that 3rd-party selling platforms stop transactions but not also demand ISPs to de-auth them too. Just suggests that the restrict them are BS or maybe spyware/intelligence related.

If I remember correctly the regulation is against these devices being sold in Canada if they're not authorized, not about them being used in Canada. It would be really unpopular with the ISPs anyways and our regulators are completely captured here in Canada so I don't see them doing it even if they had to.

But yeah the law in Canada about IC regulation touches upon sale, not use. Manufacturers, distributers and importers are held responsible, not users or carriers.

Re: Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

#412

Post by mda »

Dah00n wrote: post #399
mda wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

backdoored by FBI : Which phone is that?

Any phone turned on and used inside the US. Of course the FBI might have to do some paperwork to get the data from the NSA, but not really.

So you claim that NSA has access to all phone data without any paperwork nowadays?

Re: Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

#413

Post by rsync »

ohazi wrote: post #410
Dah00n wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>However, there are some phones (including several iPhone generations) where the entire baseband/sim subsystem is isolated from the primary application processor and operating system Yes, that's what the developer says. Totally unverifiable though unless it is both open source and you built and installed the firmware yourself.. and still there could be hidden firmware running. This is no different than Intel saying w…

I agree with this perspective as well. Assume your carrier is capable of doing anything on your phone until a thorough hardware and software audit has been performed on the device in question (this kind of audit has been performed on several popular phones), but even then, continue to be careful/skeptical. It's also a good idea to at least consider the possibility that the baseband application processor link may be s…

All points well taken but I would suggest there is one way to have high assurance in this regard ... and that is to buy a non-phone device and add a cellular USB dongle to it, after the fact.

Pretty unwieldy but given the economics of secretly throwing in a full-blown baseband processor with a SIM card that can function I think you can have high assurance that your carrier is fairly well segregated from your device ...

In fact, there used to be a particular Samsung galaxy "pad" or something that was identical to a phones form factor ... but wifi only. EDIT: Samsung galaxy "player" IIRC ?

As long as we're talking about it, I will mention one oft-overlooked downside to running a phone via external modem: in addition to cellular network functions your baseband processor is also responsible for a lot of real-time voice quality corrections and echo cancelling and related functions that are not handled by the application processor. You might, therefore, have voice quality issues with such a setup ...

Re: Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

#414

Post by greyhair »

paul7986 wrote: post #352
PontifexMinimus wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> why does the world continue to be stupid on China and pump up their economy by having the majority of their goods manufactured there? Because big companies make lots of profits from it, I imagine. > Its going to continue to bite us and everyone in the butt. Yes, unless we change our ways.

And yet im being downvoted for being negative on China?

Because you actually use the letters C h i n and a in your post and his replies do not.

Re: Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

#415

Post by PontifexMinimus »

fmajid wrote: post #396
paul7986 wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or manufacturer any product from there...why does the world continue to be stupid on China and pump up their economy by having the majority of their goods manufactured there? Its going to continue to bite us and everyone in the butt.

Because the supply chain for electronics manufacturing, and many other classes of products, is hard to replicate. Large multinational corporations would love to shift production to Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia or India, where labor is now cheaper than China, but there are logistics obstacles. Apple now manufactures some phones in India, but mostly older models.

> Because the supply chain for electronics manufacturing, and many other classes of products, is hard to replicate.

Software is eating the world, as Marc Andreessen says. So who controls the software -- including by controlling the hardware the software runs on -- controls the world.

This means that every polity that wants to be truly independent needs to control its computing infrastructure, ideally all the layers of the technology stack from chips to social media. So it would be well worth polities such as the USA or EU putting up whatever level of import tariffs (and other measures) it takes to encourage manufacturers to do these things domestically.

Not that doing so would be that much more expensive anyway. The cost of low-level assembly line labour per iPhone is probably only a few dollars. I'd guess that building them in the USA would only add $10-20 to the cost.

Re: Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

#416

Post by ohazi »

rsync wrote: post #413
ohazi wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with this perspective as well. Assume your carrier is capable of doing anything on your phone until a thorough hardware and software audit has been performed on the device in question (this kind of audit has been performed on several popular phones), but even then, continue to be careful/skeptical. It's also a good idea to at least consider the possibility that the baseband application processor link may be s…

All points well taken but I would suggest there is one way to have high assurance in this regard ... and that is to buy a non-phone device and add a cellular USB dongle to it, after the fact. Pretty unwieldy but given the economics of secretly throwing in a full-blown baseband processor with a SIM card that can function I think you can have high assurance that your carrier is fairly well segregated from your device .…

> In fact, there used to be a particular Samsung galaxy "pad" or something that was identical to a phones form factor ... but wifi only. EDIT: Samsung galaxy "player" IIRC ?

Yup, and on the Apple side there's the iPod Touch (which is apparently still available!?)

Re: Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

#417

Post by rsync »

ohazi wrote: post #416
rsync wrote: post #413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All points well taken but I would suggest there is one way to have high assurance in this regard ... and that is to buy a non-phone device and add a cellular USB dongle to it, after the fact. Pretty unwieldy but given the economics of secretly throwing in a full-blown baseband processor with a SIM card that can function I think you can have high assurance that your carrier is fairly well segregated from your device .…

> In fact, there used to be a particular Samsung galaxy "pad" or something that was identical to a phones form factor ... but wifi only. EDIT: Samsung galaxy "player" IIRC ? Yup, and on the Apple side there's the iPod Touch (which is apparently still available!?)

"Yup, and on the Apple side there's the iPod Touch (which is apparently still available!?)"

Well, right ... but presumably there is no way to add an external USB modem to that ...

Re: Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

#418

Post by mekster »

2Gkashmiri wrote: post #376
mekster wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may appear fine but your friend may be logged.

so what is the chinese government going to do to an indian who sent the text to someone ? force xiaomi to do something sinister to them?

Maybe keep getting scored until it reaches a certain threshold and gets marked for closer inspection of who the person is?

Re: Lithuania says throw away Chinese phones due to censorship concerns

#419

Post by ohazi »

rsync wrote: post #417
ohazi wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In fact, there used to be a particular Samsung galaxy "pad" or something that was identical to a phones form factor ... but wifi only. EDIT: Samsung galaxy "player" IIRC ? Yup, and on the Apple side there's the iPod Touch (which is apparently still available!?)

"Yup, and on the Apple side there's the iPod Touch (which is apparently still available!?)" Well, right ... but presumably there is no way to add an external USB modem to that ...

Oh, you meant a literal modem-with-a-USB-port... okay, yeah.

An alternative might be to use one of those standalone cellular-to-wifi hotspots, connect the iPod touch to it via wifi, and then use a VoIP app. That way you can keep the hotspot in a backpack, perhaps with a big power bank / battery, rather than dealing with the unwieldy physical dongle.

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