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Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

arstechnica.com

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Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#211

Post by kccqzy »

dist-epoch wrote: post #53
Bender wrote: post #16

Not bad. If I could make a feature request it would be something like, After 3 days of being idle: - [ ] Reboot - [ ] Power Off - [X] WIPE triple opt-in Maybe there is a custom phone OS for this that makes the phone act more ephemeral and network boot off my self hosted iPXE/immich server? A dumb smart phone so to speak. An ephemeral diskless phone.

The WIPE is doable with a custom "management app", which has the permission to wipe the phone. Maybe such a thing already exists.

A long long time ago, adding Gmail to your phone via the Exchange protocol over m.google.com gives Google the ability to wipe your phone remotely, including iPhones as well. No management profile needed.

Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#212

Post by kccqzy »

627467 wrote: post #20

I'm surprised this is something taken seriously only now by stock android. Isn't it known universally that AFU devices are insecure? What's the point of adding strict password policies, biometrics etc, if data from a stolen phone can be (relatively) trivially be exfiltrated unencrypted? Samsung's have had some feature that lets you set days of the week for the phone to restart (IME during early morning hours) automat…

Because they protect against different actors. A stolen phone? The thief likely just wants to strip your phone down to parts and sell the parts if there is a passcode. If there isn't anything, perhaps the thief would wipe it and sell it whole as a second hand device.

Only law enforcement cares about the difference between the AFU state and BFU state.

Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#213

Post by Spooky23 »

sneak wrote: post #177
ololobus wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can only second this. I have an old iPhone with a second sim-card, because I need it from time to time. And Apple introduced this auto-reboot a bit earlier, iirc last year. The problem is that after rebooting it also disconnects from wifi, so e.g. SMS/handoff synchronization stops working until you enter a passcode. This is very annoying because it was very convenient for me to receive calls/SMS to my main iPhone.…

Apple doesn’t like supporting the use case of multiple phones for one person. They even encourage their employees to use their personal devices and accounts.

That is very reasonable advice for the vast majority of people.

I have to have 3 devices: mine, work and a shared one for travel that crosses customs boundaries. It’s a massive pain in the ass.

Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#214

Post by Spooky23 »

SXX wrote: post #188
saagarjha wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Keep an app running?

Might be I did something wrong, but even with YouTube video running via iPhone Mirroring device still went to reboot.

It seems weird. I can’t get iOS to reliably auto update and reboot overnight when I want it to.

Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#215

Post by Spooky23 »

layer8 wrote: post #160
elashri wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But this still weaken your defense against apple or whomever you are trying to defend against.

Why not have the option, though?

Why not disable advanced data protection, as such an option would make the device vulnerable to simple data compromises.

Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#216

Post by Spooky23 »

epolanski wrote: post #151
greatgib wrote: post #34

It's good to have an option like that, even being a default, but there definitively need a switch to disable that if it is your own will. It's not even necessarily that good enough against cops, because in a lot of shitty countries, even some pretending to be democratics, not disclosing or at least inputting your password might be a crime severely punished. If I'm not wrong, there was a guy that had to stay years in…

Stories about airport security and officers demanding access your phone is one of the reasons I will never come to the US. An (Italian) friend of mine was stuck in Newark for 8 hours after he refused access to his phone, dragged in some room and questioned for hours along his wife while split from him own kids, even though he later gave them the password (he initially said no because he thought it was out of the line…

The Italians do the same thing. If your name matches some name or you’ve travelled to some naughty place, you’ll get picked for this sort of thing.

That said, the last time I went to Italy the customs guy looked annoyed at being awake. He asked my son’s age (he is huge but too young to use the electronic gate), then shrugged and stamped my passport with all of his strength.

Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#217

Post by matheusmoreira »

epolanski wrote: post #151
greatgib wrote: post #34

It's good to have an option like that, even being a default, but there definitively need a switch to disable that if it is your own will. It's not even necessarily that good enough against cops, because in a lot of shitty countries, even some pretending to be democratics, not disclosing or at least inputting your password might be a crime severely punished. If I'm not wrong, there was a guy that had to stay years in…

Stories about airport security and officers demanding access your phone is one of the reasons I will never come to the US. An (Italian) friend of mine was stuck in Newark for 8 hours after he refused access to his phone, dragged in some room and questioned for hours along his wife while split from him own kids, even though he later gave them the password (he initially said no because he thought it was out of the line…

Buy a travel phone specifically meant to be opened by them.

Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#218

Post by pabs3 »

mh- wrote: post #162
TylerE wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate overnight updates because a dialed one means I have no alarm and will be hours late for work. And yes, this has actually happened to me at least twice.

I haven't had that happen on iOS, but I have woken up in the night needing my flashlight just to find my phone applying a lengthy update. I have it set to download automatically and install manually now, I believe.

You don't need a flashlight, the phone screen is more than bright enough late at night.

Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#219

Post by pabs3 »

booleandilemma wrote: post #15

I just want software that will do nothing user-observable without me explicitly asking it to. No pop-ups, no suggestions, no automatic anything. I don't know if it'll take a fancy buzzword or what. Unobtrusive software? Silent Software?

Respectful software.

Re: Android phones will soon reboot themselves after sitting unused for three days

#220

Post by throawayonthe »

surajrmal wrote: post #152
udev4096 wrote: post #7

They stole the idea from GrapheneOS and shipped a barely half-baked version with hardcoded time. GrapheneOS has configurable time for it since years

As the article alludes to, Apple recently shipped the same policy to iOS so this is likely just following the precedent from them. Android developers don't pay attention to community forks.

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