101–110 of 313 posts
I feel the title editorializes a bit too much. The thread only confirms the bug, not a specific cause yet. As sibling comments indicate, the effect on GrapheneOS users is undetermined.
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GrapheneOS is focused on privacy but that must come from a secure baseline. GrapheneOS is much more privacy focussd than any other mobile operating system. Accrescent is the end goal for a secure and private app store but it's still in alpha. GrapheneOS is also the best for degoogling (eliminating all google services) because it comes with zero Google services unlike all the other ones listed here: https://eylenburg.…
Note that nobody (new) can submit to it today; the developer console HTTP 503s and is only available to an allow-list of developers.
GrapheneOS actually recommends against using Aurora and instead just using the Play Store, so this shouldn't really hurt users. For extra privacy, you can sign into the Play Store with a Google Account that isn't tied to anything else.
It seems wise to have at least one alternative mobile phone app store. Even if it isn't very good. If the government can tell Google to do trivial things like, for example, change the name of bodies (plural now) of water, it can turn off your app updates, trapping you on insecure versions indefinitely. This probably matters more if you live outside of the US, but if I had a plan B for an app store on my phone, I woul…
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I actually think there's already a lot of us in the 'community' as-is. I personally describe it as 'Valuing Privacy/Freedom over Security'. One pretty clear example of this is how they don't recommend using FireFox Mobile and F-Droid, both of which I use regardless because I'm not willing to put up with worse privacy/usability tradeoffs in the name of (imo 'hyper-')security. I think it's fine the mission of the proje…
FYI, there are ungoogled chromium builds for Android. Firefox Mobile really is a lackluster browser unfortunately both from a usability and security standpoint (e.g. IonStack worked on Fennec)
I maintain my grandmothers phone, which comes down mostly to just updating WhatsApp once in a while. Obviously she doesn't have a google account, so I've installed her AuroraStore. It's a shame that there is no official way to install apps on android without a google accout[1], since it's a basic functionality, just like calls or a web browser. [1] For obvious reasons I don't want her to download apks from the intern…
I am in the same boat. Keep in mind that you are trusting both google and meta. At least you can update whatsapp once every three months (for now)
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GrapheneOS is focused on privacy but that must come from a secure baseline. GrapheneOS is much more privacy focussd than any other mobile operating system. Accrescent is the end goal for a secure and private app store but it's still in alpha. GrapheneOS is also the best for degoogling (eliminating all google services) because it comes with zero Google services unlike all the other ones listed here: https://eylenburg.…
The problem is that to achieve privacy through security, Graphene has to treat the user as a potentially hostile actor. Therefore, the system needs to protect itself and other apps from the user. Which is very much contrary to software freedom.
Yeah, the goal is privacy although the OS is completely open source.
They do improve user experience by allowing disabling emergency alerts, call recording without alerts, no mandatory camera noise in Japan, no extra warning popup from installing APKs from the web (it's the same permission in every app store iirc), increases password length to 128 digits. All the network services are open source afaict while all the other mobile operating systems listed in that android comparison connect to Google's closed source services, netowrk permission, sensors permission, storage scopes, contact scopes.
You can still easily install whatever Android app you want on GrapheneOS and you can install dangerous apps like shizuku and apps with way too many permissions. But yeah the goal is privacy so that everyday people can protect themselves as well as journalists can protect themselves. I want journalists to get the best privacy possible without having to know a ton of technical things or making many choices.
GrapheneOS actually recommends against using Aurora and instead just using the Play Store, so this shouldn't really hurt users. For extra privacy, you can sign into the Play Store with a Google Account that isn't tied to anything else.
Interesting, I never tried Aurora on Graphene. For me the combination of Play Store and F-Droid worked really well so far.
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Doesn’t Google make it very hard to create an account tied to nothing (no phone or alt email)?
It's the SomethingAwful model: go to the store and find the cheapest Android phone from some prepaid company for :tenbux: then use it to set up your Google account during out-of-box-setup while on the store's free public WiFi (since Google OOBE allows free account creation without a number or existing email), then toss the phone in a drawer afterwards. "Hope ya got ten bucks!" (I got a random 5G Moto phone for ~$10 o…
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It seems wise to have at least one alternative mobile phone app store. Even if it isn't very good. If the government can tell Google to do trivial things like, for example, change the name of bodies (plural now) of water, it can turn off your app updates, trapping you on insecure versions indefinitely. This probably matters more if you live outside of the US, but if I had a plan B for an app store on my phone, I woul…
The government didnt ask google, they changed the name on the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS), which is the official legal mapping source which other companies like Google etc use. Hence the change filtered down through software from the top official channel.
Wether or not the most recent example is the best example, doesn't matter. What matters is when the government says "jump" in legalese, google's lawyers say "how high?"
GrapheneOS actually recommends against using Aurora and instead just using the Play Store, so this shouldn't really hurt users. For extra privacy, you can sign into the Play Store with a Google Account that isn't tied to anything else.
> Google Account that isn't tied to anything else. At the risk of being a privacy absolutist / fatalist: Google’s entire business model is surveillance. They follow you around and track your habits so you can be influenced. Given that, a Google account is always tied to something else.
Yes, the advertising targeting is incredibly invasive, but let's not pretend they aren't providing world class Search, Email, Docs, Maps, Video (YT), etc in exchange.