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GrapheneOS – A privacy and security-focused mobile OS with Android compatibility

grapheneos.org

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Re: GrapheneOS – A privacy and security-focused mobile OS with Android compatibility

#181

Post by _Ender »

strcat wrote: post #174
_Ender wrote: post #103

"Android compatibility" implies that it's something entirely new. It appears to be an Android fork that simply hasn't done away with compatibility. There are neat ideas and all, but the title implies that it's something that it isn't. Lastly, I wonder how this will do over time considering Fuschia.

It's not implied that it's something completely new, although a dozen of the sub-projects are new projects rather than forks of existing ones. The overall project is not simply a fork of the Android Open Source Project with hardening. That's a subset of the work, and a big part of it. I also added a paragraph to the placeholder index page clarifying the longer-term plans with virtualization: https://grapheneos.org/#r…

I get that, and the site doesn't imply that it's something new, but I simply found the title of the post to be such.

Fair enough though.

>If it ends up shipping as a replacement for the core OS, with Android running in a virtual machine or on top of a compatibility layer like gVisor, that would just mean that there's a better base to build on than before. All of the work done by the project would still be relevant in a future like that. I'm not so sure that's truly going to happen though.

I see.

Re: GrapheneOS – A privacy and security-focused mobile OS with Android compatibility

#182

Post by yellowapple »

strcat wrote: post #77
groovybits wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe there is a general lack of awareness of what AOSP is without Google services and add-ons on top of it. In some facets, AOSP is not a complete and working OS as is. In particular, I have personally had many issues with GPS location for the past fews years. Out-of-the-box, GPS simply does not work without additional non-free software to help it out. Additionally, many (that is, 95%) of all Android apps that y…

> I believe there is a general lack of awareness of what AOSP is without Google services and add-ons on top of it. That lack of awareness seems to be your own. > In particular, I have personally had many issues with GPS location for the past fews years. Out-of-the-box, GPS simply does not work without additional non-free software to help it out. GPS doesn't require Play Services, etc. Play Services provides supplemen…

I used CopperheadOS (without GApps) on a Nexus 6P as my daily driver for almost 2 years. Very few "mainstream" apps worked; they would loudly complain about the lack of Google Play Services, and at best would lose functionality (e.g. Slack, which apparently relies on Play Services for notifications) or at worst would crash either immediately or within a few minutes after launch (multiple reasonably-popular online dating apps had this problem).

In short, of the apps I tried that weren't distributed via F-Droid, most of them suffered from varying degrees of brokenness without Google Play Services (and these same apps work fine on my HTC One M8 and my current-daily-driver OnePlus 5T, both of which run LineageOS w/ GApps).

You're right, though, that "some Android apps work fine" is a better situation than "no Android apps work at all". Hopefully GrapheneOS can leverage that advantage well. It'd just be useful to acknowledge that it ain't all sunshine and rainbows just because it's AOSP-based; whether it's microG or something that ain't a security landmine waiting to blow off someone's leg, addressing that issue with an alternative service provider would be a game-changer, and would readily address the one issue I ever had with CopperheadOS (and - it seems - likely would still have with GrapheneOS).

Re: GrapheneOS – A privacy and security-focused mobile OS with Android compatibility

#183

Post by indolering »

strcat wrote: post #173
yegortimoshenko wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are not that many phone manufacturers that even allow you to change the trust anchor (which makes any of this even remotely possible). For example, Samsung uses e-fuses to burn in their signing key, rewriting recovery will permanently trip their attestation (Knox); other manufacturers use similar practices. Pixels are one of the only currently available phones with user-controlled trusted boot in mind.

There are more devices supporting this than there used to be though. https://grapheneos.org/#device-support explains that it's going to support other devices. It doesn't support the Pixel 3a and Pixel 3a XL yet either. Supporting each device is a lot of work, and other devices will need to be carefully chosen. It would be harmful to make bad choices about device support and encourage people to buy insecure devices wi…

Has Project Treble helped in this area?

Re: GrapheneOS – A privacy and security-focused mobile OS with Android compatibility

#184

Post by groovybits »

nextos wrote: post #88
groovybits wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe there is a general lack of awareness of what AOSP is without Google services and add-ons on top of it. In some facets, AOSP is not a complete and working OS as is. In particular, I have personally had many issues with GPS location for the past fews years. Out-of-the-box, GPS simply does not work without additional non-free software to help it out. Additionally, many (that is, 95%) of all Android apps that y…

Have you tried a pure AOSP + F-Droid on Nexus/Pixel or Xperia? It's quite good. The only major drawback are closed drivers. But the userland is nice, open and polished. My worry with Librem and all those initiatives is that rebuilding an ecosystem like F-Droid takes a lot of effort and time.

I primarily used a OnePlus 3 (non-3T) and a Nexus 4. The OnePlus 3 seemed to have a very active ROM community.

I tried many of the well-known ROMs: Lineage, Paranoid, Ressurection.

I also tried many of the OnePlus-specific ROMs, that were typically maintained by only one or two devs each.

Most of the features worked perfectly fine on both phones. But the deal-breakers were often the simple things: GPS (w/o downloading extra geolocation database services) and Bluetooth were the kickers for me. These services were consistently spotty across every ROM I tried.

My experience is as of a couple years ago. I have since moved away from the ROM scene, simply because I do not have the time to deal with this sort of stuff anymore.

Re: GrapheneOS – A privacy and security-focused mobile OS with Android compatibility

#185

Post by groovybits »

andrepd wrote: post #74
groovybits wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe there is a general lack of awareness of what AOSP is without Google services and add-ons on top of it. In some facets, AOSP is not a complete and working OS as is. In particular, I have personally had many issues with GPS location for the past fews years. Out-of-the-box, GPS simply does not work without additional non-free software to help it out. Additionally, many (that is, 95%) of all Android apps that y…

How does microg help with that?

I tried microg's Lineage image on the OnePlus 3. It was probably the most painless ROM I had ever flashed.

The microg project has been fantastic in providing an open mechanism to interface with Google's services. When I first tried it, I believe they did not yet have a working implementation of all the Google services. Some apps complained about Google services, some did not. You still needed to sign into Google though, which might turn some people away.

For those who want to interface with Google on an open-source ROM, microg's image is probably the way for you.

Re: GrapheneOS – A privacy and security-focused mobile OS with Android compatibility

#186

Post by beenBoutIT »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #180
jammygit wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did not know that and even looked it up to confirm. Thanks for mentioning it https://www.maptoaster.com/maptoaster-topo-nz/articles/how-g...

Yeah, GPS is actually insanely cool technology, and the US making it available to everyone was a real public service. Now of course, other nations are, partially for defense purposes of course, deploying similar networks as well. And it's just out there. Usable with no subscription, no account, nothing. It's just free data.

Notice I didn't specifically mention GPS, although I agree that it is pretty cool. That said, GPS alone isn't capable of providing the UX that end users expect from a modern app. Fused Location is required for more accurate location information and it isn't passive like GPS.
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