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The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

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Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#71

Post by xanaxagoras »

_rdvw wrote: post #44
nimbius wrote: post #3

tell ya what i really wanna see from pinephone: AGPS lockdown. Currently ive learned from HN there are numerous 3GPP protocols that provide direct, clandestine monitoring of the GPS location of the phone. the feature lives unchallenged in the firmware, so if you can give me a phone that cannot report its GPS data to the carrier without my knowledge, id be ever grateful.

My DivestOS: - removes most Qualcomm location blobs - removes carrier OMA-DM blobs - doesn't send IMEI to SUPL server - only allows SUPL override when an emergency call is active - disables A-GPS MSA mode - and shows a notification when location is requested via SUPL

This looks really cool. If sunfish changes from "Broken" I'll give it a try.

Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#72

Post by scarface74 »

asojfdowgh wrote: post #22
scarface74 wrote: post #15

So a 2015 iPhone 6S runs the latest version of iOS. A 2013 iPhone 5s is still getting security updates. A 2011 iPhone 4s doesn’t support LTE and soon won’t be able to connect to any network. Verizon is shutting down their CDMA network as is Sprint. So how does open source make my life better? From a hardware side, why wouldn’t I just take my phone to any number of places to get the battery replaced?

my pc is older than all of those numbers and runs fine, and I expect roughly the same from the pinephone for my pc if I wanna use a sim card after old network shutdown, all it is is swapping a single card on the mobo, perhaps swapping out some antennas too for the pinephone, just swapping the baseboard without the rest changing, or make/group hire someone to make a case with an updated modem for battery, because you…

And the modern cellphone industry is a lot younger.

Sure I can still use a Core 2 Duo 2.66Ghz laptop with 8GB RAM, a nice 1920x1200 display, 250Gb hard drive, and gigabit Ethernet from 2011 [1] in 2022. But could I use a computer from 2001 in 2011?

There is a reason that you can use a iPhone 6s from 2015 in 2022. But an iPhone 3G from 2008 would have been unusable in 2015.

[1]https://www.ebay.com/itm/224241464162

This is similar. Mine was much higher specced. It was given to me after a startup I worked for went out of business in 2012. I used it to run Windows CE emulators while writing C# Compact Franework applications.

Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#73

Post by josephcsible »

fartcannon wrote: post #67
josephcsible wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make it sound like the banks and Snapchat would have to do work for them to support me, when the opposite is true. The community already has compatibility layers that work for most apps, but those companies go out of their way to do extra work to make sure their apps don't work in them.

Yeah they're shitty. That's why maybe you shouldn't financially support ecosystems that you don't like just to use apps that are actively hostile to you. You don't need those things.

The problem with not using Snapchat is the network effect: you miss out on socialization when you're the only one in your friend group that isn't on it.

The problem with not using those banks is that I don't think there's any banks that aren't hostile like that, and keeping all of your money under a mattress is a worse choice than compromising on this principle.

Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#74

Post by josephcsible »

ForHackernews wrote: post #69
josephcsible wrote: post #24

I'd totally use a more open-source phone OS, if only there weren't communications and banking apps that check to make sure you're running an unmodified major manufacturer's OS, and refuse to run if they find any evidence that you aren't.

You could try /e/OS? https://e.foundation/leaving-apple-improved-compatibility-wi... > But while you can install many apps on /e/OS, we know that some apps are not working properly today: banking apps or games for example, and this has been painful for many of you. > Our team has been hard at work to improve app compatibility in the last few months, and we will be rolling out improved app compatibility with the 0.23…

Thanks; I'll definitely have to give that a try. And I'm quite curious what workaround they came up with.

Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#75

Post by fartcannon »

josephcsible wrote: post #73
fartcannon wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah they're shitty. That's why maybe you shouldn't financially support ecosystems that you don't like just to use apps that are actively hostile to you. You don't need those things.

The problem with not using Snapchat is the network effect: you miss out on socialization when you're the only one in your friend group that isn't on it. The problem with not using those banks is that I don't think there's any banks that aren't hostile like that, and keeping all of your money under a mattress is a worse choice than compromising on this principle.

This is HN so I'll be slaughtered for this reply, but someone definitely tried to fix the banks issue a little over a decade ago.

But yeah, fair enough! I choose to just not chat to those people, but I totally get that it's not that easy for some.

Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#76

Post by hundchenkatze »

imchillyb wrote: post #45
josephcsible wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Snapchat refuses to let you access their services at all via browser. And most banks offer you a restricted set of functionality via browser, e.g., no taking pictures of checks to deposit (in fact, I can't think of any banks that do let you do that via browser).

Quoted post unavailable.

Snapchat is in control of all the things you listed. You're agreeing with the person you're insulting.

Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#77

Post by dtx1 »

nabaraz wrote: post #18
mikece wrote: post #2

Why LineageOS and not GrapheneOS? I have a Pixel 4a with GrapheneOS and really like it. The lack of Firebase Cloud Messaging (Google's push notifications service) isn't an issue for personal usage; for work I still use an iPhone because I don't want to put things like MS Teams on Graphene OS. As for PinePhone: it's interesting that this article puts LineageOS and PinePhone together since the latter cannot run the for…

The choice is between GrapheneOS + Sandboxed Google play vs LineageOS + MicroG. If you care too much about privacy, GrapheneOS is the way to go. If you want a balance between privacy and usability, LineageOS is the way to go. Also, GrapheneOS only supports Pixel phones. I have tried CalyxOS but there are too many issues.

> If you care too much about privacy, GrapheneOS is the way to go

Not so sure about that. If you care about SECURITY than GrapheneOS is pretty much the best choice on the market, comparable only to iOS or bare Android on Pixel Phones. Everyone else isn't even reasonable to compare against it.

But wether it's more private with sandboxed Google Play Services vs Lineage OS and MicroG or iOS is not such an obvious choice to me.

Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#78

Post by mathgeek »

cromka wrote: post #59
zwieback wrote: post #30

I like the idea of a more open phone a lot but dispute the "Smartphones are shit" premise. I think modern smart phones are an unbelievably awesome value. Battery, display, wireless and processing power have advanced at such an unbelievable rate that we have something in our pockets that far exceeds predictions of 20, 30, 100 years ago. The problem is that we don't want to pay what it really costs to have such a great…

> we don't want to pay what it really costs to have such a great system so we sell our souls and then endlessly gripe about it. Last time I checked, Apple does not subsidize their hardware and actually earns majority their money off of the hardware markup, not the services.

Plenty of carriers subsidize Apple hardware. Apple also has https://www.apple.com/shop/iphone/iphone-upgrade-program

Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#79

Post by throwaway71271 »

Kerrick wrote: post #58

> Don't smartphones... kind of suck? How many times have you had to replace a phone in the past 10 years? Do you have a drawer of random crap with a growing pile of phones? I simply cannot relate with this hook. > Don't smartphones... kind of suck? No, smartphones are kinda magical. They take better snapshots than my first DSLR, they play games at higher fidelity than my first gaming PC, and they’re general purpose c…

> general purpose computing devices

not so general, you can pretty much only run programs allowed by the mothership, and if some neural net decides you can be locked out of your phone forever

Re: The case for LineageOS and the PinePhone

#80

Post by Findecanor »

josephcsible wrote: post #68
jokethrowaway wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After the nth round of european regulations, plenty of banks started requiring a smartphone app installed on Android or iOS as 2 factor authentication

What regulation requires Android or iOS in particular?

There is rather a lack of regulations that would require banks to provide two-factor authentication in a platform-neutral or technology-neutral manner.

Instead of two-factor-only apps, we get "electronic ID" that are legally like a photo ID, and which are also used for making payments from the phone itself.

In fact, some of these rely on security of the OS it is running on, and not on the use of any trusted platform modules ("secure enclave", TrustZone, etc.) or on any mathematical proof. Therefore, un-rooted recent versions of Android and iOS is compulsory in practice, because those are the only environments that are secure enough.

And BTW, the electronic ID are very convenient for the banks. If they get social-engineered and the banks' API abused, the banks can conveniently blame the victims — because it's a legal ID and not merely a login helper or debit card, and you're not supposed to be "careless" with an ID.

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