LibreCellular
librecellular.org
librecellular.org
What would be interesting would be some company with deep enough pockets to address that backing this.
Are they? Is there any plans to make a commercial product? It doesn't seem like it from the webpage. This project appears to hope to marry several existing projects to build an open source cellular network for researchers and private use, which is not even the first time this is being done. It is being funded via the grant linked below.
Even if there aren't now - there might be if it becomes easy to make one. Perhaps a town could have its own cell network with decent coverage without requiring larger corporation involvement.
On the technical side, current SDRs are cheap and very capable. Unfortunately, for this to take off one needs a large network effect and should the technology take off it is easy for various three letter agencies to compromise, for example by inserting their own nodes. And as some uses are likely to be sketchy "because terrorism/pornography" is all the justification they will need.
The folks that are freeing the Pinephone modem are focusing on the Android OS, not the underlying firmware.
The project is here: https://github.com/Biktorgj/pinephone_modem_sdk/
If so, what would one search for?
- The Pinephone uses a Quectel EG25-G, which is a System on a Module that combines a baseband modem with the necessary RF front-end bits and power needs.
- The Quectel EG25-G itself, uses a Qualcomm chipset (the Qualcomm 9607).
- Qualcomm chipsets in this category tend to have an ARM component and and the actual modem bits which are combination of ARM and Hexagon DSP cores that you talk to over an interface called "QMI."
I'd expect that if Pinephone reached scale (and they hadn't found an alternative) they would just buy the Qualcomm chipsets directly and not have to "free" themselves from Quectel's "integration" that translates between QMI and AT commands (which are miserable) or whatever else Quectel has exposed an an API.
This quirk of modern modems, where you (as a small scale manufacturer) can't buy the chipset itself unless packaged up and marked up by someone like Quectel or Sierra Wireless makes me absolutely livid.
If you're willing to deal with possibly questionable Chinese resellers, you can buy pretty much anything you want in small quantities. Just don't expect any support from the manufacturer.
See, for example: https://www.hkinventory.com/p/d/MDM9607.htm
Also imagine buying a commercially available phone and freeing it from all the TrustZone and code signing bullshit by replacing the SoC with the same chip but in a "development" mode, with no fuses blown.
Not really. The USB modem was chosen as it provides isolation from the closed-source blobs that run on the modem. This way, the modem doesn't have access to the main memory. Pine Store Ltd (the commercial entity) being based in china, they certainly could have sourced a SoC integrating a 4G modem, but there's already a zillion devices like that, the idea was to build something compatible with FLOSS from the ground up.
That said, given that using AT commands usually require enormous amounts of (potentially insecure) string parsing I wouldn't be surprised if there are vulnerabilities to closed source blobs even over USB. That is to say, the reverse engineering on the Android side could improve the security posture (or it could also make it worse!).
I’m not too familiar with cellular networks, but I’ve been curious about 5G networks as well. I wonder how long it will take for us to see similar projects for those.
Although I don't think it would be possible in countries where frequencies belong to operators, frequencies is a problem for SDR folks if they want to do long range.
I guess cybersecurity agencies would also not be happy with people using this, since it could be used as some form of stingray, I think?
But in africa or other third world countries, I guess there are large areas without internet, so they could obviously benefit from cheaper ways to have internet over there, if it was built for free or funded by some NGO.
In a Faraday cage, of course.
I seem to remember that one of the names that was rejected in favor of LibreOffice was "Bureau." I wonder how a sleek name like that might have affected the program's fortunes?
I understand the arguments for using English as a universal language but in this case the word libre brings an other nuance (meaning) "libre" != "free"
For real? I thought both languages pronounced them like /libʁ/.