NSA And Google Developing Hardened Android Kernel For Government Communication | Hacker News Reader

NSA And Google Developing Hardened Android Kernel For Government Communication

gcn.com

22 pointssupercopter8 comments

> One is an effort by the White House Communications Office to move the executive branch from BlackBerry devices to Android-based phones. The reason is because Android devices with the new kernel can be secured at a higher clearance level than BlackBerry devices, McCarthy said.

I'm not convinced that people wandering around with Secret-level (or even Confidential/FOUO/LES/SBU) material on a smartphone is the best way to go...

It already happens, and in this era it's somewhat impossible for them not to.

One of the pressures here is RIM is Canadian and even so even if the DoS/DoD is running their own BIS servers, there is still some issue with this all running on Canadian software.

I'd actually welcome this work put back into the open source project - a) for peer review and transparency, and b) so that the corporate sector and pro-sumers can benefit from this too.

Its not so much that material is on the phone its how its handled as far as access.

Let me explain, you can already secure encrypt stuff with android 3.0. So in hardening the kernel they are shutting down avenues of attack to get at stuff that may be stored on the smart phone.

However, in this case its not Google who has the remote erase and lock commands but NSA/CIA/Military..so if phone goes missing its sent a remote erase and lock command..

Won't the manufacturers of those phones have to publish the source code?

I doubt that'll be an issue for them.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/Special/2008/03/24/NSA-releases-...

if it's used internally within an organization (ie not published or sold) then no. in any case, i expect they will release the source like they did for SELinux.

Not if the phones are only used internally. You only have to distribute the code to those who recieve the binaries.

That being said, they may open source it for wider use. The NSA and DoD were responsible for the creation of SELinux.

Good security is done in the light. The NSA wrote SELinux, after all. It would make sense for them to encourage this hardened version get used outside of the government.

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