Flagship mobile phone with hardware kill switches for privacy | Hacker News Reader

Flagship mobile phone with hardware kill switches for privacy

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Wonderful except that soon that phone won't work for anything official in europe because it won't pass play integrity attestation that brussels wants to be the only gateway to certification of devices.

Yeah. Remote attestation, "certification" of devices in general, should be illegal. Anything short of that and computer freedom is lost, everything the word "hacker" stands for will be destroyed.

Is it so difficult to have a separate phone for gov & bank apps only?

We can't let Google get away with bundling their spyware in the name of security into a phone we must now have..

It's NOT ok that a government app (often practically mandatory) requires the user to accept some invasive ToS of a foreign corporation maintaining an illegal monopoly.

Requiring attestation doesn't mean Google spyware should be unremovable without breaking it, Google's business model should not be mandated by the law.

It's not a law to only trust Google's attestations.

It is however common practice. Why would corporations and governments trust our own keys, signatures and attestations? There's no reason for them to do that. They're going to restrict the set of trusted keys to themselves, thereby maintaining attestation authority.

That's how we'll be robbed of our computing freedom. Technically we'll be able to install whatever software we want but they'll be able to detect our "tampering" and discriminate against us based on it. "Tampered" with your computer? Can't access bank accounts, can't access communications applications, can't even play video games or watch films. One day even networking protocols will require corporate or government attestation. Won't even be able to connect to the internet without a corporate owned computer. Can't even read an article on some website.

We're going to be marginalized. We're going to be second class citizens of society. The only way to gain access to services is to give up control of our computers to the corporations and governments.

So is there anyone else out there attesting device firmware and ensuring they're secure?

Why must it be attested secure?

Difficult? Not at all, but it annoying at least.

The problem is not that it's difficult, the problem is that it makes phones that are not locked against their users commercially dead - a money losing venture for any manufacturer. Because most people simply won't bother with two phones.

but what if,the two phones could be packed into one?

it would be a little thicker, you would need 2 of some components.

switch between phones like switching workspace?

Ha, a phone with a KVM (1) although without the K or M: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KVM_switch

Or this 90's hardware oddity that combined Mac and PC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6b4lYOI0GQ (skip to 8:00 to see it in action).

I wonder if dual-booting is possible, with the boot-loader loading the bootloader that's been "blessed" by Google's certification priests to boot the "certified virginal" phone.

yes

Is it possible to spoof/emulate play pass integrity somehow?

No, not strong integrity, since that depends on hardware secure modules which attest that the software on the phone is signed by Google.

> One is a hardware switch that cuts circuit power to the cameras and microphones

How great might be the threat of using its speakers as microphones ?

That would practically certainly require electrical changes, at which point all bets are off anyway

Can you please elaborate as maybe I couldn't understand what you were trying to convey.

Thanks in advance!

If GrapheneOS won't plan on supporting that it means it's not as secure as advertised.

No, it means the phone isn't suitable for security maximalists. GrapheneOS doesn't support any hardware except the Pixels.

And that's even assuming one cares about the secure enclave. I am not convinced that any phones exist that one can not unlock the enclave via JTAG debugging.

For most devices, if you have that kind of physical access, and enough technical resources, all bets are off. Most people's threat model doesn't include three-letter-agencies reading their secure enclave. If yours does, you're probably better off not carrying a phone at all.

> Most people's threat model doesn't include three-letter-agencies reading their secure enclave.

Maybe it should. I'm not convinced that we're automatically done for if the NSA, CIA or whatever starts coming after us. That sort of demoralization is probably part of their psychological warfare.

The US government is constantly lamenting the fact cryptography has become widespread and regularly attempts to straight up outlaw it. Cryptography is subversive: it has the power to defeat police, judges, spies, governments, militaries. The simple act of encrypting web traffic shifted the landscape to the point governments are stockpiling vulnerabilites to get around the cryptography. The next step is to systematically eliminate these vulnerabilities so that the cryptography cannot be worked around.

GrapheneOS devs state requirements based on Pixels, not choose Pixels based on requirements

so I won't trust judgement based on that

Not at all and ignorant of you to think so.

GrapheneOS publishes a list of the requirements: https://grapheneos.org/faq#future-devices

GrapheneOS devs have announced "We're currently working with a major OEM towards future generations of their devices meeting our requirements and providing official GrapheneOS support. GrapheneOS on both Pixels and these future non-Pixels will be fine." (https://grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/115102564799343519)

You're welcome to assert otherwise, of course, but your assertions are contradictory with direct statements from the GrapheneOS team.

Hey, I learned something. I knew of Fairphone, but I didn't know they had kill switches. The device might be out of my budget, but it seems promising.

Is there a headphone jack?

Bring back headphone jacks & SD card slots!

The mediatek dimensity means it's sure to barely work on US carriers. They're not written band support anywhere on their 'detailed specs'

nit: Title inaccurate. There is a single hardware kill switch, not plural. Separately, there is also a software kill switch.

It's a run-of-the-mill pre-sale scam. Post when it's actually available for sale.

Blala, 1k electronics shit that won't potentially do calls reliably or BT with cars etc.

> shit that won't potentially do calls reliably or BT with cars etc.

Based on what? If it's not yet available, how would you be able to tell how well it does calls or BT-pairs with cars?

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