Category: phones

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And the best (and most secure) phone is…

No – this is no “best of” list like you find them everywhere, with 10 or more randomly chosen products and “affiliate links” to big online stores. This post is about security, because that’s what matters, not how great a product looks and feels in your hands, or how nice the photos are which can be made with their cameras, or all the new(ish) “AI” stuff built into them.

Since a few years now, arm – together with Google – are developing something they’ve called “Memory Tagging Extensions”, or short: MTE. That’s a mitigation against 0-day-exploits, and thus, important. The arm developers explain it on their blog, and you can also read their white paper about it in case you’d like to know what it is and how it works.

And now you can actually buy the first product which has that built in – and it’s:

The Google Pixel 8 (and The Pixel 8 Pro)

And no, it’s not enabled by default yet (except if you run GrapheneOS instead of Google’s own version of Android), but if you don’t mind your phone to being run in “developer mode”, you can read how to enable it yourself on Google’s “Project Zero” blog.

No silver bullet, that’s right. But both the arm and Google’s developers are to be complimented about that, even the DevOps from GrapheneOS (and also DivestOS) do that – and recommend the Pixel 8 (or 8 Pro) above all other handsets. Security better than that of an iPhone, as was reported elsewhere (but that’s another topic).

Even if you own a Pixel 8 (/Pro) and do nothing, I’m sure that Google’s team are testing it, and that they will activate the feature per default with one of their next (monthly) updates. GrapheneOS, like I wrote above, does use it already, so that’s my OS of choice even on my older Pixel 6a (which doesn’t have MTE built into it, but I’ll still use that as long as it’s supported (July ’27 according to Google, and GrapheneOS supports it until then as well – after that I’d have to change it to DivestOS)).

Oh, and re: support cycles – for the Pixel 8, that’s 7 years, so even if it costs a bit more, I’d most probably choose that one over a Pixel 7a. Let’s see if the next phones (8a and newer) will also be supported that long. So another thing to applaud, and we should avoid waste and that that into account (and no, the “Fairphone” can’t compete on any level, even if that’s theoretically supported a bit longer).

Like always, thanks for reading.

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First look: Xiaomi Smart Band 8

Yesterday I bought a fitness tracker. My wife and daughter both have one since long, and I started counting my steps when I first got an iPhone from the company, and later the used Google Pixel 4a from my wife. And while counting steps with a phone is good, and all that most people would probably need, I still also wanted those steps when I do *not* carry my phone, plus having a look at some other statistics like sleep tracking and so on.

Both Mitchie and Zuleikha (or Aki, which she prefers) are using FitBit devices. Mitchie lost her Charge 4 last year and got the Charge 5 soon afterwards, Aki has her Inspire 2 since about that time (or a bit earlier). But I didn’t want to go the Google route, and here’s why. Mike Kuketz, a German security consultant once mentioned an open source tracker software which doesn’t send every measurement to the big clouds for their analysis, so I was interested in that program called “Gadgetbridge” since a while. The best supported devices are those from Huami (aka Amazfit) and Xiaomi which use Huami’s “Zepp” app, but since the last update to Gadgetbridge, even some newer devices which use different protocols are supported – see here.

So my initial plan was to get a Xiaomi Smart Band 7 or an Amazfit Band 7, both of which originally use that Zepp app, and both being able to be used with Gadgetbridge instead. However, at our local electronics chain store, only the newer Xiaomi Smart Band 8 was offered, so I took that one instead. And to make matters short (or TL;DR in “modern” speech): no, I haven’t got it running with Gadgetbridge yet (support *is* still experimental), but I’m still glad I got this one, even tho it feels a bit strange to have a secure system like GrapheneOS, and then to install Xiaomi’s Mi Fitness software onto it – but in the long run, this will most probably change.

So what is it like? Well it counts my steps (and less than the free and open source “Paseo” software on the phone before, but it’s said to be pretty accurate), it also tracks my sleep, counts my heart beats, blood oxygen, and all that stuff – what most of these devices do. The Xiaomi software is pretty colourful, as are the hundreds of watch faces you can install with a single click. Here are some screenshots of the software running on my phone:

In case you want a comparison of some of these devices, here is a German one from FitForFun, and the guys from Heise’s Techstage had an almost similar result. But of course they don’t even think about using said devices with free and open source software, so choose wisely. Of the older generation (compatible with Zepp apps and such with Gadgetbridge, except the Huawei device), there’s also a nice video, also in German, here.

I will report more later, since I have the device more or less since a single day only, and this is my first one (although I can compare it to those FitBits, and to be honest, Aki was a bit jealous about that Goose watchface you could choose for mine)… 😉

Like always, thanks for reading.

Update, later on the same day:

Got Gadgetbridge working by now on the Pixel 6a (had tried it on the 3a before). And I’m still exploring it of course, but here’s a first screenshot from the phone:

Gadgetbridge working with the Xiaomi Smart Band 8 on the Google Pixel 6a running GrapheneOS

So for the moment I’ll have deactivated Xiaomi’s app and this one active instead. Switched the battery usage from ‘Unrestricted’ to ‘Optimised’, because this doesn’t have to be active when I don’t want it to. So let’s see how this develops. But I’m glad that I’ve been successful.

And again, thanks for reading.

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To whom it might concern: GrapheneOS added Android Auto

Happy new year again.

Forgot to tell you that with two updates from December 30th and 31st, GrapheneOS now added Android Auto if you can make use of it (we can’t; our car is a year or so too old for that). An article on 9to5Google reminded me of it, and here are the release notes from GOS.

And unlike stated in 9to5Google, my Pixel 6a which is on the GrapheneOS “stable channel” got it already. But since our car can’t do it, and I haven’t switched on any (sandboxed) Google services, it’s of no big deal for us. But if your car can make use of it, enjoy.

Thanks to Daniel Micay and his team over at GOS. And like always, thanks for reading.

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Now running…

  • GrapheneOS on the Google Pixel 6a mobile phone
  • DivestOS Mobile on the Google Pixel 3a mobile phone
  • Debian on my self-built desktop computer (for “work”)
  • Arch Linux on my self-built desktop computer (for “fun”, or to see the newest stuff)

Looks like this:

GrapheneOS
DivestOS Mobile
Debian
Arch Linux

Oh, and of course I’m also running the latest jams on the Wikiloops radio. You can participate in these if you like, why not give it a try?

Like always, thanks for viewing, reading, listening, and all that 🙂 Happy holidays 🙂

Update, from Wed Dec 20th, 2023:

According to the German security expert Mike Kuketz, GrapheneOS is the gold standard of all Android operating systems. His article is in German, only the parts where he cites Daniel Micay, founder and lead developer of GrapheneOS are in English.

Privacy Guides has the same opinion and recommendation. See also at Eylenburg’s comparison. And at AndroidAuthority. And maybe the best one at PrivSec.

Be aware tho that in case you reject all Google services and apps, you’ll also lose some of their “AI” and capabilities. Your choice. In that case, user profiles might help – one owner profile without, and a user profile with Google services (still sandboxed in GrapheneOS). And thanks again for reading.

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Sigh…

Just saw the first little parts of what will become Gnome 45 trickling in, like in:

:: Starting full system upgrade...
resolving dependencies...
looking for conflicting packages...

Packages (2) gnome-disk-utility-45.0-1  openpmix-4.2.6-1

Total Download Size:   1.87 MiB
Total Installed Size:  9.83 MiB
Net Upgrade Size:      0.03 MiB

And why does that make me sigh, you might ask? Well, because the guys at Gnome think they know better again, and will again break existing and working desktops for you, me, or everyone (worst will be for “the big guys” who make desktops like Unity based upon Gnome). See this article in The Register:

GNOME 45 formalizes extensions module system

I’m using four Gnome extensions which I’d really like to keep, which are OpenWeather, Freon, the built-in Workspace Indicator, and GSConnect, so I looked up https://extensions.gnome.org/ to search for version numbers, and as expected, none of them has a 45 version yet. And while it’s all documented from the Gnome developers, I’d like to wait until all these – for me – important things have updates before I’ll get a desktop which again throws out the baby with the bath water, many thanks.

Looking for / thinking about alternatives? Nah, not really. I never really loved KDE, and XFCE isn’t an option for me either, nor are others which mostly mimic Windows (like Cinnamon & Co.), or Enlightenment. So let’s see how this turns out.

But there are worse news, especially for those of us who are using Android phones, namely Google’s planned “Privacy Sandbox”. See this article:

Google Chrome Privacy Sandbox open to all: Now websites can tap into your habits directly for ads

Time to look out for another browser, see also in https://www.androidauthority.com/chrome-ad-topics-rollout-3362364/ – and it’s getting worse, since this will probably end up in AOSP. Chatted a bit about that with Tad who is the lead developer of DivestOS, and he assured me that neither DivestOS nor GrapheneOS would include these bits. But Google with its former infamous “Don’t be evil” mantra seems to turn to Orwell’s Newspeak lately, which is really bad. There’s nothing “private” about their sandbox anymore, so dump these Chrome browsers, and get Mulch or Vanadium (or better, Firefox) instead. Best solution for Android phone users: install GrapheneOS in case you have a current Pixel phone, or DivestOS for those whose devices would also be covered by LineageOS, or whose devices are too old for GrapheneOS.

And no, Apple is not an alternative. Security based upon obscurity never worked, I’m only dealing with Open Source here, no time for walled garden crap.

Like always, thanks for reading.

Update, from September 12th, 2023:

Here are some more links, some new some old, but take your pick or read them all if you care for real privacy:

https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/07/google_privacy_sandbox/

https://lifehacker.com/how-to-disable-google-chromes-new-privacy-sandbox-track-1847276073

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kateoflahertyuk/2023/09/07/new-google-chrome-targeted-ad-tracking-heres-how-to-stop-it/

https://theconversation.com/google-chrome-just-rolled-out-a-new-way-to-track-you-and-serve-ads-heres-what-you-need-to-know-213150

https://techcrunch.com/2023/09/08/google-flips-the-switch-on-interest-based-ads-with-privacy-sandbox-rollout/

https://www.theverge.com/2021/3/30/22358287/privacy-ads-google-chrome-floc-cookies-cookiepocalypse-finger-printing

https://www.zdnet.com/article/heres-how-to-opt-out-of-google-chromes-privacy-sandbox-floc-trials/

https://techcrunch.com/2023/01/17/privacy-sandbox-topics-api-criticism/

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/09/googles-widely-opposed-ad-platform-the-privacy-sandbox-launches-in-chrome/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privacy_Sandbox

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/03/googles-floc-terrible-idea

https://www.howtogeek.com/724783/how-to-opt-out-of-google-floc-in-chrome/

By far not the only sites and articles I’ve found, but enough to give you an idea why this is bad. And as I wrote above, it could be even worse on Android phones, where Google almost always has the ‘WebView’ authority, which means that any link you’ll click will be opened in WebView (aka Chrome), no matter if you have Firefox or other browsers set as your default. Only way to mitigate that is to use more private operating systems on your phones, like GrapheneOS (which uses their hardened Vanadium WebView), or DivestOS (which uses their hardened Mulch WebView, partly based upon GrapheneOS’s Vanadium (plus a few other goodies like an ad-fighting hosts file)).

Like always, thanks for reading, and for considering in helping to make the web a safer place to be.

Update, from September 30th, 2023:

Here’s another one. Do yourselves and us all a favour, and don’t use that browser.

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Nothing to Hide

If you’re reading this blog regularly, you might have asked yourselves why all the thoughts about security, privacy, freedom, and so on lately? And you might be one of those who say “I have nothing to hide”. Well…

This one is a must see. It helps if you understand English, French, and German at least a bit, but even if you don’t, watch it to the end:

This comes from the PeerTube, and it promotes those free and decentralised services, and for good reason as you will hear. So please do yourself and us all a favour and stop using Facebook, Whatsapp, and all of that – and replace it with something like Signal or even better, XMPP. We will all profit from it.

Oh, and in case you have an old Android phone which isn’t supported with regular updates anymore, try DivestOS. And if you have a new one from Google, try GrapheneOS (or else, DivestOS again). Sure you can’t live without that intrusive Play Store? Have a look at F-Droid instead. Or are you using Apple instead? Maybe think again… and please start encrypting. You can at least do that even if you stay with a standard Google or Samsung or Apple device.

As always, thanks for reading, and for viewing.

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The reasonable OS choice for older mobile devices

In my recent discussion in one of the GrapheneOS forum threads I was reminded not to encourage people to use that system on devices which aren’t supported anymore, like for instance our Pixel 3a. My follow-up question on how to best preserve such older but perfectly working hardware from becoming landfills, one of the suggestions were that if your tasks don’t really need the highest security, one should probably have a look at DivestOS instead.

And yes, I have read good things about it already, both in the German-speaking blog of Mike Kuketz, and also on the blog of a photographer friend from Florida, US of A. Mike pointed to the About page which states:

DivestOS is a full-time passion project (not a company) maintained solely by Tad (SkewedZeppelin) since 2014. It has many goals, but primarily: prolonging the life-span of discontinued devices, enhancing user privacy, and providing a modest increase of security where/when possible. The devices DivestOS supports are not fully free (as-in-freedom) and there are many security issues we cannot solve such as insecure proprietary blobs, insecure firmware, insecure bootloaders, and insecure ancient kernels. We are also fully aware of our “off-the-rails” approach, however mostly attribute it to the sheer effectiveness provided by “80%” solutions instead of mulling around and not doing anything. We genuinely believe that what DivestOS offers is something unlike any other project, especially with regards to the project scope and our persistence. We hope you find some benefit in our fruits, and remind you to have fun!

And just like the guys from GrapheneOS recommended DivestOS, Tad also writes in the Patch Levely page:

If you want a reasonably secure and well-maintained device, please acquire a newer Pixel (6/6a/7) that is fully supported by GrapheneOS and use it instead.

And that is true. GrapheneOS is probably the most secure system I’ve seen so far, and DivestOS does all they can to provide system updates for devices which aren’t even supported by the hardware vendors (and therefore, also by GrapheneOS) anymore. They even have monthly updates for our 11 year old Google Nexus 10 (Codename “manta”) tablet and its Android version 7 “Nougat”, can you believe that? So it’s this 80% effort Tad writes about which goes a long way, and which helps us all a lot – thanks man!

I’ve made three screenshots of the Pixel 3a running it, still unaltered by me (that came later). Looks like this out of the proverbial box:

DivestOS20 (Android 13) on a Google Pixel 3a, home, apps, and system info screens

So that seems to be the system for older devices. For newer ones, it depends on you or me: stock Android with all its AI goodies like Live Translate from the Google Assistant, or a much more spartan but really more secure GrapheneOS? Only you can decide. At least the Graphene web installer makes it easy in case you want to have a look…

So it’s a big “Thank You!” to people like Daniel and Tad. And like always, thanks to you for reading.

Update, from Sun 20 Aug: here’s an updated version of my home screen on the Google Pixel 3a with DivestOS as the operating system, Lawnchair as an alternative system launcher, itself being updated by Obtainium and directly through GitHub. So it now looks like this:

Themed icons and all, very cool. Almost like a stock Android, but better.

Like always, thanks for viewing, and for reading.

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Curious. And interesting results… (with update)

Over in the discussion forum of GrapheneOS, there was an interesting topic, or so I thought, titled: “Brave vs Vanadium“. In it, someone asked about how the Brave browser did seemingly offer better protection against tracking and fingerprinting vs. the hardened Vanadium browser of GrapheneOS, tho this one might be more secure. Some others mentioned tests I hadn’t seen before, so my interest was piqued, I got curious myself, and wanted to see results. So here we go.

First, the Brave browser on my Arch Linux, with a test from fingerprint.com:

Aha. As expected, I saw my IP (that comes from the router, not my machine), the slightly false geolocation (our IPs always resolve way too far East for some reason), and a unique visitor ID. So there’s no “hiding”, trackers and advertisers always know exactly where you are as long as you don’t use VPNs or the onion routing network.

Second test, same browser, with EFF:

And yes, this is where Brave shines in my opinion. Randomized fingerprint plus ads and trackers blocked, that’s what I expected to see.

Third test, also found recently, the real blocking of ads:

Ouch. 72% or 108 of 150 tests blocked, here I expected something better…

Ok, someone in that discussion thread mentioned Edge, so same tests with that one:

Ouch again, this one’s definitely out. A unique fingerprint and no ad and tracker blocking whatsoever, this is one of the worst I’ve seen.

Onto my main operating system and browser of choice, Firefox (with uBlock Origin) on Debian:

Wow, far better than I had expected! A unique fingerprint according to EFF, okay, but that’s probably due to some extensions like WindowSizer and so on… but that it was 10% better than Brave in the real world ad & tracker tests, I must say that I’m impressed!

Ok, now it gets interesting – we’re on a phone operating system’s discussion forum, so let’s take phones into the equation, shan’t we? I have a Google Pixel 6a with stock Android from Google on which I normally use Firefox (also with uBlock Origin), so let’s see:

Cool… we’re down to “nearly unique”, and to 87% blocking of real ads & trackers… the best so far, isn’t it?

Wait, what about Vanadium? That I have on a Pixel 3a with GrapheneOS, so let’s see:

Also strong protection with a nearly unique fingerprint, but these 90% blockings of ads and trackers, that’s what I wanted to see, wow…

Subjectively, I see less ads in other browsers, so I guess I still have to continue reading and understanding it all – but kudos to the team over at GrapheneOS, you did a marvelous job!

As always, thanks for reading.

Update, from August 3rd, in the evening back at home:

Some people in the mentioned discussion forum over at GrapheneOS asked if I had an ad-blocking DNS provider configured in the Vanadium browser on that Pixel 3a phone, and another one asked to please also repeat a test using the Brave browser on a phone instead of a Linux machine.

Point 1: doh… (me silly, mea culpa, and so on) – of course I had set up a more or less secure environment with Graphene on that older Pixel phone, and that included setting up a secure DNS which also uses ad-blocking. So I had to repeat that test, could do it only today as I haven’t been home for a few days. So here you go, with:

Vanadium on GrapheneOS on a Pixel 3a, *without* an ad-blocking DNS configured:

Ouch! 4% block rate only, that wasn’t good… interestingly, with the same secure DNS configured again, at the first try it was raised to about 29 or 30% only, but that could have been session-related I guess; a later test with the browser newly opened went back to the 90% which I had before.

Point 2: the test with Brave on a phone. Did that while I was away, so here you go:

The fingerprint test, as you can see that was from a different location and IP address…

EFF’s Coveryourtracks test again, as good as before, and

The real world blocking test, exactly the same as on the desktop with Arch.

Now the *real* question was/is still unanswered, namely how both would compare under the same conditions, and from mobile phones. So to be fair to the Brave browser, I set up the same ad-blocking secure DNS provider in its settings, et voilà:

95%, and only 7 of the 150 tested “attacks” left unblocked, that’s the top position of my tests so far.

So how to answer that initial question about which one to choose? Hard to say, maybe I will install and leave both on that Pixel 3a with GrapheneOS, for me Vanadium will most likely always stay the default browser on Graphene (and its web view part anyway), but I will further test Brave when in doubt, or when I see something unusual and/or new.

I’m sorry that my first test attempt was a bit misleading, and I hope this additional one could clear up things a bit? In any case, and as usual, thanks very much for reading.

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Still experimenting with GrapheneOS

Still trying to figure out GrapheneOS on my late brother Willi’s old Pixel 3a phone. Turns out that with the sandboxed Google services activated, you can have the best of both worlds – one profile with free and open source apps, one with all the usual Google Android Apps in case you want these. With the same background picture of our late cat Tuna from 2020, that looks like this:

GrapheneOS with different profiles, open source and Google Apps

As you can see, you can even have the famous Google camera. What I have not found yet is the original Pixel launcher, guess you’d have to use a lookalike like Lawnchair2 or so to get the same look and functionality like on a Pixel with only the Google Android on it.

But this here is way more secure, as all of these apps are sandboxed and don’t have system-wide privileges, unlike with Google’s version of Android. I’m tempted to use it on my main cellphone as well…

Oh, and although installing GrapheneOS is easy especially with the web based installer, there are still some nice video howtos from people like Side Of Burritos, Cozy Living Machine, or Naomi Brockwell. Just in case you want more than just *my* opinions…

As always, thanks for reading.

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Using KDE Connect / GSConnect for battery life

I’ve had problems with swollen batteries on both the old Google Nexus 5 and also the Pixel 4a devices. Nice as they were, this was probably my own fault: like the company’s laptop/notebook, I had them “plugged in” (into their power adapter) pretty much all of the time, and I’ve only recently learnt and read that doing so is putting lots of stress on those rechargeable batteries.

So with the remaining devices (one Pixel 3a which I re-inherited from my late brother, after originally having bought it for Mitchie who gave it to Zuleikha who gave it to Willi – and my Pixel 6a which was a gift from my family and the first ever new phone I’ve got), I’m a bit more careful. What I’ve read is that you shouldn’t let the batteries run out completely and you also shouldn’t always charge them until they’re really full – an 80/20 rule would be much better for longevity. So I’ve decided to use that 80/20 rule whenever possible – meaning charge them when the batteries reach 20% (turning on their battery saver at that percentage as well, in case I don’t see it), and charge them up to 80% mostly, and only to the max if I know I’ll be out of the house for a while and want them to last as long as possible.

They last long anyway, at least with my way of using them. Here’s a screenshot from the 3a where you can see the reloading to about 80% spike after a few days:

That one lasts long because first, I don’t use it that much (it doesn’t even have a SIM card, so I use it via WLAN only), and second I had its original Google Android operating system replaced with GrapheneOS which doesn’t “call home” as much as the original did. In fact, no Google services on this one at all…

… but also the Pixel 6a is pretty good once I turned off everything I don’t really need, like location history or Google’s “Fit” and other stuff. This one *does* have a SIM card, but I also don’t use it really often, so here’s a screenshot showing that I charged it to 100% last Friday evening, and the screenshot was taken this morning, at 25% battery life left. As you can see, I’ve used it for reading a bit, with a free PDF viewer:

So how do I keep track of charging them up to 80% only, instead of full? Easy: I’ll get a notification from my computer, like this:

And that one comes from a program / an extension on my desktop which is called GSConnect. You can set it like this, like here for the Pixel 3a:

On the phones, the application you have to install is KDE Connect, and you can get that from the F-Droid store in case you don’t want to be logged in into Google just to use their own “Play Store”.

The application can do lots more than just notify you about the battery status, but that is what I usually do with it – looks like this on the Gnome desktop:

According to its Wikipedia page, KDE Connect is also available for Microsoft Windows and for Apple’s MacOS, but I haven’t tried these. Go on and see for yourself if you’re using these. It’s built right into KDE (their “Plasma” desktop) in case you want to try that as well.

Hoping that this is useful for anyone. Like always, thanks for reading.