/e/OS is not fully degoogled, as DNS connectivity checks, hardware attestation provisioning, and eSIM activation all go through Google.
It is often many weeks or months behind on security updates, especially in the WebView, which makes it easy to exploit.
It doesn’t support bootloader locking on many devices, and if you lock the bootloader on a phone that does support it, it could brick if /e/OS is on an older security patch than the stock ROM was.
It doesn’t use a lot of the hardening in GrapheneOS such as hardened_malloc which prevents memory corruption exploits, even if the hardware supports it.
And finally, /e/OS’s text-to-speech sends what you say to OpenAI, despite local options being available.
If you want a properly secure Android phone, the best option is GrapheneOS, however it only supports Pixel phones and future Motarola phones due to its high security requirements.
If you can’t get a Pixel then iOS in lockdown mode is the next best option, however if you can’t replace your phone, LineageOS is much worse than Graphene although it is still much better than /e/.
As someone who bought a Murena FairPhone 5 with /e/OS preinstalled because I had the option to pay a reasonable price for a decent phone that isn’t Google branded, and have been enjoying the experience with it for a while now, I don’t think I’m going to fall for that very obvious rage bait that’s been copy-pasted from an aggressive forum post.
I’ll give GrapheneOS my attention when it works on more than one phone. I hear Motorola is building a second phone for it to be compatible with.
what has prompted this, I wonder.
Is it already time for the lead GrapheneOS developer’s annual crash out? Where do the years go?
the fun thing is like, I use grapheneOS on a pixel 10 pro, though I find it kind of difficult to fess up to given the cringeworthy escapades of the graphene community.
who pissed in their cereal? does the mere presence of other ROM projects attack their identity in some way? have they claimed to be more secure than GOS and others?
You’re an ungrateful one huh. I wonder if you hate any of the other people who make software you use. 🤔💭
Wow what a leap. note that i said community and not project members, though they’ve not been without controversy either. let’s not pretend micay wasn’t massively problematic,
If I’m not mistaken that guy completely left the project like a while back now. Hasnt been involved in any way for a hot minute
AFAIK he’s just stepped down from being lead dev and still works on the projects. Doesn’t really feel different though because he’s still the only name I’d recognise online.
Wrong about everything + no arguments award 🏅
This is honeslty a shameful post. A personal rant with just a nasty agenda
People or projects attacking other privacy focused projects working on good faith intent to help us escape the duopoly are just sad. If a project doesn’t fit your personal needs, so be it, move on
As a whole we need as many of these projects to succeed & elevate as possible. Shooting at others because you got your feelings hurt elsewhere is childish and self-defeating for all. Last thing we need is creating a monopoly of privacy focused options
Security is very important.
Sure is. And if you ain’t surfing nasty sites, loading ‘free’ VPN spyware, crap AI dung & scammy apps it’s all good
Android OS is a very secure OS. Google recently moved their older devices to quarterly updates versus monthly. Are we now saying those older pixels (still in support life) are insecure because they could go 3 months w/o an update? In itself that move is telling & obliterates the marketing scare tactics used by some & some projects. It’s sad really.
Common sense and good online habits will take you further than all else
The reason I wrote my post is because there are better alternatives, like Graphene if you have a Pixel and can accept sandboxed Play services, or LineageOS which is less secure but works on many more phones and supports MicroG.
/e/ is very insecure compared to those, and it is likely easy for someone who has bought a used Cellebrite to get into it and make your lockscreen useless.
That may be true but it is still my best option if Google plays idiot like they seem to be planning. My current phone supports e/OS for the record and that’s the only reason I’ve paid it attention.
Ive always thought having options was a good thing.
If I drive a car towards a crosswalk, and people in it scream at me to stop, am I less culpable or more culpable if I have the window rolled down to yell “I’m going to brake in a second, you can trust me”? What if I know my brakes are worn out and I am already braking?
what.
Good thing no one forces you to use it.
Ah, but have you tried IodeOS?
It seems to be LineageOS with some extra preinstalled apps. I doubt it is horrible but there is little reason to pick it over Lineage, especially as Lineage will get security updates a bit sooner and lets you install MicroG as sandboxed user apps instead of system apps.
Removed by mod
Booooriing. (Written fro e/OS phone)
OP was insecure that his weird rant was getting downvoted so he upvoted yt on his alt accounts.
I hate /e/OS for sucking the air out of the room and leaving divestOS stranded. Fuck you /e/OS.
Smart phones are a bad idea. A simple, dumb phone to make calls, texts and occasionally tether your laptop, vehicle tablet to for data access are all you really need. Even the dumb phone should have physical switches for the radios and a battery that can be removed without any tools.
The problem is that real dumb phones are hard to find. Many modern “dumb phones” are actually full android devices, complete with a boatload of spyware that helps keep the cost of the device itself low.
KaiOS is better but that’s a whole linux distro, with similar issues.
Since you mentioned tethering, do you have an example of a non android (or at least one that’s not preloaded with a ton of spyware) dumbphone that supports usb tethering? I am skeptical that a real dumbphone would have this feature.
Nokia 2780 is not bad. It runs KaiOS, supports tethering and 4G cell data. As long as you stick to the script on how you use the device it will have minimal privacy issues IMHO. If that is still not enough you can skip phones altogether and get a 4G dongle for your favorite Linux laptop/tablet and just use a softphone + voip service.
