Privacy

Android is a secure operating system that has strong app sandboxing, Verified Boot (AVB), and a robust permission control system. When you buy an Android phone, the device’s default operating system often comes with invasive integration with apps and services that are not part of the Android Open-Source Project. An example of such is Google Play Services, which has irrevocable privileges to access your files, contacts storage, call logs, SMS messages, location, camera, microphone, hardware identifiers, and so on....

While source code is critical for user autonomy, it isn’t required to evaluate software security or understand run-time behavior. One of the biggest parts of the Free and Open Source Software definitions is the freedom to study a program and modify it; in other words, access to editable source code. I agree that such access is essential; however, far too many people support source availability for the wrong reasons. One such reason is that source code is necessary to have any degree of transparency into how a piece of software operates, and is therefore necessary to determine if it is at all secure or trustworthy....

The first task a person should do when taking steps to protect their privacy and security is to make a threat model. Defining a threat To make a threat model, we must first define a threat. A common mistake made by people who are just getting into the privacy space is to define the threat as “big-tech companies.” There is a fundamental problem with this definition: Why are we not trusting “big-tech companies,” but then shift our trust to “small-tech companies”?...