78
Disable Your Mobile Ad ID
(firewallsdontstopdragons.com)
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 10 May 2025
78 points (98.8% liked)
Privacy Guides
18988 readers
15 users here now
In the digital age, protecting your personal information might seem like an impossible task. We’re here to help.
This is a community for sharing news about privacy, posting information about cool privacy tools and services, and getting advice about your privacy journey.
You can subscribe to this community from any Kbin or Lemmy instance:
Check out our website at privacyguides.org before asking your questions here. We've tried answering the common questions and recommendations there!
Want to get involved? The website is open-source on GitHub, and your help would be appreciated!
This community is the "official" Privacy Guides community on Lemmy, which can be verified here. Other "Privacy Guides" communities on other Lemmy servers are not moderated by this team or associated with the website.
Moderation Rules:
- We prefer posting about open-source software whenever possible.
- This is not the place for self-promotion if you are not listed on privacyguides.org. If you want to be listed, make a suggestion on our forum first.
- No soliciting engagement: Don't ask for upvotes, follows, etc.
- Surveys, Fundraising, and Petitions must be pre-approved by the mod team.
- Be civil, no violence, hate speech. Assume people here are posting in good faith.
- Don't repost topics which have already been covered here.
- News posts must be related to privacy and security, and your post title must match the article headline exactly. Do not editorialize titles, you can post your opinions in the post body or a comment.
- Memes/images/video posts that could be summarized as text explanations should not be posted. Infographics and conference talks from reputable sources are acceptable.
- No help vampires: This is not a tech support subreddit, don't abuse our community's willingness to help. Questions related to privacy, security or privacy/security related software and their configurations are acceptable.
- No misinformation: Extraordinary claims must be matched with evidence.
- Do not post about VPNs or cryptocurrencies which are not listed on privacyguides.org. See Rule 2 for info on adding new recommendations to the website.
- General guides or software lists are not permitted. Original sources and research about specific topics are allowed as long as they are high quality and factual. We are not providing a platform for poorly-vetted, out-of-date or conflicting recommendations.
Additional Resources:
- EFF: Surveillance Self-Defense
- Consumer Reports Security Planner
- Jonah Aragon (YouTube)
- r/Privacy
- Big Ass Data Broker Opt-Out List
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
Buy a used pixel in cash, install Graphene. This is probably the best way to accomplish running without google services.
pixels are expensive and unavailable in my area.
i hate this trend of needing specific unobtanium hardware for privacy.
The reason for pixel has to do with meeting graphene’s specific security and privacy guidelines. You can read them here https://grapheneos.org/faq#future-devices. I’m not a pixel fan specifically, but I am Graphene fan and I like my privacy and security.
Then maybe Graphene should amend their guidelines to address that not everyone can get that phone, especially after Orange Man tariffs
Maybe that should be the case. But according to them they are unwilling to budge on any of the guidelines as to not sacrifice any of their goals of privacy and security.
Hopefully someday they either support more devices, or preferably more devices meet the guidelines. I personally would like to see devices that are better supported from a repairability point of view, like the fairphone or hmd skyline.
But, none of that changes the fact that if you want to forgo google play services on android in a secure and private way today, a pixel with Graphene is going to be your best bet. What I would like to be, or what I think should be has no bearing on that answer.
Yeah, same. I'm a GOS user myself but hate the absolutism some people have about it. I would've probably gone with Lineage if I hadn't bought this particular phone (and would likely go there anyway after the support ends, as GOS' support is relatively short).
Edit: where I am, Pixels are also not officially available (although still surprisingly popular despite that, as they're easy to get from unofficial resellers) and expensive relative to average income - like, the latest models would be completely out of my reach, their cost is egregious, and even a generation behind ($300) was still a lot.
For me it isn’t absolutism. It is about trying to get the most private secure setup I can. Currently, that is Graphene and that required a pixel. If there ever comes a time where another device is supported, preferably one focused on repairability, I will go that way.
I meant "Absolutism" not in the way of "actually being superior in one way or another", but rather "considering other options invalid even though they might be good compromises for some people".
A fork of GOS for EOL devices would be pretty nice I agree , but GOS doesn't decise phone security, manufacturers do. Any phone with good enough security would be a target device for GOS.
Calyx OS usually run longer on EOL so I would go there before lineage.
I absolutely understand why GOS stops updates when it does. And that's precisely why I dislike the absolutism - the user might have other priorities.
Well . That's what forks are for. The aim of GOS is not to support a lot of devices. Since it can't achieve its goals of a reasonable secure device that way. But as I said a fork of GOS would be good , or longer support from calyx. I think I got a year more out of a pixel 3 on calyx OS. But if your goal is maximum security there is no way around the fact that without manufacturers updates and to a certain extent hardware limitations, it won't be possible to do.
But best would be a good Linux phone so we can move away from Android all together, hope we can see that soon
most people for whom I help configure their phones they don't want to buy a new one. and they are often terribly afraid of used phones. I don't have any google services on my phone, the problem is not about me, but lets be honest, the absolute majority of the world's population
Why such an obsession with used Pixels? While $300 for mine was expensive, it wasn't a lottery when buying at least, and its battery didn't come pre-worn. Also I had no trouble buying it in cash.
Why would I buy brand new when I could provide life to a phone that might otherwise end up in a landfill?
Because no one should give Google any more money! Buying second hand/refurbished is the only way it makes sense for me to get a device by a large corporation like that.
I've had a couple of refurbished pixel phones and they've each worked well for years. The battery health was at about 95% when I bought them I think.
But by that logic, the unofficial reseller I buy from has also already paid Google for the phones they're selling now...
Google do Google stuff not because they are evil. They do it because they can , which is true for any company in this system. If another takes the position it will do the same. Also its not like phones are Googles main income source. Buying a pixel and putting GOS on it probably is worse for Googles bottom line , no matter new or used, than using a stock any other Android.
they didn't mean to buy from a reseller who got it directly from google, but to buy from people who had it and are selling it now.
Yeah but you have no control over how other people spend their money. That second hand phone would still be there whether you buy it or not. But if you buy a new one you're giving google more money.
Ideally there would be no second hand google phones because nobody would buy them new, but that's not happening