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hkgvktoday at 7:10 AM6 repliesview on HN

The only reason I have not switched Graphene is because for reasons I do not understand, Graphene OS is very closely tied with Google hardware.

I bought a /e/os Fairphone instead.


Replies

defrosttoday at 7:25 AM

Give it a year, we may have GrapheneOS/Motorola then ...

* (March 2026) Motorola announces a partnership with GrapheneOS Foundation - https://motorolanews.com/motorola-three-new-b2b-solutions-at...

cromkatoday at 7:12 AM

Those reasons are explained clearly and openly. Ironically, your /o/OS is way less open than GOS on Google hardware.

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petutoday at 9:22 AM

Pixels are consistently "third party Android builds friendly", plus GrapheneOS has a list of required security features (beyond their control): https://grapheneos.org/faq#future-devices

e.g. first one in the list:

> Support for using alternate operating systems including full hardware security functionality

GrapheneOS wants users to lock the bootloader (≈enable Secure Boot) after install by providing user signing keys (avb_custom_key) -- that already seems to leave only Pixel, Nothing and Fairphone.

https://github.com/chenxiaolong/avbroot/issues/299

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prmoustachetoday at 9:19 AM

I bought a second hand pixel when I had to buy a new phone. Still better for the planet than buying a new fairphone anyway.

gf000today at 7:35 AM

It's because only Pixel devices have proper hardware security to build anything secure on top.

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microtonaltoday at 10:44 AM

Sigh, /e/OS.

Your phone is running proprietary Google DroidGuard blobs in a privileged process every time an app initiates a Play Integrity request.

If you install some Google apps like Google Maps, they are run with more privileges than other apps (their microG fork gives apps elevated privileges when they match certain Google signing key fingerprints).

Also, your device is running a firmware bundle provided by Fairphone's Chinese ODM, including TCL image processing blobs. Your phone will soon run an ancient kernel and firmware tree with many known critical CVEs.

But this all doesn't matter anyway, because security hardening is only for spies and pedophiles according to the CEO of Murena (the company that makes /e/OS).