A lot of people on this forum, and in Jolla’s sales pitch for SFOS, tout the better security and privacy of Sailfish when compared to, say IOS or Android. I would like to understand if this is actually true and why.
I get the argument that because the Sailfish user base is tiny when compared to the mainstream mobile OSs that its unlikely to be specifically targeted by hackers (i.e. ‘security through obscurity’), but other than that, what makes it better?
I know that Android apps collect and use personal data for all sorts of purposes, but what stops Sailfish apps from doing the same? Sure, a lot of SFOS apps are open source, but has anybody done a code-walk or otherwise checked all these apps to actually make sure that there are no built in data trackers?
And don’t IOS and Android have encryption, sandboxing, app permissions, etc?
Furthermore, if you look at AppSupport on the mainstream SFOS devices (i.e. excluding the Jolla C2 on SFOS 5.0) the security patch level is from December 2023, well over a year ago - isn’t that a huge security risk?
So apart from the above, what makes SFOS the mobile OS of choice for the security and privacy conscious user?
I’m not the guy to give an exhaustive and balanced technical answer to all your questions, but one thing I do know, all SFOS apps are carefully dissected by many enthusiasts, at least the open-sourced ones. If they are not open source… then simply do not use them.
Well there are exceptions. The proprietary Jolla apps, where you simply have to rely on Jolla.
I think it’s true and still a good idea to use SFOS for data security reasons.
The first reason you mentioned in section #2 of your post. Mass hack attacks will not work on SFOS because they target to the bugs and backdoors of Android. But surely SFOS will not withstand a targeted hack attack coming from a government or secret service instance.
section #3: I did and found nothing evil in the apps, but some g++gle servers in some system config files, e.g. time server of GPS system, and Browser. check about:config in stock browser and you’ll see.
#4: SFOS has ‘Sailjail’
#5: Theoretically yes, but no, if you avoid the usage of intrusive Android apps.
#6: SFOS enables you to stay away from Big Data, no Google or Apple account is needed, and it’s advertising free!
But big part of data security is your own personal behavior! If you have a SFOS phone and then you install all these apps from big tech chat apps, junk apps from delivery or pizza service, insurances, public transport, railway, e-bike rental and parking operators, then surely privacy is gone again and SFOS will not help you.
Also it can be that some Android apps will not work on SFOS Appsupport. This is exactly because SFOS protects you if some apps try to do nasty things. Download Android apps only from F-Droid or really trusted sources. You can manually install .apk files on the SFOS phone.
Yes, but both Android and IOS implement sandboxing to restrict apps access to system resources, so is there any real difference?
Agreed, but for a lot of people (probably the majority) AppSupport makes the difference between making SFOS usable as a daily driver and unusable (using only native apps). I know this has been covered before, but modern life makes some apps indispensable these days. For example, I can try all I like to persuade all my friends and relatives to use Telegram as their messaging app (so that I can use Fernshreiber or Yottagram natively), but if they are already using Whatsapp to connect with their friends, relatives, etc, most will not agree to change. Another example is that I have to use Slack for my work - its company policy and I cannot change it no matter how much I might like to disagree with it. And this is presumably why AppSupport exists at all - to make SFOS usable for the majority.
Same argument … SFOS users then install MicroG to make at least some of these ‘essential to them’ apps work with signature spoofing, cloud notifications, etc.
Yes, that is a big advantage of SFOS!
Agreed, I think I’m coming to the conclusion that, in general security and privacy terms, and unless you restrict your usage to only native SFOS apps, and only if you use open source SFOS apps that have been checked and found not to scrape personal data for other uses, then SFOS as a daily driver with App Support, maybe MicroG, etc is inherently no more secure than anything else.
Hahaha!!! We had this discussion abt. 100 times here in the forum! I’m one of the minority and my friends take the effort and write an e-mail or call me up if they want something from me.
Yes, I have … but it is very buggy. Messages are displayed out of order, the unread message count is always wrong, multi-threading doesn’t really work properly at all and support for modern slack features and functions (other than pure text messaging with picture attachments) is absent. Sadly, I don’t believe the app is maintained any more and has simply fallen too far behind to be useful now .
Yep, and yet here we are all still here, and here we are all talking about the same things as before … the textbook definition of insanity - doing the same thing, in the same way, over and over again, and expecting the outcome to be different …
More secure? Arguably no. You can fuck up things quite easily.
A standard Android or iPhone is pretty secure by default. There is no way to get root, a whole bunch of quality of life features like “Find my phone”, “Press Power button 5 times to disable fingerprint unlock if the cops try to force you to unlock your phone with your fingerprints”, Spam Caller detection, Automatic theft detection, the ability to remotely disable your phone if it gets stolen, Google (or Apple) Safetynet etc.
But it also is not very private. There is telemetry everywhere, your data gets exported into the US and Korea or China, you’re forced to have a Google/Apple account, your email at either gets read etc
SFOS on the other hand gives you more autonomy over your device, but that comes with a lack of the security features mentioned before. Flash things wrongly? Might have a brick. Phone gets stolen? It’s gone. Police wants you to unlock your phone? Better not have any fingerprint unlock enabled in the first place.
But it also gives you a whole lot more privacy, by not doing any of the things listed above.
More secure; perhaps not… More private and much less intrusive - most certainly. With that said, for every Android device that is potentially more secure, there is at least a dozen that are laughably bad. What aspect(s) of security are you actually after?
Trust - which is sort weak-sauce as a safeguard.
Basically all, no?
Same question towards a Linux-distro… somehow this seems to be a non-issue there too.
The data-stealing flashlight app was picked up quick enough.
Fairly certain that can be implemented by any developer well within an afternoon.
Be the solution.
Change from using Whatsapp that they use to message everyone else to using (or adding) Telegram just so that they can message me using a SFOS native app without the ‘security issues’ of installing Whatsapp via Appsupport.
I’m not ‘after’ anything. I’m just curious to understand if SFOS really is more secure and private when compared with mainstream IOS, Android, etc, or whether its just sales hype.
Indeed it is. Back in my Blackberry 10 OS days there was an ‘open source developer’ of apps (can’t remember the name) who produced some quite functionally rich native BB10 apps as replacements for mainstream IOS and Android apps (things like Facebook, Instagram, etc) before, years later, it was found that he had been scraping and selling personal data collected by his apps all the while. Eventually word got out on the BB forums and people uninstalled and avoided his apps - but by then the damage was done.
I don’t know about the Jolla apps or other bits of the OS, say things that were contributed by Rostelcom back when they were working with Jolla. Presumably all of their code contributions have not since been stripped out?
I have a different opinion on this. Only because the others all use WhatsApp, you don’t need to “fall” and also use it. There is still (but insecure) plain old SMS service which literally EVERYONE can use. So, if some people won’t like to switch to Signal (which I use), then I just say to them, well, then you can only reach me via SMS or phone. For some people this is enough, and other people will eventually get Signal just to chat with me. If you are important to a person, then I think the choice of messaging app won’t (shouldn’t!) matter to them.
Not a good idea! Fingerprint recognition often fails for cold or wet finger. This would block the phone for the rest of the day until user is at home again and can unlock the phone with a looong unlock code.
Better would be: one special finger (and also an extra special unlock password / PIN) immediately erases al memory and immediately resets the device without any further question.
I know for a fact that I would manage to delete my phone if I pulled it out of a jacket pocket or rummaged around im my backpack for it if the wrong fingerprint deleted it
.