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What do you think will happen next?
Development of Linux on mobile will ramp up.
EU or similar wrecking Google over being monopolistic would be nice but unlikely.
Same but targeting phone manufacturers.
We need the EU to regulate Banking and Payment apps to not rely on Google apis first and mandate that they have to be available in open app stores or as apk.
They don't even do that with their own apps.
Maybe they can regulate themselves first as a start then. They already use Matrix, so it’s not like they are completely lost regarding IT Security and FOSS.
Right now the EU regulation is pushing banks to require more of Google or Apple because it's unclear and banks won't take a chance of getting fined.
Among the requirements are: ensure the device and the OS were not "altered". What does that mean exactly? Answer: [crickets].
But that's why many banks just go with the Google Play Integrity API.
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From the EU to wreck Google e-Foundation, with advantage substituting GMail, GDocs and GDrive >Murena Workspace, Murena Phones (FairPhone) with /e/OS by default, Murena is OpenSource (GitLab) selfhostable or Freemium if not, including Murena Cloud., All 100% de-googled and encrypted, no knowledge. The EU offers enough alternatives, you only have to use these.
i was going to do this until i discovered that their non-pixel devices have poor network coverage in the united states.
also doesn't /e/os has the same problems that other projects like grapheneos has when it comes to google locking down android?
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Plain burner flip phone and a wifi only Linux device that connects to a hotspot. F google and Apple.
@Sailor88@lemmy.world @ComradePedro@lemmy.ml
I'd really love a Linux phone (personally, I have a Linux PC and I use Arch, btw) so don't get me wrong when I question: what about the banking and government apps? Yeah, because finance systems are getting increasingly digital around the world and every payment will eventually need to involve banking apps, and you guessed it: just Android (Google) and iOS (Apple), no Linux, no KaiOS. One will eventually need apps to pay for rent and consumer bills, even for buying groceries, as fiat currency will get more digital and less physical.
And, no, European Union won't fight against it because, in fact, the same European Union is seeking to digitalize EUR (see "ECB publishes third progress report on the digital euro preparation phase", published by European Central Bank on 16 July 2025). It's not a matter of if, but when physical currencies will become ruled out, and "For Our Security™", Linux (alonside other alternative OSes) will either be ruled out from internet banking altogether or it'll be forced to comply with "security requirements" that, in practice, would turn Linux indistinguishable from Android and iOS.
And this seems to be where everywhere is headed, it's not just an European or USian phenomenon. The future is bleak.
You will use Monero or Parrish.
No, seriously though, the circular economy is growing and by contributing to it, you are giving the middle finger to these fuckers.
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what about the banking and government apps?
Use the browser versions. Not everything has to be done through apps
@mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works
I'm Brazilian and many Brazilian banks require apps, be it for generating a unique code (e.g. Itaú's iToken) to authorize/authenticate, to scan a QR code every time the Web client requests an action (e.g. Mercado Pago and Santander), or even to do mobile-only transactions such as Pix (Brazilian instant payment/transfer) because our Central Bank (BACEN, who created and maintains Pix nationwide) requires banks to limit Pix in a per-device basis. The latter is crucial because Pix became the main payment method around here, and it can't be done through Web browsers.
Then, there are the "safety measures" inherent to these banking apps, so they refuse to work outside rawdogged Android/iOS. Even enabling "Developer mode" or having some apps installed (such as Termux; apps can see which other apps you have installed) is enough for some banks to refuse logging in (and certain banking apps won't even tell why, just some generic error message).
Also, depending on where a person works, the employer may require the employee to receive their paycheck at a specific bank, which in turn will require an app if the employee is willing to use their own paycheck to pay their bills. Banks have been trying to push their mobile internet banking to their customers, with many banks (such as Bradesco) closing many of their physical branches so people have no nearby ATMs to do banking things.
Finally, even browser-based internet banking (e.g. Caixa Econômica Federal) sometimes require the installation of software akin to kernel-level anti-cheat because "muh security", and some will support neither Linux nor virtualized Windows (most (if not all) virtualization hypervisors can be easily detected by techniques such as the Red-Pill).
So it's not as easy as "use the browser versions", unfortunately.
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"Linux phones will skyrocketed" by who? Nerds, the comum user doesn't care if Android is proprietary or opensource, they don't even know.
There's already other mobile OS but have the same issue, no apps or developers interested on making apps for it.
FirefoxOS, Ubuntu touch, something else Linux based, it's for some nerds play on a secondary phone.
Comum people don't stop using Windows or macOS because it's proprietary or a privacy nightmare. EU didn't stop selling iPhones because it's proprietary.
It's the device vendors that decide which OS would ship, and people will use it
And yet Linux usage on desktop is rising.
Not as much as it should be IMO but it's fallacy to think things won't change.
Or is IBM still top dog?
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As of right now, it's looking like GrapheneOS will be unaffected, and Google has yet to lock down the bootloader. So this should remain a valid option for at least 2 years.
Other than that:
- Any smartphones with an unlocked bootloader + any ROMs without gapps
- Chinese smartphones with non-Google Android builds
- Linux smartphones
- Bonus: Huawei is about to release their own non-Android OS, but I wouldn't expect it to be privacy-friendly
Honestly there probably isn't any good, long-term solution. Personally I'm somewhat shocked we've gone this many years with reasonably open smartphones. Next step is probably closing bootloaders in new laptops, as part of the switch to ARM (which is already undergoing).
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Yes, absolutely there is hope.
Phones that don't support Google play services (AKA any hardcore privacy phone) will not be directly effected by Google restricting sideloading. The restriction is only for phones that use the Google suite. (source: https://9to5google.com/2025/08/25/android-apps-developer-verification/ "This requirement applies to 'certified Android devices' that have Play Protect and are preloaded with Google apps.") Graphene OS isn't going anywhere, AOSP is open source, even if Google tried to make that change in the OS, the community would hard-fork AOSP instantly and continue like nothing ever happened.
Realistically this is going to squeeze people "in the middle" towards fully-google controlled Android (one exteme) and towards fully-de-googled Android (the other extreme). Its just elminating the middle. Which is bad for people trying to gradually de-google their life, but not as dire as it might seem.
On the bright side, this is an opportunity for play-services spoofing to become commonplace and easy, and could cause more apps to avoid google play services. The EU also has a shot at forcing google to allow sideloading, since they've recently been forcing Apple to move in that direction.
So, while not a bright future, its far from hopeless for privacy respecting Android phones.
This is the point, isn't it?
Lock down their own ecosystem because they're jealous of how Apple does it, so they can herd all users into their walled garden. Then close the gates behind them. There's no easy way out, you can't just wander back and forth anymore. You have to scale a wall in the dead of night and shed a tear as you look back and see everyone else having a lovely life, then set off into the dark forest of privacy on your own.
People hate friction in the first place. This is as much friction as they can realistically make on their own without triggering anti-trust cases and EU fines.
Until substantially more people join the fight for privacy or something else fundamentally changes, I think there is a very real possibility of Google completely clamping down on Android while governments and workplaces mandate apps that only run on phones with all of Google or Apple's bells and whistles.
But the folks at GrapheneOS, Calyx, and Murena seem to be a devoted and resourceful bunch, so I am hopeful that they can give something for us to work with, even if Google pulls the plug, whether it's a fork of Android or rebasing to mobile Linux.
If that all falls through, I'll look for whichever phone supports Linux best and eventually move everything over. The vast majority of the apps I use regularly on my GrapheneOS phone aren't very demanding and have a decent alternative on Linux. And whatever apps are forced on me by other people will reside on a dedicated Android phone, ideally with a removable battery.
For this year, I'd still recommend a secondhand or reseller Pixel with GrapheneOS. Everything just works on it.
Linux phone will hopefully become realistic thing.
But the more this goes on the more my attitude has changed. I now do far less on my phone, I'm more careful about what I expose to it. As a result I spend very little time on it and that's been great.
To be clear I hate what's happening, it's just been working out to improve my time.
Said this in another thread
So how long until celluar providers also say you have to have a trusted device to activate your SIM? Apple, Google, Samsung, automotive and Windows would be fine and they’d probably allow their branded or limited hotspots.
This would basically eliminate any Linux option (pc or phone), and DIY devices. I could see other OOB vendors getting on board to be certified to have a certificate issued to them.
Fuck it, I'm going back to Landline
Weary traveler, I beseeth thee to not harken down this path.
I hear tales of dark spirits haunting those old byways. Ones of greed, with an emotionless façade, and hunger for gold from too-eager souls.
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Well, I'm still hoping for Linux phones to skyrocket a bit when more people realize we're fucked with Google. But as of today I don't think we have a reliable alternative for day to day use...
We first need Linux phones to be reliable daily drivers; so far everyone I've encountered who has a linux phone says it's usable... wiþ caveats.
We have to eliminate þe caveats in at least a handful of phones, first.
This is America. We don’t do privacy and consumer rights. You will freely give all your data to a tech company where you are the product up for sale.
This is the internet, not America
Related: Has anyone here used Pretty Good Phone Privacy (PGPP)?
What about a Murena phone such as the Fairphone 6 ? Is /e/os impacted?
Fairphone 6, especially with /e/os is not an option atm from a security standpoint. But then again, no phone is except iPhones and Pixels (and more recent Samsung phones).
Fairphone 6 does not keep up with standard Android privacy/security patches and has no secure element to provide working disk encryption for typical users not using a strong password, among other flaws.
Regarding privacy, Murena is shilling their own proprietary Apps as alternatives to Google.
/e/OS includes numerous non-private apps and services. The Murena voice-to-text service included in /e/OS even sends user speech data to OpenAI with no local option compared to Apple and Google both offering offline speech-to-text support via local models which users can make sure is always used:
https://community.e.foundation/t/voice-to-text-feature-using-open-ai/70509
Taken from the Graphene OS forum
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There's no hope for privacy at all as long as American and the 5 eyes exist.
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I'm afraid not.
I'm not gonna go looking for it or share it, but I am here using my Librem 5 and kinda feeling like that kid in the meme hitting a bong in the background while people in the foreground fight.
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Yes. As long as GrapheneOS still exists there is at least some hope. The sad thing is even before this outside of GrapheneOS there really isn't any other "ROM" actually focused on privacy.
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this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2025
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Privacy
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