[7speter]

I imagine if you want a phone that espouses “freedom,” you’ll want to build it with a board that definitely doesnt have any sort of malware (ROM?) baked in. We are supposed to be pretty certain raspberry pis doesn’t have any of that going on, but what about boards with sketchy origins?

[thenthenthen]

Define origins

[7speter]

>Define origins Well thats the thing. What if the claimed origins are false? Or what if these nameless boards were made during the night shift at a legit factory, but a rogue actor paid extra to have something bad baked in. A lot of people buy stuff off of aliexpress, but I sorta remain skeptical.

[JPLeRouzic]

> these nameless boards were made during the night shift at a legit factory, but a rogue actor paid extra to have something bad baked in.

This happens everywhere. Look at various devices that are inserted in routers, CPU and microcode of Western equipment. A mobile modem is a black box, what's inside it? What are over-the-air capabilities built in the SIM card of your phone? This exists since decades.

More-so I worked (now retired) in Telecom industry and for two years I was responsible of lawful interception in (French) Britanny. I was horrified to learn that French police was listening to people conversations without asking for any authorization by a judge (kinda unlawful interception).

One also can wonder why IEEE 802.11 security is so bad and why so many good proposals have been repulsed under weird reasons (I attended IEEE 802.11 meetings for two years).

Even standards implicitly make room for (legit) lawful interception:

https://www.itu.int/dms_pub/itu-t/oth/23/04/T23040000010004P...