[palata]

There are security reasons to use locked bootloaders.

But I do agree that we should be able to unlock and relock the bootloader. That's one of the reasons GrapheneOS supports the Google Pixel, for instance. The security model relies on the locked bootloader.

[realusername]

Very few people need a GrapheneOS level of security anyways.

Yeah sure there's a few cases where it make sense but they are few and far between.

[palata]

I meant it's part of the Android security model. That's what makes Android more secure than Desktop OSes, for instance. A locked bootloader is a great way to make sure that the base system hasn't been tampered with, e.g. by malware.

It is desirable for anyone who doesn't want malware.

[realusername]

I mean yeah sure, third party apps on android have a strong security model but what's the point when GrapheneOS is the only rom making updates on time, the play store runs as admin and manufacturer apps and driver can do whatever they want?

The OS is borked even before you install even a single of these highly sandboxed third party apps.

While in theory that model sounds great, in practice the security is worse than your average Linux distribution and the only people which managed to make it work is the GrapheneOS non-profit representing less that 0.1% of the devices.

(And ironically the only secure Android rom doesn't fully pass Play Integrity)

[palata]

Well the secure boot is about the OS itself. Of course... you have to trust the OS. Including all the firmwares that are embedded into it and make your hardware run.

I don't know if there is much value in arguments like "in theory that's great, but in practice I don't trust anyone other than X so anything that is not X is worse".

[realusername]

> Well the secure boot is about the OS itself. Of course... you have to trust the OS.

So we're back to square one then, it's pointless because you can't trust mobile OS like you can with desktop OS.

Before talking about secure boot, Android needs a way to attest what's in the OS we're saying we are booting...

I'm not even sure Google themselves are fully aware of what's inside specific models.

> I don't know if there is much value in arguments like "in theory that's great, but in practice I don't trust anyone other than X so anything that is not X is worse".

I would rephrase it as why attesting that we have an unknown and outdated OS is valuable to the phone owner?

[palata]

I'm really not sure what you are talking about. When I run GrapheneOS, "the OS" is open source. It includes some binary blobs, just like my desktop Linux.

> I would rephrase it as why attesting that we have an unknown and outdated OS is valuable to the phone owner?

I am not sure if you're genuinely not understanding what the secure boot does, or if you're just venting about the situation with mobile phones.

The secure boot is there to attest that the OS running on your phone is coming from the manufacturer and has not been tampered with by a malware. If you don't trust the manufacturer or if the manufacturer doesn't update the OS frequently enough, then I guess you should look for another manufacturer. GrapheneOS is pretty much up-to-date.