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GrapheneOS makers take a knife to this 'Google-free' phone coming to the US (Updated)
(www.androidauthority.com)
this post was submitted on 19 Jul 2025
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Most Android phones from brands smaller than Samsung and Google fail the first requirement. Most Android phones are years behind the most basic iPhone in terms of security, mostly because of manufacturers cheaping out and a race to the bottom even in phones more expensive than a second hand car.
Graphene's thread model is "a (corrupt) cop can't see my location history and every account I've ever logged into by plugging my phone into a USB device" and most brands fail horribly at it. Only Pixels with GrapheneOS are safe as of the latest article about it, with iPhones and Pixels coming in second.
LineageOS is even worse, unless you manage to lock the bootloader without bricking your phone post install. Any time you lose sight of your phone for any moment (i.e. at an airport) you should reflash your entire OS if you care about basic privacy. I don't know why relocking the bootloader seems to be such a challenge for device manufacturers, but it's proving to be a rather niche requirement despite being the most basic security feature you could implement.
Most people don't really care about security and offline privacy of their devices, that's why most people don't need GrapheneOS. However, that doesn't mean that GrapheneOS is wrong to point out the shitty status quo of Android phones. The sad state of affairs right now is that if you care about offline privacy, you need to fiddle with a Pixel to install GrapheneOS or buy an iPhone and put it into lockdown mode (which Android still lacks).