It ultimately depends on your threat model, but many of the most important security features in Graphene are at the hardware level. Without those, it’s very possible that a bad actor could bypass the rest of the protections, since Graphene is designed with those hardware features in mind.
I saw it already, but those hardware security features also secure the features you mention there. The other features were developed with the hardware security features in mind. Again, without secure hardware, it’s possible for your software to be modified and no longer secure. That’s the broken security model I keep mentioning.
While it could definitely be more secure than other ROMs, security was never tested without the hardware features and thus it could also expose you to attacks because of that. Worse, it could make you assume that you’re secure when you’re really not.
An excellent example is Cerberos. GrapheneOS is able to completely block attacks from Cerberos by disabling the USB port data lanes entirely, something that most (if not all non Pixel phones) are unable to do. Cerberos uses many zero day vectors to break in though the data lanes, and in this case you likely would not be able to block the attack. They’d be able to dump your phone contents and then much of the software security features wouldn’t matter.
Should the world just throw away the billions of non-Pixel devices in use today?
And/or should everyone just give up on improving security at all for the vast majority of phone users who cannot afford Pixels, since they can’t ever be as secure as a Pixel?
I didn’t say that they should be thrown away? I’m not sure where that came from.
I said that I would rather use something else that was designed without the hardware security features in mind. It’s all about your personal threat model, and mine does not align with this fork of Graphene. I’m either going to use something like Lineage which has at least been tested from a security standpoint (and does not have possible zero days because of patch working a ROM designed with specific hardware features not available on my device) or I’m going to get a used pixel and run Graphene. Even Calyx would be preferred to this once they start up development again.
I think they are frustrated at repeating themselves, as I’m sure you are.
I tend to agree that, even though the hardware security isn’t there, GrapheneOS has some good features that would make it an alternative for these devices. If your threat model doesn’t include eg: physical access to the device then it still has benefits.
Sorry that I interpreted your comment as suggesting that anything less than a Pixel is not worth trying to improve the security of.
What’s with the hostility?
No hostility intended. But I still don’t understand why you think that omitting Graphene’s Pixel-requiring hardening features would cause Graphite to be less secure than other Android distributions which also lack those features.
Should the world just throw away the billions of non-Pixel devices in use today?
Why are you acting like GrapheneOS is the only custom ROM available? There are other GSIs and ROMs that non-Pixel users can use to keep their older phones going.
It ultimately depends on your threat model, but many of the most important security features in Graphene are at the hardware level. Without those, it’s very possible that a bad actor could bypass the rest of the protections, since Graphene is designed with those hardware features in mind.
see my other comment in this thread
I saw it already, but those hardware security features also secure the features you mention there. The other features were developed with the hardware security features in mind. Again, without secure hardware, it’s possible for your software to be modified and no longer secure. That’s the broken security model I keep mentioning.
While it could definitely be more secure than other ROMs, security was never tested without the hardware features and thus it could also expose you to attacks because of that. Worse, it could make you assume that you’re secure when you’re really not.
An excellent example is Cerberos. GrapheneOS is able to completely block attacks from Cerberos by disabling the USB port data lanes entirely, something that most (if not all non Pixel phones) are unable to do. Cerberos uses many zero day vectors to break in though the data lanes, and in this case you likely would not be able to block the attack. They’d be able to dump your phone contents and then much of the software security features wouldn’t matter.
Should the world just throw away the billions of non-Pixel devices in use today?
And/or should everyone just give up on improving security at all for the vast majority of phone users who cannot afford Pixels, since they can’t ever be as secure as a Pixel?
I didn’t say that they should be thrown away? I’m not sure where that came from.
I said that I would rather use something else that was designed without the hardware security features in mind. It’s all about your personal threat model, and mine does not align with this fork of Graphene. I’m either going to use something like Lineage which has at least been tested from a security standpoint (and does not have possible zero days because of patch working a ROM designed with specific hardware features not available on my device) or I’m going to get a used pixel and run Graphene. Even Calyx would be preferred to this once they start up development again.
What’s with the hostility?
I think they are frustrated at repeating themselves, as I’m sure you are.
I tend to agree that, even though the hardware security isn’t there, GrapheneOS has some good features that would make it an alternative for these devices. If your threat model doesn’t include eg: physical access to the device then it still has benefits.
Sorry that I interpreted your comment as suggesting that anything less than a Pixel is not worth trying to improve the security of.
No hostility intended. But I still don’t understand why you think that omitting Graphene’s Pixel-requiring hardening features would cause Graphite to be less secure than other Android distributions which also lack those features.
Why are you acting like GrapheneOS is the only custom ROM available? There are other GSIs and ROMs that non-Pixel users can use to keep their older phones going.
Are there any other options with a feature set comparable to GrapheneOS(-minus-pixel-only-hardening-features) ?