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Would really love to see this upvoted more. This basic truth should be common knowledge for privacy-minded or security-minded technologists/developers. There a

Would really love to see this upvoted more. This basic truth should be common knowledge for privacy-minded or security-minded technologists/developers. There are lots of reasons GSM won't/is hard to make work. What are the options? As more and more carriers in the USA provide wifi-dongles that are connected to 3G, maybe it's better to just do that, and move off making calls directly from your phone completely? For example, it might make sense to buy some phone, connect it to a device (or flash it with some software) that makes it essentially a portal for phone calls of sorts, and give it sandboxed access to your network. It's significantly harder for GSM backdoors to be effective if the entire device is sandboxed right? Maybe this way, as you roam around, you can somewhat securely communicate over IP to your call-making device, and make/receive calls? [EDIT] - Thinking about it, the suggestion is moot, since all someone would have to do is write some software to replay messages, or leak messages or some other nefarious thing, and stick it on the baseband of the device -- even if it can't damage your network it's still quite insecure. Maybe we should just give GSM up altogether, and start trying to move ourselves (and the world) to only communicating over IP (which we have a shot at securing, assuming modern crypto isn't completely broken)? What is the situation like with completley open source wifi connectivity?

doctorshady 11y ago
I think what the author was implying is that the code that runs the UMTS/LTE/whatever else stacks is still based on that nineties source, when the firmware was initially conceived for GSM.
seba_dos1 11y ago
LTE is basically VoIP, a 180° change from the monstrosity of 3G, although the providers still manage to fail spectacularly at it. https://media.ccc.de/v/32c3-7502-dissecting_volte https://media.ccc.de/v/32c3-7502-dissecting_volte
- hardwaresofton 11y ago
  LTE is a protocol/standard with more efficient methodology/tech right? -- my main issue was the involvement that certain agencies have with the basebands put into mobile phones and the resistance that people trying to develop completely open-source basebands encounter. LTE doesn't seem like a solution to this problem, it sounds like just a more efficient baseband. Even if it's easier to reverse engineer, use of it might still be outlawed (as is an issue with the neo9000). Does LTE use some publicly accessible/modifiable spectrum that I don't know about or something?
  - seba_dos1 11y ago
    LTE, when compared to 3G, drops a lot of complexity and basically defines a data link for IP to flow in. Telephony services are then implemented via IP. Of course the transmission itself is still as proprietary and filled with regulations as all GSM standards; I just noted that it should be easier to somehow "sandbox" the communication via LTE now than with older technologies. It's still not the solution and I'm fully aware of it.
- est 11y ago
  Holyshit, you can play so much with VoLTE moved to Application Processor.
rsync 11y ago
"There are lots of reasons GSM won't/is hard to make work. What are the options? As more and more carriers in the USA provide wifi-dongles that are connected to 3G, maybe it's better to just do that, and move off making calls directly from your phone completely?" This is an obvious approach, and the one that I originally pursued when I became worried about baseband exploits, security and privacy. I was looking into using a "samsung galaxy player" (basically, a galaxy S4 with no mobile phone chip in it) and using USB modems to use the cellular network when it suited me. The problem is, for a variety of weird reasons, a LOT of the realtime voice processing is also built into the baseband, along with the radio functions that we're all talking about here. So a lot of voice quality and noise cancellation and other things that you would really miss are built into the baseband and difficult to replicate on the main, more general purpose, CPU.

doctorshady 11y ago

I think what the author was implying is that the code that runs the UMTS/LTE/whatever else stacks is still based on that nineties source, when the firmware was initially conceived for GSM.

seba_dos1 11y ago

LTE is basically VoIP, a 180° change from the monstrosity of 3G, although the providers still manage to fail spectacularly at it. https://media.ccc.de/v/32c3-7502-dissecting_volte https://media.ccc.de/v/32c3-7502-dissecting_volte

hardwaresofton 11y ago
LTE is a protocol/standard with more efficient methodology/tech right? -- my main issue was the involvement that certain agencies have with the basebands put into mobile phones and the resistance that people trying to develop completely open-source basebands encounter. LTE doesn't seem like a solution to this problem, it sounds like just a more efficient baseband. Even if it's easier to reverse engineer, use of it might still be outlawed (as is an issue with the neo9000). Does LTE use some publicly accessible/modifiable spectrum that I don't know about or something?
- seba_dos1 11y ago
  LTE, when compared to 3G, drops a lot of complexity and basically defines a data link for IP to flow in. Telephony services are then implemented via IP. Of course the transmission itself is still as proprietary and filled with regulations as all GSM standards; I just noted that it should be easier to somehow "sandbox" the communication via LTE now than with older technologies. It's still not the solution and I'm fully aware of it.
est 11y ago
Holyshit, you can play so much with VoLTE moved to Application Processor.

rsync 11y ago

"There are lots of reasons GSM won't/is hard to make work. What are the options? As more and more carriers in the USA provide wifi-dongles that are connected to 3G, maybe it's better to just do that, and move off making calls directly from your phone completely?" This is an obvious approach, and the one that I originally pursued when I became worried about baseband exploits, security and privacy. I was looking into using a "samsung galaxy player" (basically, a galaxy S4 with no mobile phone chip in it) and using USB modems to use the cellular network when it suited me. The problem is, for a variety of weird reasons, a LOT of the realtime voice processing is also built into the baseband, along with the radio functions that we're all talking about here. So a lot of voice quality and noise cancellation and other things that you would really miss are built into the baseband and difficult to replicate on the main, more general purpose, CPU.