I really wish this was more than just a privacy concern. Google for all the shady, immoral, and frankly weird data collection they do on people; Google doesn't

I really wish this was more than just a privacy concern. Google for all the shady, immoral, and frankly weird data collection they do on people; Google doesn't actively discriminate against classes of people with their services. They'll track a high income individual the same as a homeless one. These low-end phones, preloaded with malware, and likely running and outdated and vulnerable version of the base OS with no hope of patches... Having a hope of being successful in our society right now in any meaningful way requires some level of access to the internet and these bare-minimum phones are it for a lot of people. Security online is a massive social issue that we can't rely on end-user awareness to solve. This is a supply chain attack that only hurts the worse off. You're on this site which in its own way gives you a certain baseline technical merit; You're actively are aware of the threat of these low-end phones so you don't fall into that potential trap. The people that can't make that jump between the $100 and $400 phone shouldn't have to deal with additional ongoing personal and financial repercussions from trying to participate in our modern society.