19 ms·

PinePhone Misconceptions

200 points by UkiahSmith 7y ago

petecox 7y ago
Replicant has an evaluation page incorporating this info with a handy table. https://redmine.replicant.us/projects/replicant/wiki/Pinephone https://redmine.replicant.us/projects/replicant/wiki/Pinepho...
- miohtama 7y ago
  Looks like camera is open. I wonder if it possible to tweak software to get unholy quality out of sensors like Pixel phones do, or does one need to have high power/integrated GPU or TPU hardware for it.
  - solarkraft 7y ago
    The unholy quality on pixel phones is achieved through taking many pictures and combining them in smart ways (Google's computational photography wizard Marc Levoy has given a great series of lectures about the theory behind it: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7ddpXYvFXspUN0N-gObF1GXoCA-DA-7i https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7ddpXYvFXspUN0N-gObF...) through a Qualcomm Hexagon processor, which has a special VLIW (Very Long Instruction Words) architecture. This co-processor is in every high-end Snapdragon (800 series) phone made in the last few years and you can relatively easily get the software to run on them through modded Google Camera versions commonly known as "Gcam ports". My actual point is: You don't need special camera firmware to do this. What you do need special (or open enough) firmware for is stuff like long exposures - the inability of which highly frustrated me on the phones, especially from Sony, I have owned so far. Doing weird stuff with the camera will probably be quite fun, but then again I don't believe the actual camera device will be that good.
swiley 7y ago
It’s just as closed as the typical laptop (better in many ways, some newer laptops have some nasty stuff in the bios) I think there might be 2 WiFi cards that even have open source firmware and the firmware isn’t complete enough to be usable for most people. I’m not sure who would be surprised by this, I feel like anyone that cares this much would be paying enough attention to know what’s going on.
- prox 7y ago
  The librem phone seems a lot more open, and the zerophone is also very interesting.
  - kop316 7y ago
    I'd say both are about the same. The Librem 5 physically puts the Modem and Wifi/BT modules on a physical card, where the PinePhone make it all into a single board. I believe both have the same physical/logical seperation (i.e. Modem and Wifi/BT are on a Bus versus integrated directly into the CPU), and both support a hardware disable due to the physical seperation. Both Phones have to load firmware into the Modem and WiFi/BT.
  - nottorp 7y ago
    For all practical purposes, it looks to me that there's no difference between soldered and slotted when they both have a physical switch to disable them. In theory you can change the modem/wifi in the Librem, that may be more "open" but you pay for it in size.
  - dev-il 7y ago
    the librem isn't more open than the PinePhone at all. The only difference is that they put the modem on a separate card… but that doesn't make it any more open at all. What matters, given the fact that there just isn't any open modem out there, is the fact that the modem is kept isolated from the SoC in a way that doesn't allow the modem to access anything the SoC doesn't explicitly give it.
- kop316 7y ago
  It is, however, a lot more open than most ARM Single board computers and ARM phones. Most ARM Phones/SBCs cannot run mainline Linux, and due to closed drivers, will likely never be able to. You in addition have Phones with locked bootloaders, so you can't even load your own firmware in it! This gets us into the situation we see today: even if you have a Phone that you can run your own firmware on it, it has a lifetime because the vendor has little financial intentive to do so. Even the most open Android Phones (Pixels) have about a 3 year lifetime: https://support.google.com/nexus/answer/4457705 https://support.google.com/nexus/answer/4457705 On an iPhone, you are completely at the mercy of Apple for updates (for which they have a much better track record than Android). Meanwhile, my Thinkpad x200 was released in 2008 and continues to be a supported just fine, with no end in sight. I hate to say, in contrast to even my Novena, is much better, as my Novena sits in my desk because it does not run mainline Linux, and I can't even get it to run properly on an updated Linux 4.4 Kernel that I tried to compile (due to no support). So the Pinephone (and Librem 5) shooting to ensure that they can run unmodified Mainline Linux is a huge win for openness and longetivity in a Phone.
squarefoot 7y ago
What most critics miss about its hardware is that the few closed subsystems have no access to system memory and storage. It is very different from say a ME module into a CPU, or a closed card stuck into the same bus with the disk controller, which is the case of just every "open" laptop out there. USB, i2c and SPI are effective measures against malicious hardware taking control of the system bus and sucking data from peripherals. Even in the unlikely (but technically possible) scenario in which some chips loaded with malicious firmware attempt to sniff the i2c bus, they will be fed data that has been already encrypted on a system memory, bus and storage they have no access to. If the user encrypts the data before sending it, whether the 4G modem/WiFi/BT are closed or not, they will see just noise.
- throwaway41597 7y ago
  The PinePhone looks compelling indeed. One question: does anyone know where encryption occurs for 4G and Bluetooth voice for example? Is audio going to a BT headset encrypted inside the BT chip? Is audio going to the 4G network encrypted inside the modem? Edit: Thanks for your replies.
  - kop316 7y ago
    I would assume each would happen inside the BT chip and inside the modem, respectively.
  - RL_Quine 7y ago
    There's not really any meaningful encryption in LTE in the real world, that there is is vulnerable to all sorts of nasty downgrade attacks. You're better forgetting there is any and assuming that it's all in cleartext. Any there is will be deciphered on the radio hardware and then send in the clear to the main processor. This is how it always works. The point of the pinephone post here is that you're basically treating the entire modem as untrusted and part of the internet rather than part of your device, which is the correct approach.
  - squarefoot 7y ago
    This is possible, although if the user has control over the "trusted" part of the system, nothing prevents the data to be encrypted before leaving it. That is, suppose we know the radio chip contains the encryption code, but also some suspicious closed firmware we cannot examine; since we can't trust that chipset, we could add one more encryption layer on the data before it reaches the untrusted chipset, so that any potentially malicious firmware would see essentially random noise. Of course the other end must employ the same decryption scheme, which is not immediate for sure, but still doable and would make extremely difficult for anyone to snoop our data. The point is: we can't have a 100% fully open and auditable system, both in HW and SW, so they built a fence to separate the trusted hardware in which we work with our data and the untrusted but necessary part where our data can't enter before being encrypted. It's a huge effort, which brings us one more time on the importance of having full open hardware/firmware/software. I wonder if current technology would allow crowfunding the creation of fully open chipsets. Nothing immediate, just one damn chip at a time: networking today, storage controllers in two years, graphics in 5, etc.
ldng 7y ago
Can someone clear up if the modem and the GPS can talk directly? Not being able to shutdown the GPS indepandently put me off librem.
- Zenst 7y ago
  Looks like it's on the SOC (SOC has it and not seeing external GPS chip on board pictures), so most likely. Ask them on twitter @thepine64 Though how the SOC is wired up inside may beyond their scope or the dreaded NDA from the SOC supplier.
- kop316 7y ago
  https://wiki.pine64.org/index.php/PinePhone https://wiki.pine64.org/index.php/PinePhone Looks like GNSS is directly on the modem chip.
- keyme 7y ago
  The GPS is on the modem SOC, as I understand. Perhaps they should leave the antenna unconnected. Then use an additional GPS module?
- nullc 7y ago
  Perhaps it would be better to say "Not being able to run the GPS with the modem shut down"? If the modem is on, the carrier can figure out your location relatively precisely from your transmissions, even if GPS were disabled. So the real loss is that you can't use the device for navigation/mapping without turning on the modem. Right? At least this can be resolved by using an external receiver.
- numpad0 7y ago
  I believe modern cell standards use either NAVSTAR or base station broadcasts to synchronize time slots, adjust beam forming parameters, arrange call tower handovers and such to provide Tokyo or New York or Delhi relevant density capability, and thus GPS functionality is a requirement, apart from convenience of whether it’s available to userland runs in application processor. Virtual UART drivers for every phone since 3G HSDPA creates GPS NMEA ports on your PC and it spits it garbage when it feels like doing.
- 7y ago
npo9 7y ago
Can someone explain why the modem running closed source blob is not considered a huge problem?
- Zenst 7y ago
  Often the case and one excuse they provide is so that they can comply with radio regulations - which as many are semi software with DSP's in effect, would make the slightest software bug/change cause issues with the local radio regulators and indeed, the telco's. Not saying that you would need a radio licence from the local area just to compile modem code, but maybe not that far removed in part. Certainly testing, would dictate a sheilded enviroment to avoid legal issues and then at the end of all that, it would have to be certified by whatever local regulator of the country(s) it is used. So does make open source modems rare, liability exposure of legal fallouts make for some muddy waters.
  - wbl 7y ago
    For the cellphone service. In ham land you can do anything that follows the emissions rules.
    - otterley 7y ago
      In ham land, the transmitter possesses the license to utilize the radio spectrum. With mobile phones, the carriers do. Cell phone owners don’t need a license - the model assumes their equipment manufacturers do, and will do what’s needed to assure continued compliance.
    - FlyMoreRockets 7y ago
      > In ham land you can do anything that follows the emissions rules. In the US, hams are prohibited from employing encryption with the single exception for control coms with amateur space-based radios. With the proliferation of digital modes, the encryption rule is increasingly being challenged and it will be interesting to see where this goes in the future.
  - zzo38computer 7y ago
yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
> It’s worth mentioning that LPDDR3 initialization is done by u-boot SPL, which is also open source. There are no blobs in there either. That's actually pretty impressive, isn't it? I was under the impression that RAM setup was a mess.
- monocasa 7y ago
  It's been open on these chips for a while (which is probably one of the reasons why Pine is so into them). And the way it works with these chips it's a pain to support more than one board layout with more than one model of chips, but that's more a supply chain and SKU explosion issue.
Tepix 7y ago
This phone is looking fantastic. I‘m getting one for sure. Perhaps the GPS issue can be solved by disconnecting the GPS antenna using a kill switch.
Skunkleton 7y ago
All network connected systems have a boundary where they become untrusted. With the exception of the GPS, this all seems like a securable, hackable, and supportable system architecture. RE cellular modems, there are some things worth noting. First, they are a huge privacy hole. It doesn't matter if they run open or closed firmware, the real adversary is the cell provider's hardware. Second, interoperability is a real problem. There would be large consequences if enough improperly configured cellular modems ended up in the wild. Edit: Another point here. Open firmware does guarantee security. It is unlikely that whatever distro you end up running on your pine phone will be nearly as secure as iOS or Android. Of course privacy is a different story.
lvs 7y ago
A removable battery AND a headphone jack? I mean, this is my definition of luxury. Has anyone actually gotten one of these yet? Any critical impressions? Could I actually rely on it as a phone?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- tmzt 7y ago
  People are reporting receiving them (the bravehert edition with near final hardware) now in #pinephone on the pine64 discord.
anonymousiam 7y ago
How long before PinePhone goes the way of Phantom Secure? https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/courts/sd-me-ramos-plea-20181002-story.html https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/courts/sd-me-ramos...
- commoner 7y ago
  > To prevent law enforcement from getting their hands on the special phones, Phantom Secure required existing customers — referred to as “executives” — to vouch for new customers, then conducted background checks. The company’s safeguard didn’t always work. > The judge called Fairfield’s participation in the scheme “aggravated” because of the significant amount of money laundered, the use of his expertise and the four-year stretch of illegal activity. In contrast, anyone (including law enforcement officials) can buy a PinePhone, and I doubt Pine64 is laundering money. It is unlikely for Pine64 to be prosecuted the way Phantom Secure was.
l0b0 7y ago
This just sounds like a classic case of perfect being the enemy of good. A bunch of "purists" unironically lamenting the fact the device isn't 100.00% FOSS while typing on much more closed platforms. Or maybe just planted misinformation by competitors or three-letter agencies, either of which don't seem too far-fetched these days.
numpad0 7y ago
> The LTE modem on the PinePhone is a ‘black box’, and runs its own Linux system internally. First mention of Linux I’ve seen wrt modem firmware. Interesting!
- tmzt 7y ago
  The EG25 has two cores like most Android devices. One is running Qualcomm AMSS and the other a Linux kernel. The Linux side apparently converts AT into QMI messages, and provides endpoints for NMEA and other protocols. It also uses an android bootloader and partition layout, and can support adb connections. https://osmocom.org/projects/quectel-modems/wiki/EC25 https://osmocom.org/projects/quectel-modems/wiki/EC25

200 points by UkiahSmith 7y ago

Replicant has an evaluation page incorporating this info with a handy table. https://redmine.replicant.us/projects/replicant/wiki/Pinephone https://redmine.replicant.us/projects/replicant/wiki/Pinepho...

miohtama 7y ago
Looks like camera is open. I wonder if it possible to tweak software to get unholy quality out of sensors like Pixel phones do, or does one need to have high power/integrated GPU or TPU hardware for it.
- solarkraft 7y ago
  The unholy quality on pixel phones is achieved through taking many pictures and combining them in smart ways (Google's computational photography wizard Marc Levoy has given a great series of lectures about the theory behind it: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7ddpXYvFXspUN0N-gObF1GXoCA-DA-7i https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7ddpXYvFXspUN0N-gObF...) through a Qualcomm Hexagon processor, which has a special VLIW (Very Long Instruction Words) architecture. This co-processor is in every high-end Snapdragon (800 series) phone made in the last few years and you can relatively easily get the software to run on them through modded Google Camera versions commonly known as "Gcam ports". My actual point is: You don't need special camera firmware to do this. What you do need special (or open enough) firmware for is stuff like long exposures - the inability of which highly frustrated me on the phones, especially from Sony, I have owned so far. Doing weird stuff with the camera will probably be quite fun, but then again I don't believe the actual camera device will be that good.

swiley 7y ago

It’s just as closed as the typical laptop (better in many ways, some newer laptops have some nasty stuff in the bios) I think there might be 2 WiFi cards that even have open source firmware and the firmware isn’t complete enough to be usable for most people. I’m not sure who would be surprised by this, I feel like anyone that cares this much would be paying enough attention to know what’s going on.

prox 7y ago
The librem phone seems a lot more open, and the zerophone is also very interesting.
- kop316 7y ago
  I'd say both are about the same. The Librem 5 physically puts the Modem and Wifi/BT modules on a physical card, where the PinePhone make it all into a single board. I believe both have the same physical/logical seperation (i.e. Modem and Wifi/BT are on a Bus versus integrated directly into the CPU), and both support a hardware disable due to the physical seperation. Both Phones have to load firmware into the Modem and WiFi/BT.
- nottorp 7y ago
  For all practical purposes, it looks to me that there's no difference between soldered and slotted when they both have a physical switch to disable them. In theory you can change the modem/wifi in the Librem, that may be more "open" but you pay for it in size.
- dev-il 7y ago
  the librem isn't more open than the PinePhone at all. The only difference is that they put the modem on a separate card… but that doesn't make it any more open at all. What matters, given the fact that there just isn't any open modem out there, is the fact that the modem is kept isolated from the SoC in a way that doesn't allow the modem to access anything the SoC doesn't explicitly give it.
kop316 7y ago
It is, however, a lot more open than most ARM Single board computers and ARM phones. Most ARM Phones/SBCs cannot run mainline Linux, and due to closed drivers, will likely never be able to. You in addition have Phones with locked bootloaders, so you can't even load your own firmware in it! This gets us into the situation we see today: even if you have a Phone that you can run your own firmware on it, it has a lifetime because the vendor has little financial intentive to do so. Even the most open Android Phones (Pixels) have about a 3 year lifetime: https://support.google.com/nexus/answer/4457705 https://support.google.com/nexus/answer/4457705 On an iPhone, you are completely at the mercy of Apple for updates (for which they have a much better track record than Android). Meanwhile, my Thinkpad x200 was released in 2008 and continues to be a supported just fine, with no end in sight. I hate to say, in contrast to even my Novena, is much better, as my Novena sits in my desk because it does not run mainline Linux, and I can't even get it to run properly on an updated Linux 4.4 Kernel that I tried to compile (due to no support). So the Pinephone (and Librem 5) shooting to ensure that they can run unmodified Mainline Linux is a huge win for openness and longetivity in a Phone.

squarefoot 7y ago

What most critics miss about its hardware is that the few closed subsystems have no access to system memory and storage. It is very different from say a ME module into a CPU, or a closed card stuck into the same bus with the disk controller, which is the case of just every "open" laptop out there. USB, i2c and SPI are effective measures against malicious hardware taking control of the system bus and sucking data from peripherals. Even in the unlikely (but technically possible) scenario in which some chips loaded with malicious firmware attempt to sniff the i2c bus, they will be fed data that has been already encrypted on a system memory, bus and storage they have no access to. If the user encrypts the data before sending it, whether the 4G modem/WiFi/BT are closed or not, they will see just noise.

throwaway41597 7y ago
The PinePhone looks compelling indeed. One question: does anyone know where encryption occurs for 4G and Bluetooth voice for example? Is audio going to a BT headset encrypted inside the BT chip? Is audio going to the 4G network encrypted inside the modem? Edit: Thanks for your replies.
- kop316 7y ago
  I would assume each would happen inside the BT chip and inside the modem, respectively.
- RL_Quine 7y ago
  There's not really any meaningful encryption in LTE in the real world, that there is is vulnerable to all sorts of nasty downgrade attacks. You're better forgetting there is any and assuming that it's all in cleartext. Any there is will be deciphered on the radio hardware and then send in the clear to the main processor. This is how it always works. The point of the pinephone post here is that you're basically treating the entire modem as untrusted and part of the internet rather than part of your device, which is the correct approach.
- squarefoot 7y ago
  This is possible, although if the user has control over the "trusted" part of the system, nothing prevents the data to be encrypted before leaving it. That is, suppose we know the radio chip contains the encryption code, but also some suspicious closed firmware we cannot examine; since we can't trust that chipset, we could add one more encryption layer on the data before it reaches the untrusted chipset, so that any potentially malicious firmware would see essentially random noise. Of course the other end must employ the same decryption scheme, which is not immediate for sure, but still doable and would make extremely difficult for anyone to snoop our data. The point is: we can't have a 100% fully open and auditable system, both in HW and SW, so they built a fence to separate the trusted hardware in which we work with our data and the untrusted but necessary part where our data can't enter before being encrypted. It's a huge effort, which brings us one more time on the importance of having full open hardware/firmware/software. I wonder if current technology would allow crowfunding the creation of fully open chipsets. Nothing immediate, just one damn chip at a time: networking today, storage controllers in two years, graphics in 5, etc.

ldng 7y ago

Can someone clear up if the modem and the GPS can talk directly? Not being able to shutdown the GPS indepandently put me off librem.

Zenst 7y ago
Looks like it's on the SOC (SOC has it and not seeing external GPS chip on board pictures), so most likely. Ask them on twitter @thepine64 Though how the SOC is wired up inside may beyond their scope or the dreaded NDA from the SOC supplier.
kop316 7y ago
https://wiki.pine64.org/index.php/PinePhone https://wiki.pine64.org/index.php/PinePhone Looks like GNSS is directly on the modem chip.
keyme 7y ago
The GPS is on the modem SOC, as I understand. Perhaps they should leave the antenna unconnected. Then use an additional GPS module?
nullc 7y ago
Perhaps it would be better to say "Not being able to run the GPS with the modem shut down"? If the modem is on, the carrier can figure out your location relatively precisely from your transmissions, even if GPS were disabled. So the real loss is that you can't use the device for navigation/mapping without turning on the modem. Right? At least this can be resolved by using an external receiver.
numpad0 7y ago
I believe modern cell standards use either NAVSTAR or base station broadcasts to synchronize time slots, adjust beam forming parameters, arrange call tower handovers and such to provide Tokyo or New York or Delhi relevant density capability, and thus GPS functionality is a requirement, apart from convenience of whether it’s available to userland runs in application processor. Virtual UART drivers for every phone since 3G HSDPA creates GPS NMEA ports on your PC and it spits it garbage when it feels like doing.
7y ago

npo9 7y ago

Can someone explain why the modem running closed source blob is not considered a huge problem?

Zenst 7y ago
Often the case and one excuse they provide is so that they can comply with radio regulations - which as many are semi software with DSP's in effect, would make the slightest software bug/change cause issues with the local radio regulators and indeed, the telco's. Not saying that you would need a radio licence from the local area just to compile modem code, but maybe not that far removed in part. Certainly testing, would dictate a sheilded enviroment to avoid legal issues and then at the end of all that, it would have to be certified by whatever local regulator of the country(s) it is used. So does make open source modems rare, liability exposure of legal fallouts make for some muddy waters.
- wbl 7y ago
  For the cellphone service. In ham land you can do anything that follows the emissions rules.
  - otterley 7y ago
    In ham land, the transmitter possesses the license to utilize the radio spectrum. With mobile phones, the carriers do. Cell phone owners don’t need a license - the model assumes their equipment manufacturers do, and will do what’s needed to assure continued compliance.
  - FlyMoreRockets 7y ago
    > In ham land you can do anything that follows the emissions rules. In the US, hams are prohibited from employing encryption with the single exception for control coms with amateur space-based radios. With the proliferation of digital modes, the encryption rule is increasingly being challenged and it will be interesting to see where this goes in the future.
- zzo38computer 7y ago

yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago

> It’s worth mentioning that LPDDR3 initialization is done by u-boot SPL, which is also open source. There are no blobs in there either. That's actually pretty impressive, isn't it? I was under the impression that RAM setup was a mess.

monocasa 7y ago
It's been open on these chips for a while (which is probably one of the reasons why Pine is so into them). And the way it works with these chips it's a pain to support more than one board layout with more than one model of chips, but that's more a supply chain and SKU explosion issue.

Tepix 7y ago

This phone is looking fantastic. I‘m getting one for sure. Perhaps the GPS issue can be solved by disconnecting the GPS antenna using a kill switch.

Skunkleton 7y ago

All network connected systems have a boundary where they become untrusted. With the exception of the GPS, this all seems like a securable, hackable, and supportable system architecture. RE cellular modems, there are some things worth noting. First, they are a huge privacy hole. It doesn't matter if they run open or closed firmware, the real adversary is the cell provider's hardware. Second, interoperability is a real problem. There would be large consequences if enough improperly configured cellular modems ended up in the wild. Edit: Another point here. Open firmware does guarantee security. It is unlikely that whatever distro you end up running on your pine phone will be nearly as secure as iOS or Android. Of course privacy is a different story.

lvs 7y ago

A removable battery AND a headphone jack? I mean, this is my definition of luxury. Has anyone actually gotten one of these yet? Any critical impressions? Could I actually rely on it as a phone?

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
tmzt 7y ago
People are reporting receiving them (the bravehert edition with near final hardware) now in #pinephone on the pine64 discord.

anonymousiam 7y ago

How long before PinePhone goes the way of Phantom Secure? https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/courts/sd-me-ramos-plea-20181002-story.html https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/courts/sd-me-ramos...

commoner 7y ago
> To prevent law enforcement from getting their hands on the special phones, Phantom Secure required existing customers — referred to as “executives” — to vouch for new customers, then conducted background checks. The company’s safeguard didn’t always work. > The judge called Fairfield’s participation in the scheme “aggravated” because of the significant amount of money laundered, the use of his expertise and the four-year stretch of illegal activity. In contrast, anyone (including law enforcement officials) can buy a PinePhone, and I doubt Pine64 is laundering money. It is unlikely for Pine64 to be prosecuted the way Phantom Secure was.

l0b0 7y ago

This just sounds like a classic case of perfect being the enemy of good. A bunch of "purists" unironically lamenting the fact the device isn't 100.00% FOSS while typing on much more closed platforms. Or maybe just planted misinformation by competitors or three-letter agencies, either of which don't seem too far-fetched these days.

numpad0 7y ago

> The LTE modem on the PinePhone is a ‘black box’, and runs its own Linux system internally. First mention of Linux I’ve seen wrt modem firmware. Interesting!

tmzt 7y ago
The EG25 has two cores like most Android devices. One is running Qualcomm AMSS and the other a Linux kernel. The Linux side apparently converts AT into QMI messages, and provides endpoints for NMEA and other protocols. It also uses an android bootloader and partition layout, and can support adb connections. https://osmocom.org/projects/quectel-modems/wiki/EC25 https://osmocom.org/projects/quectel-modems/wiki/EC25