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It's a bit of an annoyance when products talk a lot about "privacy" and "security", but never once mention what sort of threat model they are private/secure aga

It's a bit of an annoyance when products talk a lot about "privacy" and "security", but never once mention what sort of threat model they are private/secure against. Then add in something like a bespoke (unvetted?) communication protocol on top and my eyes really start to roll. The people who really want privacy & security enough to be willing to buy something like this will want a lot more detail than what is offered here.

wepple 2y ago
Or _who_ is leading this project. There’s a gigantic difference between someone who has experience designing and building complex systems to be secure and private… and someone who thinks “how hard can this be? There’s gotta be a market for it!” I can’t tell which one this is
- lizknope 2y ago
  How the FBI's fake cell phone company put criminals into real jail cells https://www.npr.org/2024/05/31/1197959218/fbi-phone-company-anom https://www.npr.org/2024/05/31/1197959218/fbi-phone-company-... https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/23/24163389/joseph-cox-dark-wire-fbi-phone-startup-anom-criminals-secure-messaging-decoder-interview https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/23/24163389/joseph-cox-dark-... I remember this story. The FBI created cell phone business targeting criminals. They got criminals to believe it was a secure network all while listening in.
  - joemazerino 2y ago
    There is a distinct difference between a publicly offered MikroPhone and a phone swapped between criminals. Not every phone is some honeypot.
  - lazyeye 2y ago
    Dark Wire by Joseph Cox covers the whole story https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Wire-Incredible-Largest-Operation/dp/B0CKNP2Z8B/ https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Wire-Incredible-Largest-Operatio... It was a real conundrum for law enforcement agencies because at some point they had to stop facilitating crime and start exposing it.
    - aksss 2y ago
      (judgement aside, just facts) There's a lot of that going on with the FBI, including bot nets / marketplaces that they commandeer. How long do you let it continue? It's a fantastic way to gather intelligence, and the risk that a market player may be LE adds more peril for the players engaging in it.
- Valord 2y ago
  Look at the bottom of the page and you will see > This project is funded through NGI0 Entrust, a fund established by NLnet with financial support from the European Commission's Next Generation Internet program. Learn more at the NLnet project page. with links and everything.
  - wepple 2y ago
    Yep, and I followed all of those. I still have absolutely no idea who is designing, running, building mikrophone or the project. It’s great to know it’s not funded by DPRK, but that wasn’t my point. There’s a difference between it being built by an undergrad student and moxie marlinspike.
wslh 2y ago
As someone who has worked in cybersecurity for decades, it's remarkable to see how security concerns are finally permeating everyday life. We could always predict that the explosion of connected devices would dramatically expand the threat model, but witnessing it unfold in society is something else entirely. This extends beyond just technology: it's now embedded in politics, conflicts, and nearly every aspect of life. It's also important to note that it's not just the sheer number of devices challenging cybersecurity, but the dynamic nature of cloud security. For instance, Apple's recent innovations around hybrid AI computation highlight how cloud security is evolving alongside technological advancements.
- wepple 2y ago
  Unfortunately, I’m not convinced the dialog is connected to actual improvements - this project is somewhat of a perfect example. I remember the boom of “privacy first” products that launched after the Snowden leaks, but they were all money grabs by folks who probably moved on to blockchain later and now AI. I agree it’s wild how much of a common topic it is. I do miss the days when it was smart curious folks tinkering around.. but so goes every young field.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
debit-freak 2y ago
[dead]
Syonyk 2y ago
> ...but never once mention what sort of threat model they are private/secure against. You know, they're Secure(TM)! Against Threats(TM)! Buy me if you're scared of Threats(TM)! Threat modeling ("Secure from who? Under what conditions?") sort of stuff just doesn't seem to be a thing that's taught these days outside certain weird circles. And certainly something this project hasn't touched on in the slightest. But, yes, I was having to keep my eyeballs constrained too. As much as it pains me, I think the most "generally secure phone" out there, for at least the sort of threat models this phone handwaves at (journalists, human rights activists) is a recent (last generation or two) iPhone with Lockdown enabled - and then shut down nightly, and carried shut down through any sort of sensitive environments. I would be inclined to go with an iPhone SE3, moreso than one of the mainline devices, simply for fingerprint scanning versus the FaceID stuff. You can't "point a phone at me" and unlock it with my fingerprint, but you can with FaceID in a wide enough range of situations to be concerning. Set a longer than usual PIN/passphrase, and be careful where you enter it. As far as I understand the boot process, Apple has largely fixed a lot of the "before first unlock" type attacks with their secure enclave. They fixed that rather well after the battle with the FBI, and seem to have continued hardening and improving that process (hence my recommendation for the latest generation or two of device - there are changes in the boot security flows every now and then, and I assume they matter, at some point). Then Lockdown, as near as I can tell, does a very fine job of simply closing the common attack points used. Most of the "good" attacks on iPhone users (at least the ones I know of...) are through the various "texting-esque" endpoints with weird image formats, or a browser based Javascript/JIT exploit, and Lockdown does a fine job of simply refusing most of the paths these use. Weird image formats simply aren't rendered. URLs in text messages aren't accessed and previewed. The Javascript engine removes all JIT capabilities, WebRTC, WebGL, and other "suitably complex that it's probably exploitable" sort of features. It's not perfect, but were I an individual who believed I was under actual threat for this sort of stuff, I'd 100% use a secured iPhone (possibly with some of the Mobile Device Management features configured by a trusted person to disable the USB port and such things) over a random device like this. Sorry, open JTAG ports means it's "comically insecure" against anyone with local access and the time to bother doing anything with it. And of course, don't keep location services on, don't install a ton of apps, etc. The usual if you're concerned about any of this. I don't like that this is the state of the world of secure computing, but it certainly seems to be it, to me.

wepple 2y ago

Or _who_ is leading this project. There’s a gigantic difference between someone who has experience designing and building complex systems to be secure and private… and someone who thinks “how hard can this be? There’s gotta be a market for it!” I can’t tell which one this is

lizknope 2y ago
How the FBI's fake cell phone company put criminals into real jail cells https://www.npr.org/2024/05/31/1197959218/fbi-phone-company-anom https://www.npr.org/2024/05/31/1197959218/fbi-phone-company-... https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/23/24163389/joseph-cox-dark-wire-fbi-phone-startup-anom-criminals-secure-messaging-decoder-interview https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/23/24163389/joseph-cox-dark-... I remember this story. The FBI created cell phone business targeting criminals. They got criminals to believe it was a secure network all while listening in.
- joemazerino 2y ago
  There is a distinct difference between a publicly offered MikroPhone and a phone swapped between criminals. Not every phone is some honeypot.
- lazyeye 2y ago
  Dark Wire by Joseph Cox covers the whole story https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Wire-Incredible-Largest-Operation/dp/B0CKNP2Z8B/ https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Wire-Incredible-Largest-Operatio... It was a real conundrum for law enforcement agencies because at some point they had to stop facilitating crime and start exposing it.
  - aksss 2y ago
    (judgement aside, just facts) There's a lot of that going on with the FBI, including bot nets / marketplaces that they commandeer. How long do you let it continue? It's a fantastic way to gather intelligence, and the risk that a market player may be LE adds more peril for the players engaging in it.
Valord 2y ago
Look at the bottom of the page and you will see > This project is funded through NGI0 Entrust, a fund established by NLnet with financial support from the European Commission's Next Generation Internet program. Learn more at the NLnet project page. with links and everything.
- wepple 2y ago
  Yep, and I followed all of those. I still have absolutely no idea who is designing, running, building mikrophone or the project. It’s great to know it’s not funded by DPRK, but that wasn’t my point. There’s a difference between it being built by an undergrad student and moxie marlinspike.

wslh 2y ago

As someone who has worked in cybersecurity for decades, it's remarkable to see how security concerns are finally permeating everyday life. We could always predict that the explosion of connected devices would dramatically expand the threat model, but witnessing it unfold in society is something else entirely. This extends beyond just technology: it's now embedded in politics, conflicts, and nearly every aspect of life. It's also important to note that it's not just the sheer number of devices challenging cybersecurity, but the dynamic nature of cloud security. For instance, Apple's recent innovations around hybrid AI computation highlight how cloud security is evolving alongside technological advancements.

wepple 2y ago
Unfortunately, I’m not convinced the dialog is connected to actual improvements - this project is somewhat of a perfect example. I remember the boom of “privacy first” products that launched after the Snowden leaks, but they were all money grabs by folks who probably moved on to blockchain later and now AI. I agree it’s wild how much of a common topic it is. I do miss the days when it was smart curious folks tinkering around.. but so goes every young field.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

debit-freak 2y ago

[dead]

Syonyk 2y ago

> ...but never once mention what sort of threat model they are private/secure against. You know, they're Secure(TM)! Against Threats(TM)! Buy me if you're scared of Threats(TM)! Threat modeling ("Secure from who? Under what conditions?") sort of stuff just doesn't seem to be a thing that's taught these days outside certain weird circles. And certainly something this project hasn't touched on in the slightest. But, yes, I was having to keep my eyeballs constrained too. As much as it pains me, I think the most "generally secure phone" out there, for at least the sort of threat models this phone handwaves at (journalists, human rights activists) is a recent (last generation or two) iPhone with Lockdown enabled - and then shut down nightly, and carried shut down through any sort of sensitive environments. I would be inclined to go with an iPhone SE3, moreso than one of the mainline devices, simply for fingerprint scanning versus the FaceID stuff. You can't "point a phone at me" and unlock it with my fingerprint, but you can with FaceID in a wide enough range of situations to be concerning. Set a longer than usual PIN/passphrase, and be careful where you enter it. As far as I understand the boot process, Apple has largely fixed a lot of the "before first unlock" type attacks with their secure enclave. They fixed that rather well after the battle with the FBI, and seem to have continued hardening and improving that process (hence my recommendation for the latest generation or two of device - there are changes in the boot security flows every now and then, and I assume they matter, at some point). Then Lockdown, as near as I can tell, does a very fine job of simply closing the common attack points used. Most of the "good" attacks on iPhone users (at least the ones I know of...) are through the various "texting-esque" endpoints with weird image formats, or a browser based Javascript/JIT exploit, and Lockdown does a fine job of simply refusing most of the paths these use. Weird image formats simply aren't rendered. URLs in text messages aren't accessed and previewed. The Javascript engine removes all JIT capabilities, WebRTC, WebGL, and other "suitably complex that it's probably exploitable" sort of features. It's not perfect, but were I an individual who believed I was under actual threat for this sort of stuff, I'd 100% use a secured iPhone (possibly with some of the Mobile Device Management features configured by a trusted person to disable the USB port and such things) over a random device like this. Sorry, open JTAG ports means it's "comically insecure" against anyone with local access and the time to bother doing anything with it. And of course, don't keep location services on, don't install a ton of apps, etc. The usual if you're concerned about any of this. I don't like that this is the state of the world of secure computing, but it certainly seems to be it, to me.