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The government said "trust us" too. I'm not entirely sure why anybody who wants to buy an untraceable phone would go to a website run by an unknown person to bu

The government said "trust us" too. I'm not entirely sure why anybody who wants to buy an untraceable phone would go to a website run by an unknown person to buy one. There are so many ways that this could go wrong for the phone purchaser. I'm thinking either this is a spoof site where in a week's time you'll just say "Ha! Look at all this private information you just gave a complete stranger!" or it's a government-run honeypot.

rdegges 13y ago
Not sure what I can do to prove this to you since we just launched and don't have much of a history, but I'm happy to answer any questions. I'm a programmer at a telephone company currently, and have worked in the telco industry for a while now. I have no government affiliations at all.
- monkeynotes 13y ago
  > I have no government affiliations at all. Nice try CIA ops.
  - dsl 13y ago
    It would be the FBI, actually.
- AsymetricCom 13y ago
  What chipset do you use to manage baseband communications? Do you implement any Trusted Computing standards? Can you tell us anything about the hardware architecture?
masukomi 13y ago
That was my thought too. If i'm so concerned about security there is no way I'm going to trust a web site like this. Even if we give rdegges the benefit of the doubt and say he actually is, there's no way to know that 2 weeks from now the govt doesn't hijack / buy the site, OR that they don't just start tailing these guys on their trips to the post office. Great way to find people with a better-than-average likelyhood of being up to no good.
- mirkules 13y ago
  Exactly. It actually got me thinking if burner phones are already modified (either hardware or firmware) to basically be the man in the middle. There was a big problem with Chinese-supplied hardware in the US gov't which was modified for snooping. My tinfoil senses tell me it would be relatively simple to modify older phones to, for example, send GPS signals even when the battery is not in by adding a smaller hidden power supply that recharges off the main battery when the main battery is in the phone. I guess the only way to be sure is by not using a mobile phone at all.

rdegges 13y ago

Not sure what I can do to prove this to you since we just launched and don't have much of a history, but I'm happy to answer any questions. I'm a programmer at a telephone company currently, and have worked in the telco industry for a while now. I have no government affiliations at all.

monkeynotes 13y ago
> I have no government affiliations at all. Nice try CIA ops.
- dsl 13y ago
  It would be the FBI, actually.
AsymetricCom 13y ago
What chipset do you use to manage baseband communications? Do you implement any Trusted Computing standards? Can you tell us anything about the hardware architecture?

masukomi 13y ago

That was my thought too. If i'm so concerned about security there is no way I'm going to trust a web site like this. Even if we give rdegges the benefit of the doubt and say he actually is, there's no way to know that 2 weeks from now the govt doesn't hijack / buy the site, OR that they don't just start tailing these guys on their trips to the post office. Great way to find people with a better-than-average likelyhood of being up to no good.

mirkules 13y ago
Exactly. It actually got me thinking if burner phones are already modified (either hardware or firmware) to basically be the man in the middle. There was a big problem with Chinese-supplied hardware in the US gov't which was modified for snooping. My tinfoil senses tell me it would be relatively simple to modify older phones to, for example, send GPS signals even when the battery is not in by adding a smaller hidden power supply that recharges off the main battery when the main battery is in the phone. I guess the only way to be sure is by not using a mobile phone at all.