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and the topic got moved even though it was more about UT than Lineage...
Anyway... Yes, in terms of exploits and hackers. Stock android might be more secure. But privacy and tracking is something else. And the real problem.
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@Rinkeby said in lineage native VS lineage on Ubuntu:
But, Lineage installed as a replacement for android, if I get it right. Still runs on android drives and a lot of mechanics that makes Lineage, a better alternative than Android. But not as good as Linux.
I am not sure what you are calling 'Linux' here, or what you understand under 'Linux'. All versions of Android run on some version of a Linux kernel.
And thats where my question comes in... I guess its a bit deep. But I just feel more secure with UT than Lineage. And I wonder if UT/linux kernel on top of the drives and mechanics, serves as a good layer between the phone and Waydroid/Lineage.
Ubuntu Touch, when running on devices that shipped with Android, uses the same version of the Linux kernel that the stock for that device came with. This is necessary to be able to use the closed source drivers the vendor shipped with the device. If you do not want to rely on that kernel and those drivers, you would want to run a distribution like postmarketOS, that only uses mainline kernels and drivers.
But the real privacy threats are not in the kernel or the drivers, but in the services and applications that are installed on top of those. Principally the service installed with Google Play Store, but also with less privacy respecting apps like those from Meta, Amazon and such.
Installing those on any Android, be it in a container or no, exposes you to their trackers.
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@Rinkeby said in lineage native VS lineage on Ubuntu:
and the topic got moved even though it was more about UT than Lineage...
Anyway... Yes, in terms of exploits and hackers. Stock android might be more secure. But privacy and tracking is something else. And the real problem.
Thanks for the explanation. You will already know why you are using UT. I also use UT from time to time. I personally find Xenial even more sophisticated than Focal.
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Hi,
thats good info. Though Android was once based on Linux kernel, its heavily modified. And I suspect UT kernel is still quite different. But that was also my question really. If the foundation of Linux, the kernel, helped disconnect the drives from software.
I do agree that most of the tracking are done via apps and such. But you do have network triangulation that goes via hardware and drives.
And in hope, having a real non modified Linux kernel spiked hope it might mitigate that.
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@arubislander Now I have a question about the installation. For Miatool, I personally have already used UT on Lineage Os 17.1 as a substructure. Before that, of course, I used a standard Android version. So it should also be possible to install other systems based on Android 10. Whether UT then runs cleanly is another matter. Let's see if I dare to try this on occasion.
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@Rinkeby said in lineage native VS lineage on Ubuntu:
I do agree that most of the tracking are done via apps and such. But you do have network triangulation that goes via hardware and drives.
The information for the triangulation is gathered from the hardware via the drivers, that is correct. But it is still the software that interprets the information. But what does it matter if your phone is able to triangulate its position via the radio towers it can 'see'? As long as that information stays on your device there is no privacy concern.
Of course as your device hops from tower to tower it leaves behind a trace of it having been there. Because just as the phone can see the tower, the tower can see the phone, and that is where potential privacy concerns pop up. But this has nothing to do with what is running on the phone. A dumb phone would be just as traceable in this way.
And in hope, having a real non modified Linux kernel spiked hope it might mitigate that.
The only 'real non modified' Linux kernel, I suppose, would be the one straight from Linus Torvalds commit branche. But that would not run very well on most actual hardware. All major distribution patch the kernel to one extent or the other, to make it able to work with real-life hardware. Try installing a vanilla kernel on your Ubuntu machine and you will quickly appreciate that it is necessary to modify the kernel for better hardware compatibility.
In addition, as mentioned before, UT on Android devices uses the same drivers and essentially the same kernel as what came with android device. That is why there is the per device requirement to be on a specific version of Android first, before flashing UT.
This should not be seen as a privacy concern because the drivers are isolated from the rest of the OS in a container and the kernel is compiled from source.
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@Rinkeby said in lineage native VS lineage on Ubuntu:
Though Android was once based on Linux kernel, its heavily modified.
I also wanted to mention, that it is not the 'heavy' modification of the kernel that makes Android less 'linuxy' it is all the layers on top of it.
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ok! cool. thanks for the answer. I take it from you then.
welp, then its all up to the apps I install in waydroid/lineage. But I still feel that running UT without waydroid is better for privacy. Even if I use F-droid etc.
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@Rinkeby said in lineage native VS lineage on Ubuntu:
I still feel that running UT without waydroid is better for privacy.
This is definitely the case!
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Thanks again.
And of course the Linux Kernel is modified in all directions. But Google does it in a ugly way. I know, that when you boot your phone, the manage to read information being sent before it was even started. So I dont know how deep this go. While UT gives of very little when booting. So Google and Apple sneaks in a lot of dirt deep in the code. But perhaps not as deep as kernel rather than supporting the dirt.
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@Rinkeby said in lineage native VS lineage on Ubuntu:
And of course the Linux Kernel is modified in all directions. But Google does it in a ugly way. I know, that when you boot your phone, the[y] manage to read information being sent before it was even started.
Do you have any source reference for this claim? Or was this knowledge gained from your own investigation?
Either way, if information is sent even before the device is booted, then your device is deeply compromised on the hardware and no matter what OS you put on it, it will continue doing this.
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I will look it up. Was a while ago. And it sends during the booting process obviously.
money money
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meanwhile its hard to find old sources. Welcome to Android and the commercial sector.
https://thehackernews.com/2016/11/hacking-android-smartphone.html?m=1
There is a lot of liberties with "stock" android. Wherever its geopolitics or Google/Apple themselves. I am sure Lineage kills off most of it. But even them are limited in all the code and firmware at play.
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@Rinkeby said in lineage native VS lineage on Ubuntu:
There is a lot of liberties with "stock" android. Wherever its geopolitics or Google/Apple themselves. I am sure Lineage kills off most of it. But even them are limited in all the code and firmware at play.
Not to be polemical about it, but your link only shows that some vendors go ahead and add spyware to their devices, not that Google was involved in this is any way. What the link is talking about is in no way 'stock' Android, like one would find on say a Pixel. This is the 'stock' for that Chinese vendor, and one can expect that they will add their own software on top, as do all other Android vendors (just hopefully not all as privacy invasive as these.)
For instance I expect the Android that is shipped on for example the FairPhones and the OnePlus range to be more privacy respecting than the ones shipped on budget Chinese devices. What the latter do with their devices, that's on them.
Then there's the term 'firmware' in the article: as this link explains:
Firmware meaning, especially when speaking about devices with Android, has been incorrectly expanded in popular culture to encompass all the software on those devices. Android “firmware" now means the firmware plus the Android operating system on top of it.
So the 'firmware' that contains the spyware is most likely just extra sodtware included in the image flashed to the devices. Again, none of it Google's doing or Android's fault per se.
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But we are all on the same side here, and we can agree that UT is much more aligned out of the box to the user's privacy than Android.
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Yes, agreed. Not the greatest link. But a proof of dirty firmware through Google. Eventhough not guilty of this one.
