I’m thinking of getting a fairphone in the future. I like that they are modular and last a while. Are they easily customizable to where I can flash a different ROM? Is the default configuration private?
Green washed. If they cared about sustainability they wouldn’t have removed the headphone jack for longer-lived headphones—and instead started selling their own branded Bluetooth earbuds like the rest of the manufacturers.
The gold standard for privacy is still Pixel with GrapheneOS tbh
The stock Fairphone runs the stock full-blown Google spyware stack. Privacy isn’t Fairphone’s selling point: it’s repairability.
You can install CalyxOS very easily on it however. That’s what I’m rocking on my Fairphone 4, and it’s great. I have no issues with it.
Fairly private.
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
It’s not tho…
I am happy running CalyxOS on my FP4. Bootloader is relockable as well, which is nice for security.
it is a good choice if you don’t need serious processing power
As others said, it’s pretty stock android so… Bad. But you can buy it from Murena pre-flashed with e/os and then have a stock phone with a locked bootloader running a decently private OS. The bootloader is unlockable if you so wish.
Is the bootloader relockable with my own keys?
Yes, it’s relockable. You are welcome to Google for more, I had done some research a while ago.
I plan to brush up and switch my own FP4 to e/os during the holidays.
Edit: Google it on any search engine you like ;-)
The CalyxOS installer does that AFAIK, so it should be supported
fairphone offically supports /e/OS as a private option
also unlockable bootloader if you want to run linage for example
If you need something that focuses on privacy at a similar price tag: https://mc02.punkt.ch/en/mc02-5g-secure-phone/
I’m curious, what’s your use case that you need that kind of a phone? just visited their site, says $550 for a somewhat mediocre phone. it’s repairable, but with expensive, fairphone-only sold parts. the OS on it needs removing, as stated multiple times ITT.
a 5 year old phone has comparable tech specs, costs like a 10th of that, you can open it and replace battery and parts. you also need to flash an alternative OS, so what justifies a 10-fold price hike?
edit:
it used to be cheaper, and with an audio jack. Add some environment and social consideration and I see many reasons to buy it.
Or you can buy a Google phone from Amazon and text about privacy or freeing Palestine while sipping your Starbucks coffee in your Tesla car.
Not everything has to be about how much do you personally get for the money you give.
I am so glad I could get the Faiphone 3 while it still had an audio jack. At that time the hardware was not too far behind, still too much for my use which is mainly scrolling through obscure left-ish forums and YouTube channels (thanks newpipe) and startups late-stage capitalist hacker news (I don’t know any better about tech).
The reason why Fairphone charges so much is because their selling point is ethics, and they claim they put sustainability of raw materials and fair pay for workers first. Whether or not they check that goal, companies like Google, Apple, etc definitely keep their prices low by paying workers in the global south pennies.
what’s your use case that you need that kind of a phone?
I repair my phones when they break and the easy repair of a Fairphone is in no way comparable to the absolute pain it is to remove the display on a phone released in the last 5 years.
Especially considering they provide a 5 year warranty, source fair materials, 8 years of security updates and many more years to come with full access to replacement parts.
I bought my Fairphone for similar reasons to you.
I had a second hand mid-range Samsung for about 6 months and then the USB port got destroyed. I was unable to replace the USB port so the phone is useless.
I bought a Fairphone 5 thinking that, if anything similar happened, I would NOT need to replace the phone and would save money in the long term.
Kids not dying in cobalt mines is also a bonus: https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2023/02/01/1152893248/red-cobalt-congo-drc-mining-siddharth-kara
I too repair my phones when they break and I haven’t had any issues replacing batteries, one camera assembly (was supposed to be an upgrade - wasn’t) and twice the screen with assembly on budget phones. in fact, before I buy them (always used) I check youtube for replacement videos for battery and screen. all replacements done with chinese parts, ultra-cheap and locally available.
I don’t know about the fair sourced part, I guess I’m too jaded to consider that an issue so I’ll concede that’s important to some people. I figure I’m doing everyone a service by repurposing a discarded 5 year old phone.
I check youtube for replacement videos for battery and screen
You already lost me there. My times of looking up video guides on how to repair my phone are over, I can replace the battery with my hands and the screen is mounted with 8 screws. OEM parts can be ordered directly from Fairphone and arrive within 2 days.
all replacements done with chinese parts, ultra-cheap and locally available.
It is incredibly difficult to get OEM parts for many phones, you never know if it is a good part until you actually have it in your hand. In some cases it doesn’t matter but I have never seen a cheap third party screen which comes close to the original.
I figure I’m doing everyone a service by repurposing a discarded 5 year old phone.
You are, the best phone for the environment is an old phone.
Fairphone also at least tries to create / source their phones fairly. Not important in terms of privacy, but somewhat explains the higher price tag.
Bless fairphone’s intentions but isn’t it better to buy 2nd hand?
Not really, buying 2nd hand implies that people still buy 1st hand. The second hand market is subsidizing the 1st hand market.
2nd hand fairphone
That’s a good alternative, yeah.
$550 is a lot which is why it’s a future plan for me. I have a pixel 7a which is serving me well at the current moment but the repairability on this thing is egregious. To repair the battery you have to unseal the adhesive with a heat gun and then pull off the interior battery adhesive and there’s no guarantee it’ll reseal properly. I plan to get as much life as I absolutely can out of this phone, but when it gives up the ghost I want something that’ll last a long time and is repairable because reducing e-waste is important to me. I also just enjoy being able to fix things by myself. By the time I need a new phone, all of the five year old phones will be the current shitty unrepairable ones we have today.
not to rain on your parade, but F5 is a downgrade from 7a in practically every aspect.
I’m aware of the glued shut aspect and there are solutions for that nowadays. getting a SDM870 and better SoC for under $100 with tons of RAM and storage, for me is more than a worthwhile trade off.
on the other hand, it’s perfectly understandable if you don’t want to dick around with all that and/or want to support Fairphone’s mission.
Hopefully his 7a doesn’t die tomorrow, and by then Fairphone has managed to put out Something that’s at least reasonably better than 7a.
When I bought my Fairphone, I was simply too fed up with working around the intentional shittiness of the other companies.
I prefer to deal with some technical limitations, than have to deal with intentional ones.
I use Arch BTW.
The default is Fairphone OS. It is Google Android but they don’t pay to license the name ‘Android’, so they have to use an alternative name.
You can install /e/OS (even preinstalled by Murena) or DivestOS. Any other option doesn’t make sense as Divest is best in terms of security and privacy among all available custom roms and /e/ is most convenient (good but not perfect privacy, bad security but with MicroG, relock and App Lounge as well as Murena Cloud)
DivestOS is pretty awesome. It allows for bootloader locking, which Lineage can’t do IIRC and it runs very fast on my Pixel 2 xl.
Any other option doesn’t make sense as Divest is best in terms of security and privacy among all available custom roms
X doubt
I have never heard of Divest beforeNever mind, I’ve actually found the link to divestos.org in my browsing history, I’ve just forgotten about it.
The default Android on them is pretty standard including Google Play services, so it is not great in regards to privacy (but could be worse, like an Apple device or so).
But for most of their models you can find good alternative Android roms or even mobile Linux distributions like PostmarketOS.
Fairphone’s support of PostmarketOs shows me that they actually care about their mission.
Why would I think that Apple would be worse than Google when Apple is predominantly a hardware company and Google is predominantly an ad company?
Apple also runs an ad business these days and their devices collect more types of data than stock Android does. And contrary to many Android phones there is very little you can do against that in Apple devices.
Finally a good, nuanced article on this topic, thanks for sharing. Only drawback is that the author doesn’t seem to be aware that degoogling your phone is a viable alternative, especially with manufactures like Fairphone offering this out of the box.
Lots of people (including myself, previously) fall for the narrative that Apple can financially justify not spying on their users because their hardware is expensive. Versus Google, who have always been about ads and data mining.
This logic unfortunately fails to consider that a publicly trading company will always use all methods at their disposal to keep up profit so shareholders are happy. Expensive hardware was probably enough a decade ago, but the golden rule is: as long as a company can fuck you over in a way that increases profits, they absolutely will, given enough time.
We need federal privacy law in the U.S. and we need it fast.
I think the normal fairphone is just stock android.
There is a “Murena” version of it sold by Murena that comes with e/os preinstalled, which is based on android and works with some android apps.
I know that for a fact that you can’t install GrapheneOS on it, but CalyxIS is available for the Fairphone, then flash that and you’ll have full protection, minus mandatory communication services that are require to use any kind of a smartphone.
minus mandatory communication services that are require to use any kind of a smartphone.
What?
