
Blackphone BP1 Now Available - jonbaer
https://store.blackphone.ch/#
======
rsync
Wake me when there is an open baseband that cannot be arbitrarily controlled
by the carrier (and possibly has up to DMA access to your phone).

There is no secure phone until then.

~~~
revelation
This. This phone is a joke. I appreciate the effort in trying to patch up that
raging security disaster we call Android, but the real problem in any phone is
the propietary baseband running on some RTOS with little in the way of process
isolation (or security conscious programming, for that) connected to a high
bandwidth, always on wireless communication interface speaking complex
protocols designed by a committee with an endpoint run by companies that have
been happily complying with mass-scale surveillance, mere packets away from
direct access to the microphone and GPS chip, possibly a DMA directly into the
application processor.

Oh, and that neat little micro SIM you put into it? It runs fucking Java and
has carrier push support for new "applications" builtin, in the meantime it
stores and generates the crypto keys used by the baseband.

This is the state of mobile security. Unless you are running osmocomBB on a
crusty old Motorola brick with a logger between the phone and SIM to check for
anomalous activity, don't touch it with a 3m pole.

~~~
StavrosK
It seems to me like you're saying "mobile phones can never be secured,
security is all-or-nothing, and any attempt to secure mobile phones is
futile". Is that accurate?

Because it seems to me that, sometimes, not leaving your doors and windows
wide open, even though "they can always be broken into", is a good idea.

~~~
rsync
No, we're not saying that.

~~~
JshWright
Is there no middle ground?

Is there no value to a phone that reduces your NSA dragnet footprint
substantially, while at the same time building the capital necessary to
develop an open baseband (as I'm sure you're aware, that is not a cheap
proposition)?

~~~
dobbsbob
There is for business use.

Easy to make your own burner phone with customized AOSP for temporary use
while in China or CIS/Russia if worried about industrial espionage or legions
of criminal blackhats hanging around hotel wireless APs. After going through
the source removing stuff like debuggered and GPS binaries, and writing custom
init scripts can drop in TextSecure, Redphone and many other open source apps,
thegrugq's Darkmatter app, platform sign them and enforce with middleware
install-time mac to prevent anything else not signed being installed and use
dm-verity to check system.img on boot for tampering. Lot's of business
travelers need something reasonably secure to bring that they just end up
throwing away when they return. Boot a Mobiflauge patched kernel temporarily
with fastboot and wipe/encrypt the device when you get back for safe disposal,
then flash Paranoid Android or CyanogenMod to it and sell it on CL to get some
of your money back.

There's also Nexus 7 devices that can be bought without a baseband to do this.
Essential reading is the Android Hacker's Handbook by @pof. Of course using
any phone for something illegal is a guaranteed way to get arrested no matter
what has been done to it. The hardware will always be a bundle of proprietary
blackboxes, likely with a law enforcement door to brick it, record meetings
with the mic or track the owner.

~~~
JshWright
> Easy to make . . .

For some definition of 'easy' I suppose... (not any definition that the
average person would use).

------
stevengg
Have they released the source code yet?

~~~
avmich
I'd also expect a very detailed hardware specifications - open-hardware level
of details. Hardware simulators level of details. After all they talk about
transparency - so both hardware and software should be up for the scrutiny.

~~~
dublinben
>both hardware and software should be up for the scrutiny

Except they won't ever be made available, since this company is full of crap.
They're selling snake-oil, and shouldn't be trusted.

------
zmanian
The primary value of the Blackphone is that is comes with several hundred
dollars of security services.

1\. SilentCircle's encrypted messaging and VOIP solution + licenses for close
collaborators.

2\. Disconnect.Me's VPN

3\. Spideroaks encrypted cloud storage

4\. Kashmir's wifi finger printing services.

Everything is licensed for 2 years.

The primary market Silent Circle is going after at the moment is journalists,
NGO workers, private military contractors etc who need smart phones at an
organizational level but want enhanced resistance to surveillance.

~~~
MichaelGG
1\. Eh, OK, you're probably better off using zRTP directly with your contacts.
Silent Circle doesn't seem to actually say how your calls are any more secure.
In a recent thread, they say they hand them off to a VoIP carrier and consider
that "encrypted to the PSTN". IIRC part of Silent Circle's play is that they
think the government cannot compel them to do "bad" things, so they're telling
us to trust them on that basis.

2\. One of a ton of services that cost like $3-4 or so a month and will
probably fall. And sure, it prevents the local WiFi from running sslstrip at
the cost of putting all your traffic at an easy-to-monitor place (the VPN
provider).

3\. A closed source program running access to all your data doesn't sound
particularly impressive. But sure, it's better than using Dropbox.

4\. Kismet Wifi manager is $2.99 on Google Play.

It might be better than nothing, but the product sounds seriously over-hyped,
and some of their claims seem like outright lies or at best
misleading/useless.

I also don't get, if such a combo of services was so valuable, why someone
just doesn't sell it separately.

~~~
JshWright
Silent Circle does use ZRTP (the 'Z' in ZRTP is 'Zimmermann', who is one of
Silent Circle's cofounders).

You don't need to trust anyone. There are (admittedly slightly out dated)
buildable sources for the Android clients on GitHub. The whole point of ZRTP
is that the server can be considered untrusted.

~~~
MichaelGG
Except Silent Circle is actively promoting "encrypted to the PSTN" without
specifying exactly what that means. Handoff to iBasis is hardly "encrypted to
the PSTN" for any worthwhile value of PSTN.

The ZRTP part is fine if you can bring your own client. And I guess $12 a
month isn't much to pay for SC to run FreeSWITCH as a NAT traversal/endpoint
discovery platform.

There's still no real details on how we're supposed to trust Silent Circle
from being actively attacked and backdooring clients. If memory serves me
correctly Mr. Zimmerman said they're relying on the government not being able
to compel them to cooperate. AKA, Lavabit-style. (Sure, ZRTP is solid, but a
compromised client isn't detectable to end-users, plus SC talks a lot about
calling the PSTN.)

For a comparison to a company that takes security seriously, look at tarsnap.
Then go read the PR from Mike Janke the other day.

On another note, what does "100% dedicated network – no sharing or leasing"
even mean? Did SC run fibre from Toronto to Switzerland? How is SC's network
any different from any other VoIP company that builds a datacenter?

~~~
dobbsbob
The Silent Circle phone app is end to end encryption, it's their other service
that offers "Out-Circle Calling" which is encrypted to the PSTN. I don't
understand the dedicated network PR either

------
tdicola
I saw Jon Callas talk about the Blackphone at ToorCamp over the weekend and it
looked really nice. One interesting factoid he mentioned is that the
Blackphone went from initial conversation with manufacturer to actual shipping
product in about _6 months_ which is insanely impressive for a well polished
smartphone like this.

~~~
darksim905
This isn't as big of a deal as it seems considering the testing &
troubleshooting they went through with existing phones to see what works &
what doesn't work. The hardware & shell of the phone is probably an off the
shelf, off-brand phone design that nobody decided to use with minor
customizations.

~~~
tdicola
From what he said it helped that they partnered with folks who had built
hardware like this before. However they still had to do a ton of work in the
software to customize the OS, build applications, partner with services, etc.

------
mahrain
So we can be pretty certain that just visiting the Blackphone website has
tagged you for Xkeyscore...

~~~
lallysingh
If you're worried about that, the blackphone website can host (via https)
assets for ads, and put ads up on a few ad networks. Soon opening a connection
to the blackphone site won't mean much.

Ephemeral DH for PFS, of course.

------
javajosh
The first rule of Blackphone is: you do not talk about Blackphone!

(Actually I hope you do talk about blackphone because it's a worthy
_political_ product, and probably even a worthy product product.)

~~~
StavrosK
I have one, it's actually surprisingly good. I'd like to somehow get Google
Apps on it (which, I know, defeats the purpose), but it's a very snappy phone,
and I was really surprised by how light it is.

------
BorisMelnik
people have been trying to get this for a while within my circle. definitely
would love to play with one of these.

------
kndkvndslkgn
That's some nice proprietary software you've got there.

It would be a shame if someone were to place a backdoor in it...

If you want true freedom and security, run Replicant.
[http://redmine.replicant.us/projects/replicant/wiki](http://redmine.replicant.us/projects/replicant/wiki)

------
krsunny
This phone has an 8 mega pixel camera. At what point do you think
manufacturers will stop increasing pixel resolution? 50? 100? It has to top
off somewhere otherwise people will need a second hard drive just to store
phone pictures.

