this post was submitted on 14 Jul 2025
809 points (97.9% liked)

Technology

73067 readers
2060 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related news or articles.
  3. Be excellent to each other!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
  10. Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.

Approved Bots


founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

TLDR: Drug dealers in Catalonia have started to adopt GrapheneOS en masse leading to Catalan police suspecting anyone with a Google Pixel is a drug dealer

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] rc__buggy@sh.itjust.works 313 points 1 week ago (40 children)

Basically, if you don't have a phone the cops can easily backdoor, you must be a criminal.

"What do you have to hide?" taken to it's logical conclusion.

[–] rottingleaf@lemmy.world 17 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Humans are apes desiring power, there's no excuse under which you can give it to them. They'll invent authority giving them right to judge you and think they are in the right.

Also why I absolutely despise the Silicon Valley - it's many such people who think they are the elite now. I want that place detroited as soon as possible. Zuckerberg prosecuted for all the murders he's committed (I'm certain there are plenty, a person with ASPD with such power just can't be anything else) which are now unknown, Brin and other jerks playing "cooperating with legal elected authorities" while giving them something with no mandate whatsoever feeling themselves powerful - prosecuted for high treason, all these playing censorship and recommendation - prosecuted for scams on the scale of billions, yadda-yadda.

Cops saying this should be immediately sued for inciting hate or defamation or whatever against people who don't want to be backdoored.

I have a right to not be surveilled, they don't have a right to surveil me.

Anyway, I might all the time fly a weird trajectory between various ideologies, but they are all anarchist and Silicon Valley bosses are all thieves.

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (39 replies)
[–] dastanktal@lemmy.ml 192 points 1 week ago (2 children)

This is the best recommendation for a phone I've seen yet.

Thanks catalonian police

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] Aitolda@lemmy.world 143 points 1 week ago (4 children)

This is a weird advertisement, but I kind of want grapheneOS now.

[–] hiramfromthechi@lemmy.world 2 points 6 days ago

Shameless plug for SwapMyOS

[–] Zetta@mander.xyz 39 points 1 week ago (9 children)

Been on it for ~2 years and never going back, fuck Google, fuck the government.

[–] pineapplelover@lemmy.dbzer0.com 20 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I've also been using it for like 2 years but I really want the hardware of something like the Fairphone. A fairphone or something similar with Graphene would be amazing

[–] hiramfromthechi@lemmy.world 4 points 6 days ago

You can technically put GrapheneOS on a Fairphone, but it's not officially supported.

Long term, the GOS team is looking to branch off from their reliance on Pixels.

[–] Zetta@mander.xyz 16 points 1 week ago (3 children)

The Graphene OS people have always been talking about how they eventually intend to develop their own hardware. So, possibly they will make something good eventually.

load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments (8 replies)
[–] ITGuyLevi@programming.dev 17 points 1 week ago

Been on it for about 19 months now, it's what Android should be.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Yupa@ani.social 101 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Sounds like a good recommendation.

[–] Cethin@lemmy.zip 17 points 1 week ago

Yeah, this is legitimately an amazing ad, though Google may bot want it because they probably make more money off your data than you buying the device.

[–] besselj@lemmy.ca 88 points 1 week ago (1 children)

They're mad they can't use cellbrite to snoop on properly configured GOS phones and that they actually have to do real police work to catch drug dealers

[–] boonhet@sopuli.xyz 45 points 1 week ago (21 children)

Yes. They (cellebrite) don't mention GrapheneOS support very loudly because it's poor. They can't decrypt one that's BFU (Before First Unlock), not even by brute force if it's a 6 digit passcode apparently. Don't know if they can get data from an AFU GOS pixel. A year ago when their internal docs leaked, they also had no support for latest iOS at the time, but had brute force support for older versions as long as phone itself wasn't too new and had AFU access without brute force for even older versions.

Moral of the story: if there's a chance police might take your phone to investigate for a crime you hopefully didn't even commit, shut down your phone completely - the 5x power button trick on iOS disables biometric unlock, but the device itself stays decrypted and thus more vulnerable. Also keep your OS up to date.

If you've got a phone that's neither iOS nor GrapheneOS, it's probably pretty much Swiss cheese anyway. IOS isn't as good as GrapheneOS either, but it offers some protection against Cellebrite if up to date and BFU. But if they keep your phone for long enough (months, years), they'll get it unlocked because you can't install updates that would patch any newly discovered vulnerabilities and one day they'll find a BFU unlock for it, probably.

[–] Zorsith@lemmy.blahaj.zone 35 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Grapheneos also has options to just disable data over the USB port when its locked. Or disable it outright.

[–] AmbiguousProps@lemmy.today 27 points 1 week ago

Yep, disabling it entirely allows for charging when the device is off, but otherwise, it is functionally useless and is disabled at the hardware level.

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (20 replies)
[–] Itdidnttrickledown@lemmy.world 79 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (4 children)

The police: 'We've encountered a difficulty with our paid spying software. Welp it must be just the criminals.'

Edit: Missed the R and hit the T on our.

[–] Gonzako@lemmy.world 20 points 1 week ago (6 children)

pretty much. The original article says that if they have a pixel they have to ask for a warrant

load more comments (6 replies)
load more comments (3 replies)
[–] DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works 60 points 1 week ago (2 children)

"Feds"

checks Wikipedia page for Spain

Government: "Unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy"

🧐

(Sorry for nitpicking lol 😅)


But serious tho:

I kinda hate these weird associations. Its like arresting people who wear glasses because intellectual rebels wear glasses? (Pol Pot?)

Like can't someone just use a phone in peace? Most Pixel users don't even use Graphene OS.

Hey you know what, drug dealers drink water. Lets arrest people who drink water!

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] Part4@infosec.pub 47 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Police are not the brightest in any society.

So I guess somebody needs to tell them that they need to focus their efforts a little better if their current plan is 'anyone with a Google Pixel is a drug dealer'.

Can I suggest they start with the people with drugs, rather than the people with the -- not uncommon - google phones in their search for drug dealers?

[–] kadup@lemmy.world 20 points 1 week ago

Police are not the brightest in any society.

It's a literal job requirement. If you're smart, you're not going to blindly follow orders. Police cognitive testing literally discards candidates that perform well in intellectual tasks. This is not a conspiracy or a joke, it's how police works.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 45 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Reminds me of getting a notice in Middle School, decades ago, about how a pager was considered "drug paraphernalia"

There was also a big Bloomberg-Era push by the NYPD to arrest any woman carrying condoms on her person, on the grounds that a woman carrying a condom must be a sex worker.

[–] icegladiator@lemy.lol 20 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Everything I hear about Bloomberg make me question how he ran as a democrat, and then I remember he fits the democratic party better than anyone else...

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] mkwt@lemmy.world 44 points 1 week ago (19 children)

Doesn't a Google Pixel device come with its own OS image by default, independent of Graphene OS? Is there some kind of step that we're missing here?

[–] TheBat@lemmy.world 85 points 1 week ago

Yes. Cops are idiots. Duh.

load more comments (18 replies)
[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 38 points 1 week ago (7 children)

Well I do use a Pixel (for lineage OS) and I do make my living selling drugs... wait wait this is a bad example.

[–] dangercake@feddit.uk 17 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Well in that case two marijuanas please

load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments (6 replies)
[–] midtsveen@lemmy.wtf 29 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Update, July 3, 2025 (11:45 AM ET): The crew behind GrapheneOS is understandably none too pleased about their good name being dragged through the mud, and members are speaking out about these reports from Spain. Over on X, the official GrapheneOS account posts:

European authoritarians and their enablers in the media are misrepresenting GrapheneOS and even Pixel phones as if they’re something for criminals. GrapheneOS is opposed to the mass surveillance police state these people want to impose on everyone.

Security is a tool, and can be wielded just as much for good as it can for bad. While some people may see this as an indictment, we’d say it’s more the inevitable consequence of GrapheneOS just being very, very good at what it does.

Yeah, when the media is wrong, GrapheneOS out here correcting the media!

[–] Bluewing@lemmy.world 28 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Glances at my new Pixel, Welp, I guess I ain't ever goin' to Catalonia. Not that I was planning to go there anyway.

***Tinfoil conspiracy: Maybe this a scare tactic to keep the British out of Spain.

[–] descartador@lemmy.eco.br 16 points 1 week ago (4 children)
load more comments (4 replies)
[–] Flockwit@lemmy.nz 23 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Reminds me of when the US tried to fight "terror" by kidnapping people and shoving them in Gitmo because they were wearing Casio watches, which is apparently a brand favoured by terrorists.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today 19 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I've used Samsungs for years, but they have gotten too expensive for what I need, so I went for a Pixel this time around. I got issues with it, but mostly because I'm so used to the Samsung universe. Still way better than an Apple.

I guess I'm a Spanish drug dealer now.

[–] FundMECFSResearch@lemmy.blahaj.zone 16 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

Merci per la idea de negoci. (/s)

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›