this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2024
50 points (100.0% liked)

Privacy

32456 readers
522 users here now

A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.

Some Rules

Related communities

much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
 

I have been considering replacing my nearly 7 year old iPhone (although very reluctant) and I was checking for options. Really the only phone that caught my eye was the Sony xperia 1 V, but I found no information about how to degoogle and lock down the device. I really like the features and the built in camera apps, etc. Is there a way to degoogle the phone without loosing the funcionality/ease of use?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 11 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

The Xperia phones are often horrendously locked down

Not really, at least when compared to most other brands. I've had three or four different Xperia models, and unlocked the bootloader on every one of them using official Sony tools. They even have official open-source software archives, which are very helpful to people who build de-googled "ROMs".

The one thing that has been especially locked down is the TA partition, which contains DRM keys used for Sony's proprietary apps. It's not needed for an open-source OS like LineageOS.

For this phone specifically, it looks like official LineageOS support is already underway, despite it being a fairly new model:

https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/pdx234/

I would definitely recommend a Pixel device if you’re going to go De-Googling.

Pixels do have unusually good support for user-installed OS, but the irony here is that you can't truly de-google them, because no OS will change the fact that Google controls the hardware and firmware.