Old network protocols are a hazard to your personal security and expose you to eavesdropping from criminals, investigators, and networks with illegal intentions. Read on for a cheat-code-based security addon for your Android-based mobile phone. A little warning: Technical insights will not get you outside the scope of Danish law as implemented by the Socialdemocratic government although it makes it harder to fool you. All these violations of our rights as citizens of the free world are symptomatic of politicians, who do not govern using first principles respecting both basic human rights, families, and the free markets. Be the victim of a power hunger corrupted politician and end up with your private life in some distorted form or the other exposed to authorities, union leaders, and next-door intruders.
Surfing the internet for information on disabling the old 2G protocol on my cell phone for good, I came across a series of differing advice. Upgrade to 5G and disable all other services, upgrade to Android 12 and use a system-wide visible menu to disable 2G, use encrypted texting and phone calls, use proxy servers, and disable apps and services you do not use that may pose a risk to your phone.
You should avoid rooting your phone, although you might gain extra security from changing the operating system through upgrades or a choice of secure alternative. Kali Nethunter and Graphene OS are currently (June 2022) the best free alternatives to Android and iOS. Furthermore, KaliOS and its XWindow system can be run on top of Windows 10 and Windows 11 computers with WLS2 in Powershell and is therefore both a Windows-Linux system and a Linux killer. This paves the way to a computerless office with docking stations for your 8 or 12 core mobile devices, although the investment has not been made yet by Microsoft themselves. China’s Xiaomi and OnePlus currently provide the best platforms for the Renegade project that supports Windows on a smartphone. The computerless office today is thus more of an Asian idea than a Western idea. I am personally reluctant to use a Chinese-produced mobile phone due to the possibility of chip-based surveillance and backdoors. The problem may still persist in some form or another in Western produce, and we still have to see a better solution. As a Western, I recommend the Big brother closer to your own cultural background. The best future choice may be an innovative offer to kill or neutralize eavesdropping and interference features using multiple core features, putting a randomized series of computations critical to the operating system on an added chip and supplementing with an operating system distributing calculations by default. Such a hardware add-on may also serve as personalized hardware-based security you can plug out of your smartphone. Since open-source libraries will be the primary choice for such a solution, we will experience a shift toward Linux-based operating systems, similar to the shift to Android. Android itself did not receive the attention and innovative effort for which it was designed, so it may still become the first choice for even professional office solutions in the future.
It is harder than most people realize to set up a secure mobile phone and commercial software with antivirus and added app protection are recommended. I am reluctant to recommend Onion and Tor as secure permanent dark web solutions: Those systems seem possible to close down or circumvent within the Western hemisphere for NATO military authorities and the backdoor may be JS (javascript) based and not only hardware related as suggested previously. You should power off your devices and go use an anonymous computer or second-hand buy-and-throw-away non-camera tablet with a secure Linux system in a cafe without video surveillance on a public wifi connection and pay with cash when the dark web is needed for critical personal anonymous communication.
Hardware still means a lot, and I recommend products with electronics components made in several Western countries, i.e. Japanese American Motorola, then you benefit from both critical consumers and the effect of diplomacy across countries. Hedge your bets as a consumer and gain more freedom.
The computerless office might be the next big thing that also adds physical security due to the dependence on mainframe and cloud-based solutions. Since Microsoft has not made the investment in those past years possible, it is clear evidence of the persistence of non-free markets. I might as well mention another sign of non-free markets: The nonexisting encrypted IP-based consumer market devices and software. IP consumer products add security through encryption. In Denmark, we suffer from lower-grade encryption of mobile communication for companies to provide more bandwidth. Consumers should use modern technology and fast infrastructure to encrypt their personal communication. Today people do not convert and use apps like Zoiper on smartphones when MMS and SMS messaging are not among the features, and this affects the market for proxy servers and encrypted networking. A truly free market would adapt to both government-based agreements for providers and security risk exposures. There was a time when a lot of innovative companies offered IP telephone solutions on the consumer market, those days are gone. You cannot even read text messages in Denmark on your stationary phone. However here is my advice: Get an IP phone account and use apps like Zoiper with a secure proxy server to add more security to your telephone calls and help create a free market with better products and lower prices on internet-based services, general communication services, and telecom provider services.
On my Android-based Motorola Zoom One, I ended up disabling all protocols except LTE. This is done through the hot code *#*#4636#*#* which opens the Phone information screen. (On some iOS devices *3001#12345#*) I then scrolled down the settings list to “Set preferred network type” and selected LTE only. It is also possible to select bands, to further reduce the risk of activating 2G. Usually, you need two active bands for communication, with LTE only one is necessary, e.g. 1800MHz. Please refer to your mobile provider for details on frequency ranges and bands covering 2G solely and get rid of those to enhance your privacy. My mobile provider forward all calls to my VoIP number, and SMS/MMS is still received on the sim card exclusively used for only LTE although the subscription is a mobile phone subscription. A degree of security can be added using Kali Linux Nethunter or other secure versions of Android, and/or using proxy networks.
It is possible to secure your mobile communication even further by forwarding VoIP from a server at home. The server may be connected to the internet using a mobile phone, a mobile broadband modem, or an Arduino with a mobile telephone SIM card and a script forwarding calls and SMS messages via VoIP to a softphone on a WIFI-connected smartphone or tablet.
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