Have a Samsung phone (outside of the United States), and want to unlock the bootloader? Well, soon you won’t be able to do so anymore, as Samsung seems to be removing this option from their phones – including already sold models being upgraded to One UI 8.
Bootloader unlocking is a popular way to breathe new life into older devices, by loading unofficial software onto a device, like custom ROMs, gaining root access, custom kernels, etc. This option will be taken away from users with One UI 8.
[…]This means not only is the OEM Unlock not visible in Settings anymore, but the bootloader doesn’t even contain any of the code required to unlock itself. This means a workaround to brute force it open is not possible at all, unless Samsung updates the bootloader to add this logic back in.
↫ Josh Skinner at SammyGuru
And so, the ongoing process of locking down Android to a point where it becomes nigh-on indistinguishable from iOS’ locked-down, anti-user nature continues unabated. Samsung is the default choice for Android users in a lot of places around the world, and seeing them, too move ever closer to fully locking down their phones is terrible news for consumers. We should be striving for less restrictive computing, not more.
Combined with persistent rumours that Google is looking into effectively taking Android closed source, leaving only a stub AOSP behind, the future of Android as an least somewhat “open” platform looks quite grim indeed.
It is a sad development, I agree. At the same time un-rooting has not been a thing for me for a long time already because:
– the banking apps won’t accept it (this kills it for me)
– the hassle of un-rooting together with the risk of bricking the device is material
– Android/Samsung phones work rather well for me
So its more a sentimental feeling rather than a practical consideration. I won’t un-root my mixer or my coffee machine either.
Wouldn’t you agree that you not being bothered with it is actually the final puzzle? For ages we were more and more stripped of our rights to do what we want with the devices, to tinker with them so now when they finally close it once and for all we are not that bothered.
I was kinda in the same both – loved using custom Roms but then banking apps refusing to run was at begining mild annoyance and then outrighte blocker.
Now I would love to see the world where (the UE?) would force: makers to make the devices unlockable so I can install whichever OS I want (akin to the PC), force banking (and other essential apps) run on such devices (I can easily open my bank app on my main linux PC under root and surprisingly there are no sirens indicating TheEndOfTheWorld, and I can do way more than with the mobile app) and also force providing drivers for their devices (though Andorid way of handling it is stupid).
Thus, as a result if you are fed up with the bloated official rom you could use install whichever one suites you best…
Andreas Reichel,
I want to respectfully suggest that while it may only be “sentimental” for you, for other people like myself the restrictions are extremely regressive in terms of what can practically be done with our hardware. Not long ago I had to give up on a second hand chromebook due to the onerous restrictions built into it. Obviously the FOSS/openness movement has philosophical components too, but it’s not just a philosophy, there are many practical applications when owners are allowed to be in control of their own hardware.
I want my printers to notify all logged-in users when they jam.
Please get the reference…
@Alfman, you know that I respect your position a lot and so I do feel uncomfortable when I have failed to express myself well: Of course I would love to haven open phones and prefer open hardware and open source in general and I believe that I wrote “feeling sad”.
My main point was: This battle has been lost to me when the Banking Apps locked us in because I really depend on those and have no alternative. So formalizing the lock-down has indeed no practical impact on me since I have been locked-down effectively for more than 10 years.
Btw: Fair phone, isn’t that still open and in general a good idea to buy?
Andreas Reichel,
I get that, twisting the screw harder doesn’t impact you since you’ve already left alt-os behind anyway. But from my point of view every twist of the screw leads to closing the door on openness for future generations.
I looked at them, but they’re not sold in the US. Unfortunately US carriers including ATT tend to blacklist foreign devices. While I’m not sure if this is responsible for all the problems, I have read numerous posts from US users experiencing issues with fairphones in the US.
https://www.reddit.com/r/fairphone/comments/11nxkwo/fairphone_4_on_att_us/
https://www.reddit.com/r/fairphone/comments/16zmkbq/murena_fairphone_issues_and_us_experience_on_att/
This isn’t limited to Fairphone, For background: the 4G FCC license required carriers to accept all compatible phones on their network, but the 5G FCC license did away with these consumer rights, allowing US carriers to be more discriminatory. Ajit Pai at the FCC was actively fighting against consumer rights, you may have heard we repealed net neutrality, that was him too.
So I guess Fairphone would have to sign a deal with ATT (and others) to make them work well in the US. Though as I understand it, using a foreign SIM card or even a domestic MVNO might be a way around carrier device blacklisting.
Well, US people are screwed indeed for many reasons.
I just went through Istanbul airport and they have been actively selling “e-sim” for 120 countries without restrictions. Maybe this can help your case?
Alfman,
The Fairphone 6 is available in the US through Murena. It ships with de-googled, with /e/os:
https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/16674972235537-Murena-Fairphone-in-the-USA
oskeladden,
Thank you for mentioning this. Although your link does seem to confirm it’s not supported on ATT.
BTW I’m not trying to upsell ATT or anything, but we actually switched from tmobile to resolve coverage issues where my parents lived. For better or worse, switching carriers can make a big difference.in rural areas that are prone to lack of coverage.
Shipping with /e/ standard OS is a pro in my book, although I am fairly certain I want to try GrapheneOS next. If anybody’s got a recommendation that that works flawlessly on ATT, that would be useful to me. I expect I’ll probably have to flash it myself but GrapheneOS out of the box would be all the better.
Your coffee machine isn’t connected to the internet (hopefully… mine isn’t) and the vendor cannot decide out of the blue to add a bean brand detection feature to only make coffee with “partner beans” . (remember Juicero?)
This is technological servitude. Whether it bothers you or not is a different discussion.
How do you feel about Steam’s newly introduced rule 15* ? Same shit, different smell.
*Steam won’t sell content payment processors don’t like.
Edit: this was supposed to be a reply to Andreas above. ^
All my coffee machines are connected to the internet permanently. We chat on WhatsApp daily and they start making coffee as soon as I touch tarmac at the airport. 😀
It is the world we live in. All manufacturers are moving the way of apple because owner restrictions are beneficial to manufacturers 🙁
It’s one thing for a device to be sold with restrictions up front, but when those restrictions are created after the fact, that crosses the line. I am not holding my breath, but ethically Samsung deserves to prosecuted in a class action lawsuit with triple damages. Of course, it’s only a tiny minority who unlock & re-flash, but for that minority it’s a huge violation of ownership rights.
I am afraid that, over time, ownership rights are eroding across the board. This is the future that all corporations want, some have just been earlier than others. It’s happening with phones, chromebooks, televisions, IOT, even cars, etc. While many of us here have been actively protesting this, it’s not enough when so many consumers are completely ignorant about it. It happens less so today, but ten years ago we had corporate fans on osnews cheering on apple’s restrictions. I have to concede that not everybody actually appreciates owner rights, however the problem is that everybody looses the rights when they’re not sufficiently protected.
We’ve got Louis Rossman and even PewDiePie of all people doing what they can from a grass roots angle, but it hasn’t been enough, We’ve got a degree of openness grandfathered into some hardware, like x86 computers, but everywhere else we’re loosing the war.
I do believe that there are many aspects to that:
1) Security. The vendor is blamed for all kind of security issues and hit hard when anything goes wrong. So from that angle alone they will try to keep full and tight control over the devices and also can justify any action they want. “We did it to improve security for our end-users and to prevent hackers stealing your data, judge.” There goes your lawsuit.
2) Market shares: People buy apply products, at 80% margin. Proofs that any good intention just gets punished. We 1000 people caring and paying for Open Solutions simply do not matter.
3) Alternatives: A few China phones are still open, however I have tried all of them and they becomes rather useless after 2 years or so while Samsung indeed provides monthly updates for 4 years plus. This matters to me because swapping the phone is a nightmare to me (banking and 2FA apps!). Fair Phone maybe?
4) Technically, its an update, isn’t it and nobody forces you to apply it.
So I agree with you: this battle has been lost and I believe it went lost a long time ago. Samsung is just catching up with reality here. Time to move on. We lost Mercurial to Git too and after a week of cursing, life just went by.
Andreas Reichel,
Ok, but the owner doesn’t HAVE to flash their own firmware. All the steps are actually quite challenging to do. Having to enable root mode, get unlock codes, access ADB, etc. For me the process literally took weeks. I’d be surprised if there’s even single verified case of a normal user unintentionally overwriting the official firmware. And as for the ones who do so on purpose, well that’s always been at their own risk so it doesn’t really pose a liability problem.
If you have any counter examples though, I’d like to hear about them.
Yes, I am very aware of the fact that FOSS/alt-os users are in the minority, however I do think that we are still deserving of protected rights, especially in the face of a near-absolute duopoly.
Yeah, but see my other comment 🙁
Nobody expects an update to permanently remove features though. It’s clearly unethical and even from a legal standpoint I would hope that a judge would recognize this is truly unfair for affected consumers.
Just to be clear, when I said ethically deserves, I didn’t mean to suggest it was likely. On the contrary corporations typically have the upper hand in the US and consumer interests rarely matter. My actual prediction is that owner rights will continue to unravel while corporations continue gaining more control over owners. Obviously it goes without saying this isn’t what I want, but I think it’s a good bet that money will beat out ethics.
Clearly got that and you are not wrong.
With this news + AOSP becoming more closed source + Play Integrity becoming more widespread and strict (e.g. for banking apps) + things like the EU Online ID App having mandatory Play Integrity, there’s no escape from the Apple/Google monopoly.
I think the “””solution””” for myself would be to have a degoogled Android phone (Fairphone if Pixels don’t support unlocking in the future) as my daily driver for running open source apps, and a cheap used old iPhone with cracked screen for the mandatory evil stuff.
I agree. In a changing landscape, everybody needs two phones: an iPhone for banking apps and VoLTE, and a Pixel with GrapheneOS for everything else.
a_very_dumb_nickname,
You do the best with the circumstances you find yourself in, but it feels so wrong that alt-os users are treated this way. This two phone solution isn’t just impractical, but it’s not great for the environment or wallet. It’s very cumbersome to have to carry a 2nd phone around to be able to connect to your work VPN. I’ve done it, buying and traveling with a 2nd phone, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t resent it.
It’d be one thing if I genuinely needed a second phone, but to be coerced into it on account of alt-OS discrimination is very unpalatable for me.
Sounds like maybe a new OS for phones should be made outside of China and the US?
Maybe some major investment into Sailfish instead of investing in trying to DeGoogle….. Google (Android)
Just a thought.