Quite pleased by the destruction of the wifi chip on my e-reader,
I was thinking about destroying more of my stuff.
My questions involve ways to severe physical routes to GPS, 3G/2G, mic & cam.
I want to keep the wifi for e-mails.
But first, here's my (hopefully logical) reasoning.
I consider a smartphone only as a phone now. I need it:
- for work (specific days where I have to be reached at once).
- for emergency calls.
Else, the battery will be removed.
Why all the trouble?
- No tracking. Not that I care that much, but why allow it? Even if it
represents a limited amount of location privacy (other smartphones mics,
surveiliance camera and face recognition in the near future I guess...), at
least it's worth trying.
- It feels like a false need to be reached at all times.
- Less wave intensity colser to my genitals (phone in the pocket), even if
it's not proven harmful for now.
Downside: often unreacheable by phone, but often by mail
(need wifi to be on then, at work for example).
So how to stay as reachable as possible when my phone is off (most of the
time)?
I can invite e-mail use. At home, I need an audio and visual alert for
e-mails.
On the go:
Since I don't want to buy yet another device, which would be super outdated
and would cost as much,
I can try to destroy GPS and 3G on my current (relatively cheap) phone,
as well as the mic and cam, in order to transform it in some kind of offline
PDA.
But if wifi is still enabled, and it doesn't use one of the severed channels,
I still need an as free as possible OS.
Maybe severing it anyway and using an external libre wifi card could work.
If it works, I have a solid PDA, with mail and web as needed. Better that
tons of paper pads, a music player, etc.
I can enable the wifi on the spots where it's kind of "ok" to be tracked
(stationnary outside the house, like at work, or a wifi hotspot).
Else, I'm just unreachable when going out, or between places. And it's an
acceptable downside.
Now, questions, questions:
1 - Do you have any insight about circuits on a motherboard?
I want to physically disable 3G/2G, GPS, mic and camera.
Because I'm 100% sure I don't need them on a smartphone turned into a PDA.
2 - Is a cut or a whole enough (I guess it is, specially right through an
antenna or chip)? Is there a better way?
Of course, I can just attempt stuff and test if I'm reachable, or if I can
use the mic for example.
But it's safer to gather some data first.
Links are welcomed too. So far I found interesting data on websites about
phone repair.
My phone (which I want to turn to a PDA) isn't supported by CyanogenMod :(
3 - Is AOSP from source without Google's crap really wort it? Is there a list
of parts to remove from the source?
Right now I'm thinking of the Tor link I've already posted about hardening
Android.
But if I can compile without all that, it's even better.
4 - I also wonder what's different between AOSP cleaned up and Replicant (and
thus CyanogenMod).
I really don't need to be this much off the grid, but I want to try anyway.
I feel like Mac Gyver lol
Of course I could just use something like that instead:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hipster_PDA
