The pixel device is (as far as I’m aware) the only mainstream device that allows you to re-lock the boot loader.
Otherwise, once a phone is cracked, it remains cracked. I’m not entirely sure what that buys, but that’s why they do it
Most brands allow relocking bootloader. But after that you with be only able to use stock rom. Pixel lets you lock the bootloader with a different signature, so in this example you are basically able to lock it to only boot grapheneos and nothing else.
Security. You're caught with your pants down if you have any personal data on a phone with an unlocked bootloader. All data is effectively plaintext, all security is nullified with trivial difficulty. This is the actual worst-case scenario for journalists, whistleblowers, or anyone who is or may become under surveillance for any reason.
That's wrong, data is still usually encrypted.
A locked bootloader 'just' prevents tampering with the OS. You're only pwned when using the phone after it has been manipulated.
Yeah but if you have the phone with an unlocked bootloader and anyone gains access to it (physical or otherwise)...
They still wouldn't be able to do very much. All an unlocked bootloader does is let you flash things via fastboot.
Even with a locked bootloader, you could still get into recovery and cause mischief with physical access. You wouldn't be able to access the storage partition without decrypting it, but you could still maybe flash stuff to the system partition to infect it for the next time the phone is booted up.
Remote access to the phone won't be able to do much of anything with an unlocked bootloader. The far bigger hazard is app signature spoofing (eg Magisk and MicroG), which if successfully exploited can cause all sorts of havok - you can have apps pretending to be other apps that have root access.
Even then, though, I think it's a fair trade of risk. The chances of any of this happening are very, very low, albeit the consequence is extreme. I personally prefer that to the absolutely certain risk that Google is spying on my phone, even if the consequences of that spying are relatively low.
The pixel device is (as far as I’m aware) the only mainstream device that allows you to re-lock the boot loader.
Otherwise, once a phone is cracked, it remains cracked. I’m not entirely sure what that buys, but that’s why they do it
Most brands allow relocking bootloader. But after that you with be only able to use stock rom. Pixel lets you lock the bootloader with a different signature, so in this example you are basically able to lock it to only boot grapheneos and nothing else.
Security. You're caught with your pants down if you have any personal data on a phone with an unlocked bootloader. All data is effectively plaintext, all security is nullified with trivial difficulty. This is the actual worst-case scenario for journalists, whistleblowers, or anyone who is or may become under surveillance for any reason.
That's wrong, data is still usually encrypted.
A locked bootloader 'just' prevents tampering with the OS. You're only pwned when using the phone after it has been manipulated.
Yeah but if you have the phone with an unlocked bootloader and anyone gains access to it (physical or otherwise)...
They still wouldn't be able to do very much. All an unlocked bootloader does is let you flash things via fastboot.
Even with a locked bootloader, you could still get into recovery and cause mischief with physical access. You wouldn't be able to access the storage partition without decrypting it, but you could still maybe flash stuff to the system partition to infect it for the next time the phone is booted up.
Remote access to the phone won't be able to do much of anything with an unlocked bootloader. The far bigger hazard is app signature spoofing (eg Magisk and MicroG), which if successfully exploited can cause all sorts of havok - you can have apps pretending to be other apps that have root access.
Even then, though, I think it's a fair trade of risk. The chances of any of this happening are very, very low, albeit the consequence is extreme. I personally prefer that to the absolutely certain risk that Google is spying on my phone, even if the consequences of that spying are relatively low.