Slashdot Mirror
Russia's New Secure Android Tablet Keeps Data From Google
wiredmikey writes "It seems Russia's defense ministry doesn't trust Google's tablet computers: a new Android device presented to a top Russian government official boasts encryption and works with software and a global positioning system made in Russia, the AFP reports. The OS has all the functional capabilities of an Android operating system but none of its hidden features that send users' private data to Google, addressing concerns that data stored by Google could slip into the hands of the US government and expose some of their most secret and sensitive communications. Two versions of the tablet will supposedly be made — one for consumers and one for defense needs."
As in, a public one that sends all data to Yandex and a secret one that does not?
My first program:
Hell Segmentation fault
Right, so this tablet does keep data away from google. What about russian FSB?
--Coder
Can we have an EU version, that keeps data within Europe, not like the EU version that hands all our banking data over to the USA when asked, one that respects OUR privacy?
Sounds like a good idea to me.
In US all you data still belong to US!
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
I think I'd rather have my data go to Google rather than the Kremlin...
Why is this even news? Even China did the same. It would be irresponsible not to.
For Russia, it's the North Pole. And for China, it was the Tibet. If you let an American company suddenly do your mapping for you, or tell you where you're standing with their satellites, then you might as well kiss whatever new territory you just claimed an hour ago good bye.
It's a steep slippery slope. One day, the North pole is gone. The next day, Moscow is part of Alaska. And your average citizen doesn't have a clue because he's too busy drinking vodka and industrial alcohol and looking at his phone for gps directions.
Will they honour their GPL obligations and make the source code available ?
Android is an open source OS built on the Linux Kernel. You're welcome to take it and build the notknown86OS suitable for installing on whatever device you like which meets this "neither" need, and sharing it with the wider world as long as you adhere to the license requirements. If you do it well, fame will be yours. If you sell it well, fortune too. Unless there is no demand for this feature.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Great - now we have a choice. We can trust Google and the US government or we can trust the Russian government .. Oh wait!
"There is nothing like this operating system on the market. It is hack-proof," Mikhailov claimed. "There are people who are clamouring for this."
(emphasis mine)
I can see this going over juuuust fine.
Or maybe he thinks that all the good hackers are russian and won't touch it because they "love their country" or something?
Except that Baidu is Bing for their English language search result. Microsoft paid them to use Bing, probably just to give Ballmer a 'market share boost' in something so he can keep his job, but maybe for something more sinister.
So you may think you're avoiding the US corporate Mafia, but actually you're not.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/04/microsoft-bing-baidu-china-english_n_889829.html
They did not choose their own alphabet, their choice of church did it for them centuries ago, and it is actually a lot closer to the greek alphabet than the latin one ( which was, if I remember right, an offshoot of a western greek variant.) So if you want a reason for all that, blame Greece! :)
The fact is though, that at least objectively, the cyrillic alphabet is better than the latin one, having much less ambiguity and more letters for things such as 'sh 'kh' 'ch' etc. The only failing it has is that it uses letters similair to latin letters to mean completely different things, which leads to an inevitable amount of brain bonk when you are trying to learn it.
but USA has something on them as leverage.
What dirt could possibly be so bad and so extensive that it literally forces the hand of every country in the E.U. with regards to SWIFT? Even the E.U. countries that initially were in opposition backed down (such as Germany.)
If we accept your theory as true, that the U.S. has some major dirt on all the E.U. governments, then maybe you shouldn't be trying to make the U.S. out to be the bad guy. Sins so bad that the E.U. could be blackmailed into giving up the banking data of 500 million people doesn't sound like little white lies to me. It sounds like very serious evil-type shit
"His name was James Damore."
I would say that Russian alphabet resembles ancient Greek one. At least, I was surprised that, knowing Russian, I could read names on ancient Greek stones.
Vladimir Lenin wanted to switch to Latin alphabet, but did not have enough time for this. He died in 1924, 4 years after the end of the Civil War.
English language and Latin alphabet are OK, are fine. But I enjoy ti read and watch movies in Russian too. It is not possible to compare. These are two different worlds.
I prefer to read a book in a language it was written on; the same about movies.
Usually, if someone starts to write in Russian language by Latin letters on a forum, it ends in a ban. No one does it anymore.
The first thing we learn in security training is that if you don't want your data found,
make sure there's no such data to begin with. If you read nothing else, read the paragraph
following this one, and the last one.
People's personal devices are being used to spy on them on a regular basis. In the US it
was recently rules your smartphone CAN and WILL be used against you without a warrant.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/08/federal-court-rules-cops-can-warantlessly-track-suspects-via-cellphone/
In Russia it was recently rules you don't need a smartphone to go to jail for "free expression"
only in a church.
http://articles.cnn.com/2012-08-17/world/world_europe_russia-pussy-riot-trial_1_band-members-nadezhda-tolokonnikova-russian-court
Now that we've covered the facts, more facts are that your smartphone DOES send information
about you SOMEWHERE. Be it google (standard US Android device, data sending enabled) or
Mother Russia (Russian version of Android device) if you have GPS enabled and outbound data
sending enabled... someone out there has access to the data, whether or not they keep it,
catalog it, database[ify] it, store it, or analyze it [later].
If you want your information to be kept private... KEEP IT PRIVATE. That means don't use a device that
sends that information ANYWHERE ELSE. Even if you think it "shouldn't" send it somewhere it MAY.
MAY is a percentage between 0 and 100% that if you can't afford it should be ALWAYS zero.
GPS -there are plenty of devices that will plot your location, show you a route to a destination, and have
no capability for transmission.
PHONE -there are plenty of phones that WILL GIVE YOUR LOCATION TO CELL COMPANIES WHICH
IN THE USE WILL GIVE THEM to law enforcement without a warrant.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/08/warrantless-gps-phone-tracking/
Feel free to have your phone either OFF or covered in a Faraday cage (aluminum foil works) until you must use it.
DATA -there is no way you can use data [which requires bidirectional packet flow] without giving away your
location unless you are using a local WiFi hotspot.
In short... in summary... put your smartphone into airplane-mode. Turn on wifi-only (android phones will allow ...and welcome to the 21st Century.
you to enable WiFi in airplane-mode but will leave other radios disabled). Use local hotspots. Don't install
applications that require "access to the physical device such as speaker or microphone or location-based information"...
E
They don't trust Google, so they made their own stuff.
I dont see a problem with it at all.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Good idea for the Russians, they should avoid syncing their state secrets to the cloud. They better be sure that there are no back doors left in, but they probably use Windows too. I don't think even the CIA would use basic Android for their spies.
I think spies would use standard phones because weird phone would blow their cover. They would just know not to discuss their spying activities on email, text message or voice. The professional spies would know how to send encrypted data on public channels back to their agency or handlers.
If I were running the CIA, I'd send all my intel back to HQ using Pastebin or something like that, and my best sources would look to all the world like notorious hackers who somehow evade being apprehended...
Or I'd encode it in the misppelings in flamebait AC posts on Slashdot. You think it's just an anonymous dickhead talking about some irrelevant obsession, but it gives the names and addresses of Israeli spies in Tehran to my analysts who are monitoring what they are doing.
It would be nice to have a group create a version of Android that doesn't report back anywhere. To be honest, one of the reasons I don't like to use Google products is that you always have this feeling that you don't even know when you are being tracked, but if it has the Google logo somewhere they will try real hard to do it. I get it, they are for-profit corporation and that's the way to get their revenue but I rather pay or use open source software whenever I can. It isn't funny how many people are willing to let go of their privacy because of a free product/service (think rebates).