FREE YOUR PHONE!

Lesser-spotted Jonni Bidwell climbs to the top of a 5G mast to extol the benefits of running Linux on your phone.

- Jonni Bidwell

The mobile device world has become duopolised by two big tech outfits, one fruity and the other Borg-ish. Google's Android runs on an array of mobile hardware, has a Linux kernel, and the core Android Open Source Project (AOSP) is freely licensed. Devices can generally be unlocked and custom apps can be sideloaded. Compare it with Apple's walled-garden, locked-down hardware approach in iOS, and you can see why free software advocates might prefer to side with the Android camp. But this argument is specious, because much of Android proper is proprietary.

The Google apps and most of the popular Android apps are all proprietary, and many rely on the fiendish Google Play Services library to do their work (or display ads). Those apps all collect data and tie it to your Google account. Despite new privacy controls, permissions and supposedly easier-to-understand license agreements, it's difficult to comprehend what is being shared and how it's used. This has led to an orthogonal argument, that Apple (a fashion brand that makes hardware) cares more about protecting privacy than Google (an ad company).

We're not here to settle arguments, though. We're here to show you another way. How to take back your privacy. How to keep old hardware no longer supported by Android ticking along. To that end, we'll look at installing LineageOS, the most popular AOSP derivative. Next, we'll explore running 'pure' Linux in the form of UBports and PostmarketOS. If you'd rather not install a whole new OS, there are plenty of less risky measures you can take. Read on.

The issue with Android

Android is a hodge-podge of free and proprietary components.