The Nitrophone 1 is an unusual smartphone inspired by the Google Pixel 4a, offering unique security and privacy features.
The company behind the Nitrophone 1 is German and is called Nitrokey. It aims to provide a trusted phone for anyone who wants to keep their personal data completely secure and private.
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Nitrophone 1: What is it/ this
The Nitrophone 1, based on Google’s Pixel 4a and running on an operating system called GrapheneOS, is the embodiment of Nitrokey’s desire to provide an ultra-secure phone to the world. It is also very easy to use and has a respectable specification.
Its operating system, GrapheneOS has been touted by former CIA employee Edward Snowden as the most secure for a smartphone.
The Nitrophone 1 can be purchased from Nitrokey for £630.
Nitrophone 1: Decent specifications
As mentioned above, this phone is based on the Pixel 4a, so the two phones have similar specifications.
The Nitrophone 1 has a 5.81-inch FullHD+ display. It is powered by a Snapdragon 730G processor, backed by 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage. Its main camera is a 12.2MP sensor.
So much for the phone’s main features. As you may have noticed, there’s nothing extraordinary about it from a hardware point of view. This is normal, as it is its operating system that makes the Nitrophone 1 the most secure phone in the world.
Nitrophone 1 with GrapheneOS: Protection against physical attacks
GrapheneOS offers you strong encryption and protection against sophisticated physical attacks with its Titan M
When the phone starts up, an integrity test verifies that your phone has not been modified while it was powered down.
In order to enter your PIN code securely, the screen is activated to prevent anyone from peeking in. If you don’t wish to use screen scrambling, simply unlock your phone with your fingerprints.
You can even set your phone to automatically power down after a certain period of activity.
Nitrophone 1 with GrapheneOS: Protection against software attacks
To protect the Nitrophone 1 from spyware and dozens of other categories of software attacks, the operating system kernel and other features have been significantly strengthened. These include: File system access, WebView, compiler and related tools, libc, malloc etc.
To prevent the Nitrophone 1 from being compromised by malicious applications, all applications are run in a sandbox, a framework that prevents any attack on the system.
Other measures include ultra-protection of the browser and PDF readers, very close update dates, protection against remote attacks by isolating the baseband radio processor using IOMMU. LTE mode is only available as an option to significantly reduce the cellular radio attack surface.
Nitrophone 1 and GrapheneOS: Privacy
This phone does not offer Google Play or cloud integration. However, you can download Google Play, but the application will be run in the sandbox and therefore will not have any special privileges. This is the price of absolute security.
Other hard restrictions imposed by the Nitrophone 1’s operating system are: prohibiting applications from accessing the phone’s IMEI number, MAC address, your SIM card ID and number, GPS data, camera, microphones etc. In addition, your MAC network address is artificially and randomly regenerated to prevent WiFi network scanners from tracking you.
Even the more secure iPhone does not offer the level of security found on the Nitrophone 1. You even have the option of having all of the phone’s microphones on to prevent hackers from listening in on you without your knowledge. You can plug in a headset with a microphone to take your calls.
You can buy it from Nitrokey for £630, and obviously it won’t be suitable for everyone.
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