PinePhone Covid Apps

[bigtreeman]

One very necessary use for a phone is Covid Location apps and going into the future Covid Passports.
Is the Pinephone and Pinephone Pro able to use these very necessary apps  ?
or will we have to carry around an android phone for this purpose ?

[Zebulon Walton]

I don't see that as necessary at all, and in fact one of the reasons I use a Pinephone is that it is not possible to run those kind of tyrannical smartphone applications. My medical history is between me and my doctor, and it's nobody's business at all where I've been and who I've seen.

[KC9UDX]

I agree. I don't have a PinePhone (yet) but to me this is one of the best reasons to get one.

If you *do* want these kind of things, why *wouldn't* you want an iPhone or Android phone?

[bigtreeman]

It's amazing how sense has gone out the window with the pandemic.

I've been hacking hardware since the first cmos micros
and will keep doing it for many years to come.
The US has passed the number died in the Spanish flu pandemic.
Here in Queensland, our borders are closed and we are relatively free to
move around safely, but carefully. It's not about my paranoia,
it's about caring for my neighbours and surrounding community.

Sorry to raise a sensible point in this contentious time.

[Zebulon Walton]

I'm not going to get into the politics of it, this isn't the place. Ditto the legitimate reasons for questioning what we are being told. The point is that if you want a phone that will spy on you down to every location you visit and every person you have contact with (at least those carrying another spyphone), there are plenty to choose from that will happily do so right out of the box, and will let you load as many additional spying "apps" as you desire. I don't see that kind of spying as "caring" in any way, shape, or form.

The whole idea of the Pinephone is to escape from that ecosystem of spyware.

[zetabeta]

It's amazing how sense has gone out the window with the pandemic.

I've been hacking hardware since the first cmos micros
and will keep doing it for many years to come.
The US has passed the number died in the Spanish flu pandemic.
Here in Queensland, our borders are closed and we are relatively free to
move around safely, but carefully. It's not about my paranoia,
it's about caring for my neighbours and surrounding community.

Sorry to raise a sensible point in this contentious time.

as a temporary measure, i don't have problem if government collects some data in case of coronavirus. however, i have serious problems if closed platforms are used for it like google and apple.

in eu, countries provide documents which can be store on almost any device. it's just reader apps which might be dependent on closed platforms.

tracing apps are not available for pinephone, and mostly likely they won't be, because who wants to code them. tracing apps usually use bluetooth.

for that paranoia, i don't like to promote one, but googoo corps and worm-eaten rotten apple (and facehatebook) won't help on this paranoia, meaning that their corporate policies makes things worse. however, take paranoia only in moderation.

[lot378]

One very necessary use for a phone is Covid Location apps and going into the future Covid Passports.
Is the Pinephone and Pinephone Pro able to use these very necessary apps  ?
or will we have to carry around an android phone for this purpose ?

It's amazing how sense has gone out the window with the pandemic.

I've been hacking hardware since the first cmos micros
and will keep doing it for many years to come.
The US has passed the number died in the Spanish flu pandemic.
Here in Queensland, our borders are closed and we are relatively free to
move around safely, but carefully. It's not about my paranoia,
it's about caring for my neighbours and surrounding community.

Sorry to raise a sensible point in this contentious time.

@bigtreeman Your question deserved a sensible answer.

The short answer is: you would be best advised to have an Apple or Android smartphone to install any CV19+ related applications.

These applications were written and ported to those specific types of phone. PinePhone may be able to run those apps within Android emulation software but the emulation would be slow, you would need to keep the emulation running all the time and it is not guaranteed the app would work completely. A very important reason to avoid using the Pinephone in this way is that the hardware and software cannot be fully relied on as they are experimental. That is not a risk you should take when lives may be at stake, or work or entry to a public place or travel depends on it.

[Zebulon Walton]

One could argue that the entire concept of the Pinephone, being privacy-oriented, is a product of paranoia. After all, if you have nothing to hide... 

Frankly in the instant case a lot of what is being done does not make any sense and is not supported by real-world data, it is driven by another kind of paranoia and can easily lead to a very dark place. However that discussion is beyond the scope of this forum.

Getting back to the Pinephone, of course if the OP or anyone else wanted to develop the kind of tracking software being discussed they are free to do so and to try to convince others to use it. I suspect though that given the nature of the Pinephone and the reasons many buy it there would not be many takers.

I've been trying to couch this in hopefully acceptable terms but that's all I'll say about it since this thread could easily get out of hand if it has not done so already.

[calinb]

I don't see that as necessary at all, and in fact one of the reasons I use a Pinephone is that it is not possible to run those kind of tyrannical smartphone applications. <snip>

I agree.  I don't have a PinePhone (yet) but to me this is one of the best reasons to get one. <snip>

It's amazing how sense has gone out the window with the pandemic. <snip>

The point is that if you want a phone that will spy on you down to every location you visit and every person you have contact with (at least those carrying another spyphone), there are plenty to choose from that will happily do so right out of the box, and will let you load as many additional spying "apps" as you desire. <snip>

I second all of the above. The day that the Pine community embraces COVID cult aps, thus supporting the global totalitarian regime behind such freedom and life-destroying weapons, is the day I drive over my Pinephone with my 3 ton mini excavator and then proceed to dig a very deep hole in the ground in which to wholeheartedly and ceremonially bury its remains!

I view the Pinephone as a response to the current establishment's tyranny. It serves no purpose if it devolves to aid and abet it!

I'm not going to get into the politics of it, this isn't the place. Ditto the legitimate reasons for questioning what we are being told.<snip>

From reading your posts over the last year plus, Zeb W., I think we're likely kindred spirits (and of similar vocational backgrounds and generational vintage) but I believe the global situation is now so utterly dire that EVERYPLACE is the place for dissent and discourse--at least as much as will be tolerated by others. (Getting oneself censored certainly doesn't advance our cause.)

BTW, I watched Stef Monlyneux's documentary, "Hong Kong: Fight for Freedom", long before I became a member of the Pine community. Since then, I've watched it again. It now makes me even more sad!
https://www.freedomain.com/documentaries/

[ryo]

Please don't bring this authoritarian shit show to the PinePhone, which seems to be the last beacon of freedom in the smartphone market.
Nobody needs covaids related apps, if the authorities say "papers please" like how the gestapo did to the Jews 80 years ago, just ignore them.
The sheep using these authoritarian apps is exactly what prevents the world from going back to normal and is exactly what makes the dictators go more totalitarian.

It's expected that the more they try to push it all, the more people start to wake up, the more they start looking in the direction of PinePhone, Librem 5, and degoogled Android phones, and throw away their iPhone and Google Android phones.
And once the majority does that, the world will go from tyranny to anarchy very quickly.

as a temporary measure, i don't have problem if government collects some data in case of coronavirus. however, i have serious problems if closed platforms are used for it like google and apple.

I have a problem with governments even existing in the first place.
All governments of the world are among those who start the whole covaids scam along with Google, Apple, WEF, WHO, Phizer, Moderna, among all the other NWO corporations/governments, while most "awakened" people only blame Bill Gates and Anthony Fauci for it.

You know what they say, nothing is more permanent than a temporary government measure.