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This looks hugely blown out of proportion. The project founder has a well documented history of what I would consider a persecution complex. Once again he has p

by Lariscus 10mo ago

This looks hugely blown out of proportion. The project founder has a well documented history of what I would consider a persecution complex. Once again he has provided no substantial evidence. The only thing they provided are some, admittedly borderline libelous, news articles. Unless they provide some more concrete information about these supposed attempts of getting a backdoor installed into the system, I will consider this as just another day of GrapheneOS drama.

gruez 10mo ago
>The project founder has a well documented history of what I would consider a persecution complex. Source?
- richbell 10mo ago
  One highly publicized incident was https://www.reddit.com/r/PrivacyGuides/comments/13s7mv3/why_i_deleted_grapheneos_louis_rossmann/ https://www.reddit.com/r/PrivacyGuides/comments/13s7mv3/why_...
dijit 10mo ago
I mean, maybe? Multiple accounts have said the same thing in this thread, and I'll be honest here: given the Jia Tan situation, it could be true (in the way that he's being pushed by external forces). It could it be character assassination... Or it could be totally valid: idk. But what I do know is that nobody is providing any citations. I also know that progress depends on the tyranny of unreasonable people.
aunty_helen 10mo ago
Don’t you need that sort of paranoia to go out and create a privacy focused mobile OS?
- jjgreen 10mo ago
  A world-weary cynicism suffices.
  - idle_zealot 10mo ago
    I expect that most cynics would just keep their heads down and use iOS or something. The intense idealism needed to motivate something like Graphene is compatible with paranoia, but not with weariness.
    - bigbadfeline 10mo ago
      > The intense idealism needed to motivate something like Graphene Yes, the intense idealism of the brainwashed and oblivious prompted the realistic Graphene creators to do something themselves instead of waiting for other realistic folks who happen to be few and far between.
- cladopa 10mo ago
  It is not called "paranoia" if it is real that they are coming after you. Have you not seen what happened to Telegram CEO?
deleted 10mo ago
[deleted]
concinds 10mo ago
The evidence is not "news articles", but the contents of those articles where a high-ranking prosecutor threatened to go after GrapheneOS "if they don't cooperate with the law". No matter your feelings about the creator, I think this was entirely the rational choice. France is pro-Chat Control. For about a year now there's been an anti-drug trafficking fervor among legislators and government, in which they've pushed for encryption backdoors (separate from Chat Control at the EU level) and recently threatened GrapheneOS. The country is politically unstable so future politics are hard to predict, but anti-encryption politicians stand a good chance of winning the next election. Any rational project would move out.
- Lariscus 10mo ago
  I don't disagree about leaving France over their position on chat control or legislation. I disagree about them essentially spreading misinformation about what actually happened. One prosecutor, that probably doesn't even know what GrapheneOS is, making boisterous claims to the press, is not the same as being contacted by the state about adding a backdoors.
  - jasonvorhe 10mo ago
    I don't get what you're saying. Interviewed cop says they'll go after them if they don't cooperate, which would mean a) requesting assistance to law enforcement via means such as backdoors and server seizures and b) resulting in legal steps against the organization and its members by France. Who in their right mind wouldn't take this a threat? After Wikileaks, the Telegram CEO, pushes for chat control and other authoritarian techniques? Sure, the cop might be a nobody in the grand scheme of things but they're representing a government agency publicly so they're probably not babbling out nonsense in a bar somewhere, being overheard by a reporter.
- 0x1ch 10mo ago
  Didn't France intercept Telegram's CEO to force him to backdoor the app while in country? Yes. Yes they did.
  - 10mo ago
sunshine-o 10mo ago
What happened to the founder of Telegram should be enough to discourage any of them to travel in France. Especially since I guess they do not have the same kind of money and influence to fight it back.
- rgblambda 10mo ago
  A European Arrest Warrant would make the entire EU off limits. Which makes me think they haven't thought this through and are just overreacting, as many on this thread suspect. If the GrapheneOS maintainers were being advised by a lawyer, they'd surely know that if French Authorities wanted them arrested and they were standing on a street corner in Stockholm, they could just as easily be picked up by police as if they were in a café in Paris. Making the whole France travel ban just a load of theatrics.
  - bigbadfeline 10mo ago
    > Which makes me think they haven't thought this through and are just overreacting. You're contradicting yourself. If "they haven't thought this through" they clearly haven't been paranoid enough but in that case they aren't overreacting, they're under-reacting. They need to transfer development out of the EU, not just out of France. That's one unexpected benefit of Brexit, btw.
    - rgblambda 10mo ago
      My point is that they clearly haven't sat down with a lawyer, so don't know what the appropriate response is. I suspect they'd get told to calm down while the lawyer sends a letter to the authorities explaining what they're currently attempting to articulate via social media. The lead developer seems to have a history of this style of communication in response to any minor critique of himself or GrapheneOS.
    - SiempreViernes 10mo ago
      > You're contradicting yourself. If "they haven't thought this through" they clearly haven't been paranoid enough There is no contradiction between "being paranoid" and "not being rational". Oh my mistake, you intentionally put "benefit" and "Brexit" in the same sentence; yes, there's absolutely a contradiction there, well done lad.
ls612 10mo ago
When you are in this business it's better to be safe than Pavel Durov.
yownie 10mo ago
I did a deep dive and Daniel Micay stepped down as lead dev back in 2023 FYI.

gruez 10mo ago

>The project founder has a well documented history of what I would consider a persecution complex. Source?

richbell 10mo ago
One highly publicized incident was https://www.reddit.com/r/PrivacyGuides/comments/13s7mv3/why_i_deleted_grapheneos_louis_rossmann/ https://www.reddit.com/r/PrivacyGuides/comments/13s7mv3/why_...

dijit 10mo ago

I mean, maybe? Multiple accounts have said the same thing in this thread, and I'll be honest here: given the Jia Tan situation, it could be true (in the way that he's being pushed by external forces). It could it be character assassination... Or it could be totally valid: idk. But what I do know is that nobody is providing any citations. I also know that progress depends on the tyranny of unreasonable people.

aunty_helen 10mo ago

Don’t you need that sort of paranoia to go out and create a privacy focused mobile OS?

jjgreen 10mo ago
A world-weary cynicism suffices.
- idle_zealot 10mo ago
  I expect that most cynics would just keep their heads down and use iOS or something. The intense idealism needed to motivate something like Graphene is compatible with paranoia, but not with weariness.
  - bigbadfeline 10mo ago
    > The intense idealism needed to motivate something like Graphene Yes, the intense idealism of the brainwashed and oblivious prompted the realistic Graphene creators to do something themselves instead of waiting for other realistic folks who happen to be few and far between.
cladopa 10mo ago
It is not called "paranoia" if it is real that they are coming after you. Have you not seen what happened to Telegram CEO?

deleted 10mo ago

[deleted]

concinds 10mo ago

The evidence is not "news articles", but the contents of those articles where a high-ranking prosecutor threatened to go after GrapheneOS "if they don't cooperate with the law". No matter your feelings about the creator, I think this was entirely the rational choice. France is pro-Chat Control. For about a year now there's been an anti-drug trafficking fervor among legislators and government, in which they've pushed for encryption backdoors (separate from Chat Control at the EU level) and recently threatened GrapheneOS. The country is politically unstable so future politics are hard to predict, but anti-encryption politicians stand a good chance of winning the next election. Any rational project would move out.

Lariscus 10mo ago
I don't disagree about leaving France over their position on chat control or legislation. I disagree about them essentially spreading misinformation about what actually happened. One prosecutor, that probably doesn't even know what GrapheneOS is, making boisterous claims to the press, is not the same as being contacted by the state about adding a backdoors.
- jasonvorhe 10mo ago
  I don't get what you're saying. Interviewed cop says they'll go after them if they don't cooperate, which would mean a) requesting assistance to law enforcement via means such as backdoors and server seizures and b) resulting in legal steps against the organization and its members by France. Who in their right mind wouldn't take this a threat? After Wikileaks, the Telegram CEO, pushes for chat control and other authoritarian techniques? Sure, the cop might be a nobody in the grand scheme of things but they're representing a government agency publicly so they're probably not babbling out nonsense in a bar somewhere, being overheard by a reporter.
0x1ch 10mo ago
Didn't France intercept Telegram's CEO to force him to backdoor the app while in country? Yes. Yes they did.
- 10mo ago

sunshine-o 10mo ago

What happened to the founder of Telegram should be enough to discourage any of them to travel in France. Especially since I guess they do not have the same kind of money and influence to fight it back.

rgblambda 10mo ago
A European Arrest Warrant would make the entire EU off limits. Which makes me think they haven't thought this through and are just overreacting, as many on this thread suspect. If the GrapheneOS maintainers were being advised by a lawyer, they'd surely know that if French Authorities wanted them arrested and they were standing on a street corner in Stockholm, they could just as easily be picked up by police as if they were in a café in Paris. Making the whole France travel ban just a load of theatrics.
- bigbadfeline 10mo ago
  > Which makes me think they haven't thought this through and are just overreacting. You're contradicting yourself. If "they haven't thought this through" they clearly haven't been paranoid enough but in that case they aren't overreacting, they're under-reacting. They need to transfer development out of the EU, not just out of France. That's one unexpected benefit of Brexit, btw.
  - rgblambda 10mo ago
    My point is that they clearly haven't sat down with a lawyer, so don't know what the appropriate response is. I suspect they'd get told to calm down while the lawyer sends a letter to the authorities explaining what they're currently attempting to articulate via social media. The lead developer seems to have a history of this style of communication in response to any minor critique of himself or GrapheneOS.
  - SiempreViernes 10mo ago
    > You're contradicting yourself. If "they haven't thought this through" they clearly haven't been paranoid enough There is no contradiction between "being paranoid" and "not being rational". Oh my mistake, you intentionally put "benefit" and "Brexit" in the same sentence; yes, there's absolutely a contradiction there, well done lad.

ls612 10mo ago

When you are in this business it's better to be safe than Pavel Durov.

yownie 10mo ago

I did a deep dive and Daniel Micay stepped down as lead dev back in 2023 FYI.