TIL of RestlessOS, fork of GrapheneOS

firmstrike

I was watching youtube(Invidious) and notied RestlessOS . Have you heard of this and are there people actually tried this on non-pixel phone?

"RestlessOS is an unofficial, unaffiliated fork of GrapheneOS packaged as a Generic System Image (GSI) for Project Treble devices. It is not endorsed by, sponsored by, or in any way connected to the GrapheneOS project or its developers."

https://github.com/cawilliamson/treble_restlessos

I'm very hesitant to give money to Google pixel so I'm going to experiment on this one.

Johnnyloans

firmstrike I'm very hesitant to give money to Google pixel so I'm going to experiment on this one.

Buy used? How do you feel about giving money to your fellow man.

Kamika242

firmstrike I'm very hesitant to give money to Google pixel so I'm going to experiment on this one.

The way I see it: I've bought my freedom from Google. I'd rather pay with real money, than my data.

23Sha-ger

firmstrike I'm very hesitant to give money to Google pixel

Can you explain us why? You can buy a second hand supported device like a Pixel 8 / 8a.
This will still have native GOS, software updates until 2030 and better price/performance/security compared to
anything you buy at the same price. And you are not giving money to Google directly. Also, they barely make money
on phones, it's the cloud services subscription with their ecosystem is what generates revenue. You are paying
for that extra security. With your logic, it's similar to say "I will use a scooter, don't want to give my money to Uber".

userofgos

firmstrike RestlessOS is an unofficial, unaffiliated fork of GrapheneOS packaged as a Generic System Image (GSI)

GrapheneOS X/twitter post regarding RestlessOS: https://xcancel.com/GrapheneOS/status/2039094988944838671#m

GrapheneOS is an open source project and that means people can make forks of it. There aren't any ports of GrapheneOS to other devices providing the same set of privacy and security features it provides. There are only highly incomplete ports losing many of the core features.

Many accounts across platforms have recently started falsely claiming there's a port of GrapheneOS to other devices and that it somehow disproves that it depends on hardware-based security features unavailable elsewhere. The person who made it says that isn't what they did.

It omits large portions of the GrapheneOS changes including not having any of the kernel changes. Many parts don't work.

Since they don't have our kernel changes and haven't done the substantial work needed to port GrapheneOS to a specific devices, many core features including hardened_malloc, hardware memory tagging, USB protection, dynamic code loading restrictions and much more are missing.

It's missing many core GrapheneOS security features and also privacy features. It doesn't provide updates to the kernel, firmware, drivers and HALs. It's missing standard Android protections including but not limited to verified boot. They haven't ported GrapheneOS elsewhere.

It's missing a lot more than what they list as not being included and that's likely partly because they don't realize how much isn't working. It's only one part of an OS and is using the stock OS kernel, drivers and HALs. It also doesn't provide updates for those or the firmware.

The author of this project is likely more than willing to list many additional features which are missing are not functional. They're also likely willing to make it clear it can't provide people with proper updates. They don't want people to be misled or to attack GrapheneOS.

See here regarding GSI's: https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/9133-support-for-gsi/5

It's highly insecure and not fully functional. GrapheneOS is not only a system image. It's an OS which makes changes to the kernel, etc. It cannot function without the kernel changes. Supporting a device without updating the firmware, drivers and kernel is highly insecure and does not make sense for a hardened OS.

The only use for a GSI release is development/testing. The only use for GrapheneOS would be reusing a single system build across devices instead of building it for each, but that doesn't change that the OS is much more than the system image.

Also mentioned on the website here: https://grapheneos.org/faq#supported-devices

firmstrike

Ok it seems this is the 1st post! https://discuss.grapheneos.org/?q=restless%20os%20

IcyScroll

Interesting, thanks for sharing.

I believe the title should be changed, though. The way it currently stands is misleading. For example:

TIL that RestlessOS, fork of GrapheneOS, can run on non-pixel phone

Instead of:

TIL that RestlessOS, fork of GrapheneOS, can run GOS on non-pixel phone

A phone without security requirements of the official Project shouldn't be called GOS. It'd merely have some features inherited from GOS. It wouldn't have the whole security model which is required for any device running GrapheneOS.

Johnnyloans

This would be a very bad idea. I'd rather have any StockOS from a major OEM over doing this because of:

... RestlessOS boots the vendor kernel
... RestlessOS uses whatever firmware the vendor partition provides

It's using what it finds on the phone.

So you will never get firmware or kernel updates and so many features are disabled. This is a huge 1 to lose hardened_malloc.

It's a security nightmare you can't wake up from the next morning.
Should be called anti-GOS -- never get security updates again.

KleinesSinchen

Johnnyloans It's a security nightmare you can't wake up from the next morning.
Should be called anti-GOS -- never get security updates again.

That sounds a bit harsh.
I very much understand why GOS isn’t available as GSI (or directly for other devices that do not meet the strict requirements). It would be confusing if there was an official GSI while missing a lot of important features.

After reading about RestlessOS a few weeks ago I would really like to try it (and compare to GOS on my Pixel 8a). Alas, no suitable device for trying (bummer!)

Never have vendor/firmware updates when using GSI isn’t necessarily true. It is your responsibility to flash them. On the other hand GSI often aren’t stable or not even intended for practical usage. End-of-life devices come in handy for experiments (as long as you consciously acknowledge+accept any risks and keep these experiments isolated from important devices).

There are things a Pixel smartphone simply doesn’t perform well at. For example: have an underwater mode, accept almost any form of dirt, abuse, drops, heat, cold on outdoor activities… and all that while being worth a can of soda.
Configurable (reliable!) auto-reboot and 2FA secondary unlock would suffice for my threat model on nature hike.

Johnnyloans

KleinesSinchen It is your responsibility to flash them.

Make sure to research which OEMs provide full OTA updates available for download. There's only a few.

Doing that is extra work that few people would do and keep up to date on.

23Sha-ger

KleinesSinchen There are things a Pixel smartphone simply doesn’t perform well at. For example: have an underwater mode, accept almost any form of dirt, abuse, drops, heat, cold on outdoor activities…

You need a GoPro, not a Pixel. And a cheap Nokia for emergencies.

23Sha-ger

GSI images are suitable for different kind of devices, like an old china tablet.
Calling it a "GrapheneOS fork" is a huge stretch. Half of the features are not available, and things are broken.
This should be called a "GrapheneOS inspired clean AOSP image" instead.
On a production daily use personal phone, you don't want to deal with all the limitations of GSI.
Apps will refuse to run, crash, notifications will have issues, etc.

NetRunner88

Everything that make GrapheneOS a strong OS is removed what a joke 😆

de0u

firmstrike I'm very hesitant to give money to Google pixel so I'm going to experiment on this one.

Personally, given the poor state of affairs for many Android devices (non-functional verified boot, dangerously-slow firmware patching), I would be very hesitant to put my private data on most Android devices, and also very hesitant about financially supporting companies that are shipping fundamentally insecure devices.

0xC0DED0D0

Best case, this is a "friendly fork" in the spirit of FLOSS.

"Hey look over here, we're doing it this way"

Then there's cross-pollination, for both camps, from lessons learned.

Worst case, it's fluff masquerading as "security".

I'm fully on Team GrapheneOS, until proven otherwise. 🤓👍

FunkTastic

0xC0DED0D0 It was continuously declared anyone could freely fork GOS for their needs unless the trademark is not infringed. Well, the author of RestlessOS did. That's how open-source is supposed to work.

other8026

Renamed the thread so the title is accurate. RestlessOS isn't GrapheneOS, so installing it doesn't mean someone is running GrapheneOS.

As other people have pointed out, they make many changes to the OS so some security features or hardening don't work, are fully disabled, or are disabled by default.