- Edited
I recently upgraded my Pixel 7 Pro to Graphene OS. My heartfelt thanks to the developers of gOS and the community for their efforts. Hope this post will help new gOS users. Senior users can give their feedback and help me reduce risks while improving the overall experience.
The installation process was smooth, notwithstanding the scary looking bootloader screens. :)
I created 3 profiles:
- Owner - with no Google services
- Not Google - With Google services enabled for non-Google Apps (Banking, etc) and no access to Phone/sms.
- Google - With Google services enabled for Google only Apps (Gmail, Maps, Drive, etc) and no access to Phone/sms. Used sparingly.
Apps installed, in addition to standard Apps.
- Owner - Fdroid, Tutanota, Newpipe, Syncthing, VLC, Organic Maps
- Not Google - Playstore, Banking App, Gym App, Linkedin, Signal, MS Authenticator
- Google - Playstore, Gmail, Maps, Meet, Sheets, Docs, Keep <- Use only for non-personal data.
Some (hopefully) best practices followed:
- Use the profile Not Google and Google ony on need basis.
- End the sessions when not in use. Use Owner profile most of the time.
- All apps have the basic 'Network' access only
- Enable - PIN scrambling, Secure app spawning, Delete guest activity
- Disable - Camera, Mic access, Location, Automatic sync, unless explictly needed 'only' while using an App
- Vanadium:
6.1 Enable Use secure connections, Close tabs on exit, Open external links incognito.
6.2 Disable auto-complete searches and URLs, Access payment methods.
6.3 Clear browsing data daily.
6.4 Block or Ask first all site settings.
6.5 Allow all except 3rd party cookies.
6.6 Disable - Save passwords, Auto-signins, payment methods, Addresses.
6.7 Search engine defaults to Duckduckgo. - Using 'Syncthing' to sync data to the profiles. Not tested across profiles. Should work. To be used sparingly.
- Those who have issues with the b&w icons, can add a nice wallpaper to improve the look.
Not happy with
I would have preferred to have Signal on my primary profile. However, Signal only runs from Google playstore and I am not comfortable using Aurora store, yet. Hence it is on my Not Google profile, which means I cannot access Signal all the time and I may miss any incoming call, as it is on the profile which is not always on.