treequell

No, read https://grapheneos.org/faq#encryption for more information.

Oh, that's a bit disappointing. From my understanding, it's the Titan chip which makes decryption impossible if you try to mount the drives outside of the phone. I wonder if this would be possible if you left the bootloader unlocked—then you could load a recovery ISO, perhaps SSH into it from another computer and start navigating through the shell. Technically, you're still going through the Titan chip then to mount the drives and decrypt them.

      Skyway If it is a motherboard issue can the storage and chips be swapped to a new board to preserve data and keys ?

      I would be very interested to know.

        I’m relying on a failing memory here, but I seem to remember that the Titan M chip knows when it is/has been removed from the board.

          Blastoidea If that's the case, board-level repair should still work. Well, depending on how it identifies the board as "the same board".

          I wonder how this would even work. It's not like the chip runs an OS itself, right?

          • de0u replied to this.

              Equal2024 It's not like the chip runs an OS itself, right?

              It depends on the definition of "OS", but there is code.

              If a reputable repair shop is willing to try replacing the screen without wiping the device, that might be your best bet. Or you could try a professional recovery place, but that will be expensive.

              @guy_758 How much would you be willing to pay up front to maybe get your data back? If $1000(?) would be fine, maybe try the professional recovery route. If more like $300(?), maybe a screen replacement is the thing to try.

                  de0u This is what I've come to think myself. Trying a screen replacement is my next step. Hopefully google support was exaggerating the likelihood of a motherboard issue. I've also reached out to northridgefix for an estimate on board-level repair. A few $100 would be fine, but significantly more than that for the possibility of data recovery is questionable.

                  • de0u replied to this.

                      guy_758 A few $100 would be fine, but significantly more than that for the possibility of data recovery is questionable.

                      You know better than anybody else what price to put on a possible recovery.

                        Equal2024 You're wrong and reading https://grapheneos.org/faq#encryption would make that clear. Both the SoC and the secure element are involved in hardware-based encryption support. Not clear why having proper encryption support is disappointing. Please read our documentation.

                          Skyway This got me to think more about what qualifies as a "hardware modification" that would stop the Titan M from releasing encryption keys to the OS. Would a screen replacement be cause for the Titan M to not release encryption keys? I tried to ask Asurion this question today. Their response was not direct, but rather they said something about needing to tell the device that the screen is an OEM part (and that, they say, is why I would need them to do the replacement instead of doing it myself).

                              guy_758
                              Im not an expert but in don't see replacing a screen as something that would disable the titan chip . its a very common repair .
                              I was looking at replacing the screen on a pixel 6 and it only required a calibration to make the fingerprint reader work . the calibration does require flashing back to stock android , but you should be able to boot and retrieve data with out calibrating .
                              My opinion sounds like they are trying to scare you into having them do the screen replacement. I'm pro diy right to repair , only you can make the decision on weather to replace the screen yourself .

                                  Skyway I agree. It felt like they were trying to disuade me from the DIY path while avoiding the Titan M question.

                                      guy_758
                                      Maybe ask on the forum for anyone who has replaced a screen without going back to stock android . just to make sure you can login and retrieve data with out calibration.
                                      That would be my concern that the initial boot may not like graphene.
                                      And again were assuming its the screen and not a motherboard issue.
                                      Maybe I'm over thinking but the more you know ahead of time the better .

                                        I'm not sure this warrants its own thread so I'm adding it here. I've discovered that my phone is no longer auto-connecting to my home wifi. The bluetooth still works, I can receive cellular calls, and I know that I have internet connection through the cellular network (I can receive signal calls). I do not know if this failure to auto-connect to home wifi happened immediately after I dropped the phone or not (the drop occurred 15 days ago).

                                        Is there some software/settings that could potentially explain the wifi behavior I'm seeing? Or should I take this as evidence that there is more wrong with my phone hardware than just the screen?

                                        Update: This was the simplest possible repair. I replaced the screen with the help of ifixit, and it works perfectly! Thanks to everyone for your comments.