Blackphone - are you buying one?

[r3wt]

[shkiser]

Im paranoid at heart, so it sounds like a set up. Kinda like the obama phone.

[Godye Scaro X9]

I'm just gonna go out on a limb here and say that anyone who spends 630 dollars one of these phones is a sucker.

Some issues i have here:

looks like an 50 dollar att go phone generic android. logic says, i can just pirate a copy of their "privatOS" and rip it to my smartphone. same level of protection offered by their product.

you use it with your normal gsm provider. of course you're still being monitored. duh! the only advantage is the software doesn't have the the hidden recording and monitoring functions that log everything you do to a reserved section of your devices storage.


TLDR;they appear to be charging you 500 dollars for their custom operating system, plus the cost of the hardware. seems like a rip off.

I don't think you can find comparable specs on a $50 phone:

Blackphone is powered by a >2 GHz quad-core SoC and features a full set of premium features, such as a 4.7" HD IPS screen, LTE, HSPA+, 1GB DDR3 RAM, 16GB of storage, >8MP primary camera with flash and 1.3MP front camera, Bluetooth 4.0, 802.11n WiFi, GPS, and more. Certain specifications are subject to change and may be adjusted prior to shipping the first phones later this year.

A $50 phone would probably have a sub-3.5" screen, 800MHz single core processor, 2 MP camera, no front camera, and run Gingerbread.

[Nobitcoin]

Wait this seems like a waste of time since all the phone networks are bugging you anyway and the hardware isn't to impressive for the money.

[fatguyyyyy]

whats the point of this phone?

[2dogs]

whats the point of this phone?

Supposed to offer privacy.

[FUR11]

Phew... The website alone is puzzling me. I keep on scrolling and - apart from the lag - it's a tad mezmerizing what happens. In light of recent events concerning privacy etc. this seems like a good idea, but I doubt that a lot of people care enough for their privacy to even consider getting such a phone. Everyone's complaining, yet they're all posting their private lives willingly on Facebook 

[PRC_May]

I think they idea is great. Needs some trustworthy third party auditing though.

The most important target right now is to get people to actually use their available security options. Even some easy and free tools like GPG.. (which is actually not 100% secure in terms of tracking depending on usage, but it's a start) just spreading the awareness.

Everyone's complaining, yet they're all posting their private lives willingly on Facebook  

^ Is just too true.

[subercoin]

Blackphone seems shitty and oveerpriced compared to Oneplusone:

Blackphone is powered by a >2 GHz quad-core SoC and features a full set of premium features, such as a 4.7" HD IPS screen, LTE, HSPA+, 1GB DDR3 RAM, 16GB of storage, >8MP primary camera with flash and 1.3MP front camera, Bluetooth 4.0, 802.11n WiFi, GPS, and more. Certain specifications are subject to change and may be adjusted prior to shipping the first phones later this year.

Oneplusone has a full 1080px HD 5.5-inch screen, 2.5 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor coupled with an Adreno 330 GPU, 3GB RAM, 64GB of internal memory, CyanogenMod 11s Custom OS, 13 megapixel (rear) and 5 megapixel (front) camera – Sony Exmor sensor, Dual LED and 4K video support.

Blackphone is 629$
Oneplusone is 350$

I think you know which one I'm going to take...

[DjPxH]

Blackphone seems shitty and oveerpriced compared to Oneplusone:

Blackphone is powered by a >2 GHz quad-core SoC and features a full set of premium features, such as a 4.7" HD IPS screen, LTE, HSPA+, 1GB DDR3 RAM, 16GB of storage, >8MP primary camera with flash and 1.3MP front camera, Bluetooth 4.0, 802.11n WiFi, GPS, and more. Certain specifications are subject to change and may be adjusted prior to shipping the first phones later this year.

Oneplusone has a full 1080px HD 5.5-inch screen, 2.5 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor coupled with an Adreno 330 GPU, 3GB RAM, 64GB of internal memory, CyanogenMod 11s Custom OS, 13 megapixel (rear) and 5 megapixel (front) camera – Sony Exmor sensor, Dual LED and 4K video support.

Blackphone is 629$
Oneplusone is 350$

I think you know which one I'm going to take...

So people are still comparing phones or anything in terms of the pure performance specs. This has always been pretty stupid. It says very little about the actual quality of the components, the quality of the surrounding hardware and the actual performance and experience provided by the operating system!

[subercoin]

Blackphone seems shitty and oveerpriced compared to Oneplusone:

Blackphone is powered by a >2 GHz quad-core SoC and features a full set of premium features, such as a 4.7" HD IPS screen, LTE, HSPA+, 1GB DDR3 RAM, 16GB of storage, >8MP primary camera with flash and 1.3MP front camera, Bluetooth 4.0, 802.11n WiFi, GPS, and more. Certain specifications are subject to change and may be adjusted prior to shipping the first phones later this year.

Oneplusone has a full 1080px HD 5.5-inch screen, 2.5 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor coupled with an Adreno 330 GPU, 3GB RAM, 64GB of internal memory, CyanogenMod 11s Custom OS, 13 megapixel (rear) and 5 megapixel (front) camera – Sony Exmor sensor, Dual LED and 4K video support.

Blackphone is 629$
Oneplusone is 350$

I think you know which one I'm going to take...

So people are still comparing phones or anything in terms of the pure performance specs. This has always been pretty stupid. It says very little about the actual quality of the components, the quality of the surrounding hardware and the actual performance and experience provided by the operating system!

How I'm supposed to know which has better quality?
Wait two yeras and ask my friend how their phones have lasted and then buy best one?
Or buy most overpriced product and hope I get some qulity too?

[1Referee]

This phone won't be a succes. Sure, here and there a few nerds will buy one, but we can already install apps that offer encrypted services to protect our privacy.

No need to buy such an expensive phone.

[ruggedman_dan]

You want real privacy and value?

$5 throw away phones from dollar general. Switch your number up every month. Hell, every week. No internet access on them plus they don't even ask for your name. Plus, you can pick what area code you want.

Pay with cash. Throw away and eat the sim card. Boom.

[Baitty]

This can't be very successful with those prices for something which can easily be done with other phones (look at the previous posts).

[DjPxH]

Blackphone seems shitty and oveerpriced compared to Oneplusone:

Blackphone is powered by a >2 GHz quad-core SoC and features a full set of premium features, such as a 4.7" HD IPS screen, LTE, HSPA+, 1GB DDR3 RAM, 16GB of storage, >8MP primary camera with flash and 1.3MP front camera, Bluetooth 4.0, 802.11n WiFi, GPS, and more. Certain specifications are subject to change and may be adjusted prior to shipping the first phones later this year.

Oneplusone has a full 1080px HD 5.5-inch screen, 2.5 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor coupled with an Adreno 330 GPU, 3GB RAM, 64GB of internal memory, CyanogenMod 11s Custom OS, 13 megapixel (rear) and 5 megapixel (front) camera – Sony Exmor sensor, Dual LED and 4K video support.

Blackphone is 629$
Oneplusone is 350$

I think you know which one I'm going to take...

So people are still comparing phones or anything in terms of the pure performance specs. This has always been pretty stupid. It says very little about the actual quality of the components, the quality of the surrounding hardware and the actual performance and experience provided by the operating system!

How I'm supposed to know which has better quality?
Wait two yeras and ask my friend how their phones have lasted and then buy best one?
Or buy most overpriced product and hope I get some qulity too?

Well you can see how the phones feel and compare them to each other. If it squeaks and screeches, well... decide for yourself. You can also await reviews how they perform. And just try and experience or try out the operating system! I can't believe so many Android phones still have such a stuttery scrolling. Awful, it just feels bad and low quality.

[Crypto_G]

Good concept, However I would go with one of those ghost phones from your friendly local neighborhood hacker LMAO

[keithers]

Seems like a cool idea, but the part that I don't get is:  Don't you basically forfeit all these privacy measures the moment you connect it using one of the major wireless carriers (i.e. ATT, Sprint, T-Mobile)?

[Baitty]

Seems like a cool idea, but the part that I don't get is:  Don't you basically forfeit all these privacy measures the moment you connect it using one of the major wireless carriers (i.e. ATT, Sprint, T-Mobile)?

Yes. Unless they have some sort of way to bypass that but I can't imagine they have and if they did have networks would probably blacklist the device.

[bluefirecorp]

No. 'tis a silly phone. Pretty much I could emulate this phone by just encrypting most of my OS already using a 3rd party application on my phone. As for calls, I'm not sure any sort of phones could handle on the fly encryption (plan would be to use SMS / text for GPG verification and then call be encrypted via shared private key that was shared via GPG).

[keithers]

The blackphone even comes in hands free!