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Robert Braxman has published another video spreading blatant misinformation about GrapheneOS in order to promote his highly insecure products and services. In addition to many false technical claims and fabrications about our team, he's falsely claiming the project is dying.

Gianmarco Gargiulo reshared this.

in reply to GrapheneOS

Robert Braxman presents himself as a privacy expert but routinely spreads misinformation and technical half-truths. His statements often lack depth and accuracy, suggesting he prioritizes narrative over substance.

GrapheneOS reshared this.

in reply to Kuketz-Blog πŸ›‘

@kuketzblog
What do you all think of Privacy on iOS? Should the average user care? Rob Braxman has made me too skeptical about iOS and MacOS devices, on privacy front.

What I am really sure about those devices is that Apple does have some backdoors, but they don't implement mass surveillance, and avg. user shouldn't worry.
Ofcourse, GOS is god in security.
What do you all think of Privacy on iOS?

in reply to No Twitter

@Notsoanonymous @kuketzblog Apple products and services are certainly far more private, secure and trustworthy than Braxman's products and services. That's not a high bar.

> What I am really sure about those devices is that Apple does have some backdoors

There's no evidence of that. On the other hand, Braxman's products/services have had actual legitimate backdoors in their code including fake end-to-end encryption where the server has access to the keys. There are people who covered this.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@Notsoanonymous @kuketzblog

> What do you all think of Privacy on iOS?

iPhones are far more secure than the vast majority of Android devices. Only Pixels are currently competitive with them.

iOS is far more secure than nearly all options. Stock Pixel OS and AOSP itself aren't far behind iOS but iOS is at least a bit ahead. GrapheneOS greatly improves security. iOS has areas it does better even than GrapheneOS, but we think GrapheneOS is more secure overall especially against real exploits.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@Notsoanonymous @kuketzblog iOS provides strong privacy from apps and services. It doesn't provide the ability to avoid Apple services and strong privacy from Apple, but neither does a Google Mobile Services device with Google. iOS somewhat more private from Apple than GMS is from Google. It has better defaults and they support end-to-end encryption for most of the iCloud services via Advanced Data Protection. What they don't support is avoiding Apple services as you can with AOSP and Google.
in reply to GrapheneOS

We have a thread already debunking this recent line of attack on GrapheneOS at grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/…. GrapheneOS quickly provided the June security patches, was ported to Android 16 and is working with a major Android OEM. It's not dying and we haven't said or implied it is.


Many companies and individuals are trying to mislead people about the future of GrapheneOS to promote their insecure products and services. GrapheneOS is not going anywhere. We've made it clear we're shipping Android 16 soon and that the supported devices will remain supported.

in reply to GrapheneOS

Braxman presents himself as a privacy and security expert but isn't one. He's a shady businessman selling unsafe snake oil products and services. His content is filled with outright fabrications and is heavily aimed at promoting his products. It misinforms rather than educating.
in reply to GrapheneOS

More privacy and security experts should address Braxman's inaccurate content along with the products and services he sells.

social.tchncs.de/@kuketzblog/1…

Braxman has repeatedly sold people fake end-to-end encryption messaging, etc. The companies working with him are scammers too.


Robert Braxman presents himself as a privacy expert but routinely spreads misinformation and technical half-truths. His statements often lack depth and accuracy, suggesting he prioritizes narrative over substance.

in reply to GrapheneOS

GrapheneOS has only ever posted about Braxman in response to his misinformation about us. In his latest video attacking us, he engages in clear libel towards our team. He pushes fabrications from a libel/stalking site and accuses us of doing what he's openly doing in the video...
in reply to GrapheneOS

Our lead developer was forcibly conscripted into a war and we've been asking for help regularly since then and expressing that the situation was dire. Android 16 making our life harder than expected made it worse. The Android 16 changes weren't really the important part...

Oblomov reshared this.

in reply to GrapheneOS

Following this, we hired 2 more full time developers and have tried to hire more people. Multiple people stepped up to do part time volunteer work helping with the port to Android 16 and other things. People stepped up to help in other ways. GrapheneOS was not and is not dying.

Oblomov reshared this.

in reply to GrapheneOS

We shipped the June Android Security Bulletin patches for AOSP on June 2. Pixel and AOSP release was June 10 based on Android 16. We began porting to 16, realized it would be far harder than expected and requested urgent help. We backported Android 16 firmware/drivers to 15 QPR2.
in reply to GrapheneOS

Our initial official production release of Android 16 was made on June 30th after an experimental release the day before which had major issues:

grapheneos.org/releases#202506…

Most users already considered that fully functional and very stable. Most early testers were happy with it.

in reply to GrapheneOS

initial GrapheneOS builds in under a month and being pressed on the longevity of the project... Now should we look at any number of OEMs software versions for the multitude of devices that they supposedly support with greater user bases than GrapheneOS?!
in reply to GrapheneOS

There were no Pixel Update Bulletin security patches for July 2025 so we took an extra day to polish things up further and GrapheneOS based on Android 16 reached our Stable channel today.

Due to requesting and receiving help, we're much better off than we were before Android 16.

in reply to GrapheneOS

We've never considered AOSP providing device trees as a hardware requirement. The crisis was a combination of the conscription, other developers being less available to work, more than ever to port (2FA unlock in particular), remaking device support and ongoing attacks like this.
in reply to GrapheneOS

Useful information on Braxman's products and services from a security researcher (founder of DivestOS):

forum.f-droid.org/t/brax2-alte…

Highly insecure, ancient hardware running a closed source fork of the end-of-life Android 10 which did NOT receive basic security patches and updates.

in reply to GrapheneOS

Secure Group is a company quite similar to Encrochat, SkyECC, MPC Secure and AN0M with a similar customer base and marketing. Look into which products Secure Group's resellers also sold. They made Braxman's previous phone and the most recent one that's supposedly shipping now.
in reply to GrapheneOS

Just saw, that my Pixel 8a ist now on Android 16. Thanks a lot, you did a really great job.
in reply to GrapheneOS

Not sure if this is the right place to ask but how will you handle the battery update for the 6a?

Did you push the one for 4a?

in reply to tinyocean

@tinyocean

> Not sure if this is the right place to ask but how will you handle the battery update for the 6a?

We'll ship it and perhaps figure out how to display a notification to users about it with the option to disable the safety feature. People should get the battery replaced though.

> Did you push the one for 4a?

No, since it was end-of-life for ages already and they didn't properly release it. We highly discourage people using end-of-life devices.

in reply to GrapheneOS

I assume that includes a check if the device is affected?

I tried my IMEI but it seems that I am not eligible for free repair. Not sure if that means I am safe or screwed over.

in reply to tinyocean

@tinyocean They used multiple battery suppliers and only the batteries from one of the suppliers have a serious issue. The changes are only relevant to that subset of users and they're the only ones getting a choice of a free battery replacement, $150 credit for a new phone or $100 cash via Payoneer. If there's a nearby repair partner then the battery can be replaced with a quick in-person trip instead of sending in a device so that's a good option if someone wants to keep using it.
in reply to GrapheneOS

Thanks, I guess that means I am safe and I can keep using it till EOL in 2027?

Sorry that I ask again but will the battery only be limited for the affected users or for everyone? Will you just include a warning for everyone and you need to manually confirm if you can disable the safety feature at your own risk? Or does the update from google contain a list of affected devices / detects the battery origin and unaffected users don't need to do anything

Questa voce Γ¨ stata modificata (2 mesi fa)
in reply to tinyocean

@tinyocean

> Thanks, I guess that means I am safe and I can keep using it till EOL in 2027?

We aren't fully sure, but when we add the planned feature you'll only get a warning if you have a problematic battery. Their code only activates the change when the battery is from the problematic supplier so we can do the same with a warning. We could also tell people their battery is NOT one of the problematic ones. We haven't fully decided what to do about this yet and don't have resources to spare.

in reply to GrapheneOS

this thank-you note from me was written on a pixel tablet that was updated seamlessly to android 16 today as part of the latest GrapheneOS release.
in reply to GrapheneOS

I'm so sorry to hear that. I assume that most people don't come close to the expertise required to be beneficial to the project. Let's hope for the best, and the end of the war. :ablobcatheartsqueeze:
in reply to GrapheneOS

hopefully they find a good way out of the conscription, better yet out of the war.
in reply to GrapheneOS

Look I'm happy using GOS and happy that the A16 port worked out but it's a simply a lie that you didn't originally paint it as doomsday when the device repos stopped updating.
in reply to Eskuero

@eskuero No, it is yourself and others misrepresenting what we said in this series of posts who are lying. We did not say we were going to stop working on GrapheneOS. We said it was going to be impossible to continue in the way it was going before where we could port to new major releases in 24 hours and add support for new devices in 24 hours. You're also lying about the reason for why we posted this which was far more to do with our lead developer being conscripted into an army...
in reply to GrapheneOS

"Otherwise, be prepared for the final release of GrapheneOS to be today. It's up to the people who have this access to decide if they want the project to go on after today."

is very clear language not open for interpretations

in reply to Eskuero

@eskuero No, that's a lie, and you're very clearly misrepresenting what we said. Even in this cropped screenshot, it says directly afterwards that we can continue the project with substantial effort. The following messages explain that we plan to do that but it will be very difficult. Why show this single message with many subsequent messages explaining the situation and what we planned to do removed? You're cherry picking wording expressing how dire things were/are with the rest cropped out.
in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero Cropping out a single message out of dozens explaining the situation and cherry picking wording from 1 sentence while ignoring the rest of what was said in that paragraph is not being honest about what we actually said to people. Why were the rest of the messages and edits we made to the wording omitted? You're claiming we're lying while doing an extraordinarily dishonest misrepresentation of what we said. Nope, it's you who is lying and you who will no longer be part of our community.
in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero Show the whole conversation including the edits we quickly made to the initial messages. Why are you using a cropped screenshot and twisting the wording we used in a way which contradicts us very clearly explaining it would take far more work than expected? We also did receive additional support compared to what we expected to have. Our call for help was at least partially answered.

It's now a month later after we successfully ported to Android 16 a couple weeks earlier...

in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero It's nothing short of an outrageous lie to use this cropped screenshot omitting subsequent messages, edits and twisting the wording which was used initially to present it as if GrapheneOS is dying weeks after we ported to Android 16 successfully. A major part of why it went better than expected is because the developer who was forcibly conscripted was diverted away from combat and is currently in limbo where they were able to use free time and cellular connection to help us out.
in reply to GrapheneOS

This is the only second message I got which still said you would not be able to do it without help from a partner access.

The rest you deleted already since I just scroll all way back to june 10th and it's all gone.

Do not take this as an attack because it's far from my intention but the message on day one was worrying, what happened later was great and I'm happy about it

in reply to Eskuero

@eskuero You falsely accused us of lying in your initial post. We're responding to a video which was just recently posted after our Android 16 port was completed weeks ago. Our initial concern about how hard it was going to be and lack of our usual development team is not the present. These messages also made it incredibly clear we were going to work very hard on porting to Android 16, overcoming the fact that our lead developer was forcibly conscripted and ongoing escalating attacks hurting it.
in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero Your post at grapheneos.social/@eskuero@mst… is an extreme misrepresentation of this situation. It's a dishonest attack. Braxman didn't post his video minutes after we posted that message before further clarification. He just posted it now, after our port to Android 16 was completed and after numerous threads providing clear information on our plan and how things were going. Even following the message you posted out of context, we clearly communicated we were continuing the project.
in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero Porting to Android 16 did go far worse than ports over the past many years. It took us 2 weeks and then additional time to get it to Stable instead of it taking the typical 48 hours or so to Alpha and then Stable in under a week. We care a lot about shipping updates quickly and consider what happened to be awful.
in reply to GrapheneOS

I didn't falsely accuse you of anything. You said on day one that the project would not be able to continue without help. I doubt I was the only one that thought the project was close to death.

I don't care about Braxman I don't know him and I haven't watched his video, don't relate me to him.

in reply to Eskuero

@eskuero

> I didn't falsely accuse you of anything.

You falsely accused us of lying in our thread.

> You said on day one that the project would not be able to continue without help.

We received more help than we had at the time.

> I doubt I was the only one that thought the project was close to death.

That is what happens when a state forcibly conscripts our lead developer when we already lack the resources we need, and then a port we were worried about is made much harder than expected.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero We never said GrapheneOS was being discontinued and or that we were going to stop working on it.

Do you realize how hard it is to have the person who did 95% of code review and 90% of the ports conscripted into a military and sent to basic training with nearly 0 contact with us for 45 days?

We desperately needed help and made that clear before Android 16 was released. We were not yet receiving enough help at that time.

Following the posts we made, we received more help and funding.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero It is not June 10. It is July 3. Our first production build based on Android 16 was made on June 30. Prior to that, we publicly explained how things were going in several long threads.

We made it clear we were going to be able to complete the port very shortly after June 10 after we received additional help and support.

Why is a dire situation on June 10 where we said we need help to continue being misrepresented as GrapheneOS being discontinued or struggling now, after we got help?

in reply to GrapheneOS

If that screenshot is true then indeed this message is very worrying about the next day..
It seems to me also that Braxman maybe is a scammer but right now you are doing what Braxman accuses your community, which means hurrahing people (@eskuero)
The content of the screenshot is undeniable that express the danger of last day. It is common sense and despite how many times you answer and deny it, it won't change.
At least be honest and admit your mistake on how you expressed it.
Questa voce Γ¨ stata modificata (1 mese fa)
in reply to orestis987

@orestis987 @eskuero

> If that screenshot is true then indeed this message is very worrying about the next day..

It has been altered from what was actually said by removing most of what was said.

> but right now you are doing what Braxman accuses your community, which means hurrahing people

We've done no such thing. You can choose between removing this reply with a blatant lie about us or being permanently banned. You should do it before replying to us again or we're just banning you.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@orestis987 @eskuero

> The content of the screenshot is undeniable that express the danger of last day.

Removing most of what was said and presenting something out of context while lying about what was said is dishonest manipulation and making false claims. Referring back to it weeks or months later while pretending it's current is even worse.

> It is common sense and despite how many times you answer and deny it, it won't change.

It is a lie which you are perpetuating.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero
I think you are very offensive to me as well to @eskuero.
I brought it back in order to defense him since I saw that. I don't spread a lie, I didn't claim the screenshot was true, and I think neither @eskuero had an intention to accuse you.
Maybe something I got wrong about @eskuero post, and apologize.
But threating someone to recall or otherwise banned is not the way to grow your community.
In a community I think we should be equal and respect each other. Don't we?
in reply to orestis987

@orestis987 We haven't said or done anything offensive to either you or @eskuero. You came here to make hostile posts towards us based on false claims about us including from Braxman. You're no longer welcome to contact us or participate in our community.

> In a community I think we should be equal and respect each other. Don't we?

It's you who is being toxic and disrespectful. You appear to have come here to concern troll. Please avoid contacting us again or participating in our community.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero I fully support you. And I would like to ask only one thing, is this developer safe now. He and you are also counting on the fact that he will return to work on the project as soon as possible or at least someday. Does he have the opportunity to leave, because he is such an important person for the development of the project? I know that in practice he can pay for leaving this country or get a deferment from the army.
in reply to User

@userj @eskuero He isn't being sent to combat and he'll hopefully be discharged and able to work on GrapheneOS again soon. We're in active communication with him via a cellular connection. He's currently in limbo and not really tasked with any actual assignment so he has some time to help.

Corruption is very widespread in the country but that doesn't mean he can get out of it with money. There's widespread knowledge of his situation and that he's a talented security researcher and developer.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@userj @eskuero We need to wait until he's moved to an actual assignment related to his skill set and then we can talk to the leadership there. They would be better off simply deploying GrapheneOS as a way to defend their devices and discharging him so he can continue to work on it. They may decide he's valuable to them working on something else and then he won't be able to work full time on GrapheneOS anymore. We have little control over it. We know he won't be sent to combat anymore though.
in reply to GrapheneOS

@userj @eskuero He was initially on track to being sent to do trench warfare and even after our initial interventions aimed at getting him help, it was still going that way. However, going public about it got higher level awareness of it and he got diverted away from that. He should be physically safe now. Does not mean he can work full time on GrapheneOS because they're giving him all kinds of menial tasks to do right now and he'll be transferred to a real tech related role soon.
in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero I am very glad that things are at least so, but of course I would like more freedom for him. Thank you for answering so openly. And yes, graphene would be very useful for the military, but the main thing is that it is not forced to make exploits in the system. To spy on the military inside the army or for other purposes in general. But I think you'll check it out. There would be an opportunity to learn from his experience to help you guys, but no one will teach me, only mysf
in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero We were calling for help and expressing how dire the situation was before knowing Android 16 wouldn't include device repositories anymore due to our lead developer being forcibly conscripted. That was the dire situation for us. We brought on a new full time developer and paid someone else to come back and temporarily work 80 hour weeks temporarily for this port. Cropping out one of our messages in a long series of messages to misrepresent is what's dishonest behavior.
in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero If you want to keep following us and participating in our community, then we expect you to remove the false accusation and extreme misrepresentation you made at mstdn.io/@eskuero/114824540277…. Is that really the hill you want to die on with us? We have no issue forgiving it if you retract it. We did not lie in our thread. Posting about how dire things were prior to June 10 and on June 10 including that we needed significantly more help to continue in no way contradicts anything we said...


Look I'm happy using GOS and happy that the A16 port worked out but it's a simply a lie that you didn't originally paint it as doomsday when the device repos stopped updating.
in reply to GrapheneOS

@eskuero We were in a dire situation where the project needed more development resources to continue, so we asked our large community for help and received help. What is the issue with us being honest about how things are going and asking for help when we need it? We have a large community willing to support us. Many people stepped up to help, including some developers who helped do part time volunteer work to aid with the port. We also hired 2 people, one who worked 80+ hours weeks on this.
in reply to GrapheneOS

interesting. I am not on the level of you or Mike or all the other privacy experts. I just recently discovered Braxman and wondered what you smart security guys would say. thanks for telling me.
in reply to GrapheneOS

are there any ideas to go to YouTube and counter this guy? I am convinced he has lots of followers and answering here may not help…
Unknown parent

mastodon - Collegamento all'originale
GrapheneOS
@rawshadows Verified boot is an industry standard security feature. Preserving the standard security features is only the baseline of what GrapheneOS provides. We provide massive privacy and security features built on top of that base. grapheneos.org/features provides an overview of how GrapheneOS compares to standard Android 16.
in reply to GrapheneOS

OK, I watched a few of the videos of this guy, but find it hard to follow. The β€œbest” I saw is his execuses why the BraX3 is delayed. It’s a list of bullshit bingo. I could make a dart board with usually excuses and throw blindly my darts I could create a similar video with AI.
But I have to admit, that he is good presenting and selling his ideas. Like a lot of populists there are a few things correct but then mixed with lies or misinformation or populism. So I can sort of understand that people fall for him and his lies.
I am not as smart or well educated in IT Security matters, but I read a lot. I try a lot. I think I am usually very well informed. But I have never heard of BraX3 or 2 or anything like this. No one buys his phones, so he has to act… πŸ™((
in reply to GrapheneOS

Guys, don't waste so much time and energy on these inanities. Braxman or whatever his name is can't be taken seriously. His so-called secure smartphone is a low budget China device. Let him talk
Unknown parent

mastodon - Collegamento all'originale
GrapheneOS
@rawshadows The old XSS protection header is deprecated and removed from modern browsers because it was found to be unsafe and created vulnerabilities in correct code. Modern guides recommend setting it to 0 since Safari kept it for so long. Trusted Types is the strict way of blocking XSS, etc. where your CSP can enforce Trusted Types and then provide an allowlist of Trusted Types policies which if set to 'none' completely blocks various vulnerability classes. Just need to build DOM via APIs.
Unknown parent

mastodon - Collegamento all'originale
GrapheneOS
@FamilyCyclist Android 13 is the oldest yearly release getting security backports now, although anything but the latest stable releases only gets close to full backports of High/Critical severity vulnerabilities. Low/Moderate severity ones aren't really backported much anymore since the pace of finding vulnerabilities across software being heavily fuzzed, audited, etc. is so high.
Unknown parent

mastodon - Collegamento all'originale
GrapheneOS
@rawshadows His supposedly end-to-end encrypted services have consistently had server side access to the encryption keys simply out of laziness. It's bottom of the barrel work at all levels. It's just the bare minimum which they can do to make a product people can be tricked into buying. It has to look as if it's reasonable to people brainwashed by his highly inaccurate content always presenting his products as the best solution. He covers real topics but with tons and tons of fabrications.
in reply to GrapheneOS

Hello @GrapheneOS
I am considering buying a pixel 9 and install GrapheneOS, for privacy.

I believe also that Braxman is scummer although when I watched his videos I almost get convinced. Have you considered to argument back on those accusations in order to dissolve his arguments?

For example, watching some of his videos I have the following concerns:

[to be continiued in next comment]

Questa voce Γ¨ stata modificata (1 mese fa)
in reply to orestis987

@orestis987

> Have you considered to argument back on those accusations in order to dissolve his arguments?

We've debunked his claims about GrapheneOS multiple times. He publishes inaccurate privacy content filled with fabrications for a living and we do not have time to go through all of his content and find all of the places he lies about GrapheneOS, let alone responding to all of it.

Many privacy and security experts have debunked his claims and exposed him as a charlatan already.

in reply to orestis987

-Why Pixel? Just because of TM2 chip? As Braxman claim, is there any chip on harware that can identify you to Google?

- Why you choose Vanadium as secure browsing? Vanadium is a chronium variant, which chronium is developed by google. Why don''t you prefer duckduckgo browser for example?

For now These are my questions, and may come up more. Nowadays internet is full of "experts" and you don't know who is telling the truth

As community I believe you should argument back with technical details!

Questa voce Γ¨ stata modificata (1 mese fa)
in reply to orestis987

@orestis987

> Why Pixel? Just because of TM2 chip?

They're the only devices meeting our security and update requirements. See grapheneos.org/faq#future-devi…. There's a requirement for a decent secure element with the AOSP APIs, not the Titan M2.

> As Braxman claim, is there any chip on harware that can identify you to Google?

No, it's a fabrication.

> Why you choose Vanadium as secure browsing?

It's our privacy and security hardened browser project based on the most secure mainstream browser.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@orestis987

> Vanadium is a chronium variant, which chronium is developed by google.

Irrelevant.

> Why don''t you prefer duckduckgo browser for example?

DuckDuckGo's Android browser app is a WebView-based browser which means it's a Chromium-based browser. However, it has crippled privacy and security compared to a proper Chromium-based browser. WebView isn't meant for a fully featured browser app including not having per-site isolation yet and being missing important privacy features.

in reply to GrapheneOS

@orestis987

> Nowadays internet is full of "experts" and you don't know who is telling the truth

Braxman is quite obviously a charlatan and widely exposed as such by actual experts.

> you should argument back with technical details

We provide an enormous amount of technical details. What we don't do is spend a large amount of time watching and responding to a serial fabricator attacking us every day.

If you want to participate in our community, stop peddling false attacks on GrapheneOS.

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