I’m sadly starting to see a trend. Most phone bootloaders are locked nowadays. It’s not one specific manufacturer, it’s basically everyone.

If the OEM gives you the option to unlock them, it either voids the warranty or comes with severe punishment.

When you want to root your phone to get the liberty you lost to the “security features”, you basically break any apps that check for play integrity or other methods to detect root (even tho you can bypass that, it’s against TOS). I've mostly seen this on banking apps, but they are not the only ones. Not to mention that to even have the play integrity API, you have to have Google services installed and running. So you can't even de-Google your phone and keep the features.

This problem has been rampant on phones, it’s definitely not new, but it's basically the first thing that blocks the development of Linux for general phones.

Not to mention that no constructors follow a common thing like UEFI, they just all have their own thing. Which is a real pain for any kind of OS development.

Those aren’t the only issues tho, there's also all the proprietary blobs stuff. Without a way to either replicate them without reverse engineering, or open sourcing versions of the drivers, we will be stuck in this situation. Look at postmarketOS, they struggle a lot with this. This makes adding a device to their supported list a really hard thing to do, while costing a lot of time and money.

I think this will happen soon to laptops and desktops too. With the rise of ARM, I believe locking the bios and bootloader of those systems is not out of the question. Apple already kind of started with IBoot. It’s not fully locked, but definitely less open than what was used before in Intel macs.

And it’s not that ARM devices don't support UEFI, they absolutely do. Most Windows ARM systems use them right now. Arm’s SystemReady program allows them to boot just like x86 PCs do.

Then why the lockdown?

They will definitely say it’s for security, but Windows PCs, arm or not, have proven that you can have security while giving the user the choice to disable that security. UEFI and Secure Boot work just fine on ARM too, so it's not even a compatible issue. Secure defaults can be set as default, there is no problem with that. There is a really clear problem when those same defaults can’t be changed tho.

Now they'll probably argue that they didn't choose to do so, and that’s required by regulations.

I believe this is either misinformation, a stretch or a straight-up lie.

Radio and DRM firmware can stay on an isolated part of the device on their own. They don't need to prevent the entire OS boot process. The radio part already runs on an isolated part of the system on its own processor with signed firmware that complies with the FCC/RED requirements. The same thing goes for the DRM issue. User keys can allow for banking apps and all the other apps to verify the system without having to rely on OEM only control.

We need to act, not just complain

What we should ask for:

• We need to ask for owner-managed Secure Boot on every single type of general purpose computer. This goes for phones, smartwatches, computers… you get the point.
• Either allow the user to disable secure boot or allow the user to manage their own keys, with proper documentation on how to do so.

We should also try to separate the concerns:

• The radio and DRM stuff can be kept under signed, secure version on isolated systems to meet regulations.
• This should NOT require a full system lockdown or OEM to have the full control over what you boot on YOUR device.
• Provide documentation on how to interface with the hardware like GPS, Camera, GPUs and all to allow for third party OSes to develop properly without having to reverse engineer every single driver. This also means being able to develop proper alternatives to those NDA-only drivers.

We should have proper control over our device security:

• Devices should be able to support TPM or DICE in a way that allows baking apps, enterprise and DRM to work with third party OSes.
• They should also work with User provided keys.

We need to address the EOL and right to repair situation.

• When OEM updates end, we NEED to have a proper way to continue using the device with third party software, such as postmarketOS. This means allowing the user to unlock or provide keys to continue using the device.
• This would reduce e-waste by extending the device’s life.

We also want to know how our devices work. OEMs should have proper, publicly accessible documentation on the entire boot process and unlock procedure.

Why should we act now ?

With ARM growing in popularity, I'm kinda afraid the open boot system we had until now on desktop will disappear too. If OEM lockdown becomes the norm on PCs too, it will be really hard, almost impossible, to reverse those changes. It’s basically our last chance to act.

How should we act ?

Well, the EU has some places we can reach and some projects that kinda match what we want. We can associate ourselves with the right to repair movement, and try to prevent the entire ecosystem from being locked down.

So you should contact your MEPs. Explain that all of this is needed for fair competition, sustainability and right to repair.

Also try to reference existing proof of things like this already existing. Reference Windows PCs on ARM with UEFI support, x86 PCS allowing Secure Boot management and all. If you have additional arguments, please give them to other people so we can really argue to our MEPs.

You should state that it should be a right and that it’s not really weakening security, as user keys can do the same thing as OEM keys.

If you are in the states, I don’t know what you can do. So if someone has an idea, please post it.

Btw, English isn’t my native language, so there are going to be mistakes in this text, or repetition due to my lack of vocabulary. This is also my second time posting this. The first time I used AI translation which some people didn’t like. So I translated it all myself, even if some parts are not exactly how I want them to be, you'll probably get the idea. But be aware that my last two grades in English were 6.5/10 and 5.5/10.

Also, I’m not a professional, those are my opinions and I basically gathered as much info as I could to not spread misinformation. I removed some part on IBoot due to people saying I wasn’t quite right in the last post. So if you see anything wrong, please correct me and ill edit the post.

Should we name this “Right to own” ? Idk I just thought of that.