So recently bought the Pixel 8 with my previous carrier being Verizon and was going to put Grapheneos on it but I had no idea that Verizon locks the boot loaders of their devices even though google does not. What are some things I can do to de google the device or make it more private like Grapheneos would. Or am I out of luck. Thanks
Yes a debloater would be helpful probably. Just disappointing as part of the reason I went with the pixel was this option but now it’s not one.
I hear you man. That exact thing happened to me back with the Pixel 2.
You know, I’ve heard of people having success getting the carriers to remove the lock on the bootloader sometimes. It may be worth calling Verizon’s support line and asking them to do it.
Here is a good debloater that should allow you to remove some of the cruft from Google. It utilizes Shizuku which is a fantastic tool for accomplishing stuff without rooting your phone. I know I’ve seen debloating guides on YouTube that walk you through the stuff you can get rid of.
Something else that could really help is using a DNS blocking service to filter out requests to ad/tracking domains. I use NextDNS right now because it has some pretty comprehensive filters that are very easy to setup. Here’s a video that goes over setting it up. Pi-Hole or Adguard are self-hosted options, I used Pi-Hole for awhile and liked it, but switched in order to simplify my digital life a bit.
Edit: also, here is a guide from a reputable privacy site that covers a more technical approach to degoogling stock android. You can do a lot more than you might think.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
video
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
I’m not ready to really degoogle my phone, but wow next DNS has a lot of cool features! Thanks for the recommendation
Glad it helps! Yeah DNS level adblocking is hugely helpful both in terms of privacy and security.
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