I am in need of a separate degoogled phone for some things that require high level of privacy (nothing illegal).

I have 2 phones that I can use. One of them is my business phone (it has my business number, apps, data and that sort of stuff) which is now running an OS with all the Google spyware because it’s necessary for the apps to work. I can reinstall everything on the second phone and use the first one as the secure device since it supports everything I need. The problem is that it has some issues on vanilla ROMs that I don’t really want to deal with and the reinstalling will take a lot of time.

The issue with the second phone is that it is rocking an old MTK chip and rooting instructions are let’s say a bit beyond my ability to understand. I still want to use it without Google if possible though. So can I degoogle its stock ROM with ADB or something? And is it worth trying or there will still be some vulnerabilities?

EDIT: to clear some possible misunderstandings, the reason of why I need a separate secure phone is that I am forced to use a very invasive proprietary app that I’d prefer just keeping on a separate device instead of trying to limit its spyware abilities with firewalls and that kind of stuff. I don’t trust the last solution much. Also I can’t use it in a VM because I need it to always be accessible wherever I am and yk carrying a PC is not an option

      • lemmyreader@lemmy.ml
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        6 months ago

        Up to you. Netguard does need a local VPN connection on the phone to work, so if you would need some VPN app to run there’s a problem. Netguard blocks network access per app (with choice for enabling/disabling WiFi and/or Mobile Data per app) which I think is cool. And it is an open source app available via F-Droid.

        • Blaze@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          6 months ago

          Rethink is very similar: uses a VPN connection too, and allows blocking per app, is available on F-Droid

          Anyway, the interface of Netguard seems a bit easier to use

    • GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.mlOP
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      6 months ago

      I don’t really trust such stuff. Once I tried disabling system apps via ADB (not deleting). They appeared as disabled but still could run in the background…

      • MentalEdge@sopuli.xyz
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        6 months ago

        The point isn’t to stop them from running. It’s to stop them from talking to the internet, which is a lot simpler to achieve.

        • GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.mlOP
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          6 months ago

          What I meant is that if we can’t disable them without root we probably can’t disable the network access either. I don’t have the knowledge and time to test outgoing packets and stuff like that

          • MentalEdge@sopuli.xyz
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            6 months ago

            Android has built in support for VPNs. If there was a way for the OS to leak traffic, that would be a massive security vulnerability that would have corporations dumping all android company phones within a week.

            Non root ad blockers work by creating a vpn within the phone that all network activity goes through, which then doesn’t allowed ad traffic.

          • Anamana@feddit.de
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            6 months ago

            It’s fairly secure that it works, because it’s basically setting up a VPN connection that effectively blocks every network traffic outside of the tunnel.

            But if you wanna be 100% sure you need to invest either the time or root your phone.

          • Empricorn@feddit.nl
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            6 months ago

            It’s okay to admit you don’t understand stuff, you don’t need to push conspiracy theories. None of us is omniscient…

            • GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.mlOP
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              6 months ago

              I don’t push it and it’s not a theory. It’s just my assumption that I don’t have time to prove or destroy

              • Empricorn@feddit.nl
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                6 months ago

                if we can’t disable them without root we probably can’t disable the network access either.

                Complete bullshit and utter speculation.

      • MinekPo1@lemmy.ml
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        6 months ago

        to my knowledge disabled apps do not run so you must have misunderstood something

  • impure9435@kbin.run
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    6 months ago

    You can try uninstalling as much Google crap as possible using the Universal Android Debloater

    Then perhaps use a firewall like NetGuard in whitelist mode, to only allow selected apps to access the internet

    As an additional layer of security, you can use NextDNS with the No Google blocklist, and block all connections to Google servers in DNS. If you need to access specific things like YouTube, you can whitelist them.

  • Maoo [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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    6 months ago

    You can’t degoogle without using a ROM that degoogles. Google has built itself into the Android operating system by default and replacing it is non-trivial, like using a ROM with microG.

    As another commenter mentioned, though, you can partially degoogle in other ways.

    • GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.mlOP
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      6 months ago

      Partial degoogling isn’t an option for me. Thank you for the reply though. I didn’t know Google had something inside the OS except like the regular system apps

  • smeg@feddit.uk
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    6 months ago

    You can degoogle some phones without root, assuming they have support from a good custom ROM (the classic example being GrapheneOS on a Pixel). You’ll need to look up what ROMs are available for your particular phone, and if you’re lucky then there’ll be a good one which doesn’t require too much hackery to install.

    If you’re unlucky and there’s nothing for that device then you probably can’t fully de-google it, but you can still improve the situation by avoiding any Google apps and services. This could be by using adb as you suggest, or by managing the network as the other comment suggests, or just by using alternatives.

    It all really depends on your threat model and whether or not it’s worth buying a new device just for this!

    • GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.mlOP
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      6 months ago

      Installing a custom ROM on that phone is not much less hackery than rooting it + there are no trustworthy options because the model is really really rare and it has an MTK

      Then I guess I should reinstall everything and use the first phone as the secure one

      Nah buying a new device is a very big deal

      • smeg@feddit.uk
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        6 months ago

        Ah bad luck, yeah if the first phone has better support for custom ROMs then that does sound like the better option. Just make sure you can get everything critical works on the MTK phone before you start tinkering with the other one just in case it goes wrong!

        It’s a real shame phones (and ARM devices in general, I think) are so locked down that they just become ewaste if someone hasn’t done the work to support custom ROMs.