MurderHomelessPeople's Guide On Setting Up a Burner Android

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Phones are an important part of every operation. They hold abundant amounts of sensitive information and can be the nail in your coffin when done improperly. I'll be going over a few things here but is by no means a definitive list. I will be writing this to be as scale-able as possible. There's a multiple ways to use these devices, the way you want to do this is dependent on how you want to use the phone. I personally do not set up google accounts on my devices as I have no need too. I may start to explore the option more as at first I was adverse to the topic and ill informed, that has since changed. This site shows a great example that introduced me to it which was first posted here by u/al_eberia. I've been vetting it and it's sound, if you have info stating otherwise please let me know as I am not perfect. For this post I will be doing my method.

Picking your device

Having your name on a phone is a bad idea and nothing that we can condone for business purposes. If you're just moving a few quarters to your friends and don't give a shit then by all means use your personal phone that is on contract in your name, you'll be fine, but you'll also be fucked if you ever run into some bad luck. If you're serious about moving some weight then get a separate device.

Old school cells work fine but are becoming more outdated as time goes on. With the rise of Stingray and now the Stingray 2 it's imperative to encrypt your activities now more then ever and with the wide spread availability and ease of use encryption has achieved it would be stupid not to.

It would be beneficial to do a little research on what models of burner androids (for this I'll be focusing on androids but other methods exists). are available in your area. Going for the lowest end model will leave you under powered and lagging, you need a phone that can keep up and when dealing with lots of texts a slow or unresponsive phone is unbelievably frustrating. Not to mention the battery will be fucked in a month which can leave you in some bad situations. Spend the little extra buck and get something half decent with a recent OS for longest chance of continued support in case of super critical bugs which is something we've seen from android. Where you buy it is up to you but it doesn't hurt to travel some distance

Initial Setup

I would never recommend rooting a device. You completely compromise your devices encryption standards and open yourself up to possible device corruption and data loss.

Messaging Options

As said before, don't do plain text. This goes for storing the messages too. Using a combination of Signal and Silence (a texting fork of Signal before it went internal) you can keep communications across all mediums secured. Both of these apps utilize the Signal Protocol to keep your messages safe. They also feature password protection for securing your messages locally, timed storage limit and in the case of Signal, ephemeral messages (self destructing messages). The first thing you should do after installing these apps is set a password. Remember you are only as secure as you want to be so take advantage of all the features!

Signal should be your first choice as it exchanges the keys through it's own systems, leaves no trace of your messages when used properly as the team behind signal is not keeping your messages and also allows for encrypted calling but since it is a data only app it has limitations and is beneficial to round it out with its SMS counterpart. This will allow you to remain active when there is no wifi around which will be essential for most operations.

To set up these apps together:

Another option I should mention that doesn't even need phone number is Conversations which is available for free on F-Droid but costs like 1$ or 2$ on Google Play. Conversations is a Jabber/XMPP client with either OTR, OMEMO or Open PGP encryption. This is a much more cost effective and simpler way to set up messaging even after accidental destruction.

That's all I got I think but I may think of more! It's hard to write out stuff like this so I'll pick at it more as time goes on! If you notice any mistakes please let me know! If you wanna tear it up like the piece of shit it is please do!

Why I Don't Want a Google Account

Because then you're gunna start building a profile if you do. If law enforcement finds your device and finds out your google account they may be able to extract some data from it, if you ever accidentally turned on location without realizing it may have been logged by google among other things. For this reason I prefer to go without one.


Comments


[4 Points] None:

Are you doing meth now?


[1 Points] None:

ill just stick with my tails usb in a public wifi using cash deposits on LBC... If you need to access DNM's that quickly, you should either be a vendor or an addict, but we are all addicts... just depends how ballzy your actions are with your addiction. Still respect and +1 for helping other people with this tho, seems like you put a lot of time and effort into doing this for the community


[1 Points] ffchampmt:

Can any experienced Linux devs please help me understand 'sandboxed'? It seems the paranoia is "ZOMG don't use your phones!! OP SEC! GPS!" Barring a rouge rooted app, the Android environment shouldn't allow access outside of granted permissions (in Orfox's case just "Storage") correct? Apps should also be unable to read other apps data without permissions as well if I'm right.

I understand that the security patching of Android isn't targeted like tails or the TBB leaving it more vulnerable to exploit, but I'd imagine that the miniscule number of phone users wouldn't make it a worthwhile target.


[1 Points] I5uEQKrv4u5KR3fb7yyC:

Good post, Ive done some research on the past with burner phones. You should add, looking for GSM phones over CDMA phones. GSM phones(these are your AT&T and T-Mobile) allow you to setup a phone without giving up any of your information vs CDMA phones(these are your sprint and verizon phones) that require you to call up a retailer to get it activated which will require you to give up personal information. Also some possible additions is security focused phones like the blackphone, blackberry PRIV, or even adding non smartphones since they come with no GPS tracking location functions installed(most smartphones nowadays arent open source so they could have gps backdoors), also note that regardless of GPS activiation when you call 911 they still get your location so I have a feeling that gps activation doesnt do much against police surveillance. just throw whatever you think is relevant in there hahaha i kinda just threw a bunch of shit I knew into a paragraph


[1 Points] TynesLSD:

Awesome guide! Thanks for taking the time to do this man! It means alot. Posts like these are what make this community so amazing.