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I'd be happy if we stop calling it 2FA and instead say "2of3" or something. So many providers require you to use 2FA, but almost no one forces you to include fallback authentication.

Mobile networks are two-way systems. If you have perfect reception of the mobile network - let's say full bars! - then that doesn't mean the mobile network also has reception of your mobile device.

Most of the time, your phone is in RX-only mode to save battery. It listenes for incoming data every millisecond or two, but no more. But as soon as you actively use the network, things change. The basestation must receive your signals as well. This may suddenly and dramatically change the perception of "signal quality". Before it's RX quality only, then it's RX+TX quality.

With incoming or outgoing calls, your phone may switch to another technology. While it may be idling in 4G, large parts of the world rely on 2G for voice calls. As soon as the call starts, the phone switched to 2G and naturally shows 2G reception.

Talk to somebody.

You're entering a vicious circle in your mind. As stupid as it may sound, call a suicide hotline if you need to talk.

The article doesn't state it was better than traffic lights. I think small cells in traffic lights are already reality, even if not widespread, the small cells exist.

The article presents a novel, non-obvious approach in some ealier-stage development.

No worries, it's part of the whole story. I don't particularly see the point of kill switches when you trust the software.

I acknowledge the efforts in hardware integration they do. I'd love to see the Linux desktop being upgraded to Android's standards.

In Germany the packages are usually given to a neighbor. Amazon's own delivery service sometimes leaves it in front of your door, but mostly in houses with multiple flats. When it's gone, they just deliver again.

Does it work differently in the US, so are packages usually left at the doorstep?

Matlab has a somewhat different focus, but essentially offers the experience you describe.

(just want to say: this concept is around for ages and Jupyter could adapt some of Matlab's GUI features for sure)

The software is shipped by those who create the phone itself. If you don't trust anybody, you can't get a piece of silicon to connect to mobile networks and draw a website on a screen. Any open source hardware eventually depends on the promise that the thing does what it promises.

The commercial world has these trust issues as well as the open source world. Maybe the underlying issue is: how can we test devices and software that is incredibly complex?

The open source world isn't prepared for large-scale software delivery either.

It works with the core software of Linux distributions, who deliver to administrators around the world. But userland software and dependencies are a mess. Distributions ship old software, developers don't know the target their application will run on, and we all know what's going on with the PIP/NPM/... package managers.

Moreover, we have pretty much no sandboxing and userland permission management (camera access for browser? file access for your instant messenger application? calendar access?) on any Linux Desktop.

While lawmaking and IT-security must grow up and open source is indeed a nice third player - it does not solve the immediate issues we have.

The author argues that open source magically creates a wonderful world of security and privacy. Quotes like the following make me wonder if the author every touched a software project:

"Like the Linux and open source world at large, security and privacy are not automatic features of open source. Rather, it is open source that enables those features, by allowing developers and users to keep a watchful eye on the code. [...] Code isn’t always understandable, even to seasoned Linux users."

I more and more think this is a harmful view on open source. It's a reason for projects to skip best practices, tests and professional audits. I follow a few projects very closely so I'm familiar with the code. But should others really rely on that in terms of security? Absolutely not.

When you ask the "binary people" if they need the source code for an audit, well, they don't.