That seems a bit harsh. I have two rescue parrots that live in large cages (indoors). I let them out every night when I get home from work, and they're given plenty of toys and material (including native blooms) to interact with every day while I'm gone.
I buy a couple of pinewood storage crates for them to play in and destroy every month. I also spend over half an hour every morning cleaning all their food and water containers, and cooking them breakfast (sweet potato, corn, fresh apple, assorted greens), I don't even make myself breakfast!
Not sure how I feel about this. Motorola seems to be the exclusive provider of encrypted cellular networks and associated devices to the Israeli military [1][2].
I'm under the impression that basebands still require a proprietary/binary blob, basically rendering the security features of the underlying Open Source OS useless, since it sits between the user and outside connectivity.
How can GrapheneOS ensure that there are no hidden backdoors (ie: Pegasus-like spyware, which was created by ex-IDF soldiers via NSO Group), etc, in the baseband?
In the same way they can(not) do it on Pixel phones - and I would be surprised if Google was not already cooperating with the state actors. You do what you can. Even open source drivers (which are not gonna happen when operating within tightly regulated radio bands) won't help if there's a hardware backdoor.
The way I see it, I don't have much direct control over the actualities of that kind of nation-state spying stuff. However:
1. I can direct my consumer-dollars towards the vendors that promise to respect ownership and privacy in general, and they will also have the most to lose if they are caught enabling spying.
2. Defense in depth. Security features generally add to the spying's difficulty, expense, or risk of detection, and that in turn decreases the incentive for abuse.
Just only ever speak in a language of your own invention that uses both cryptographic and steganographic techniques which you invented while colocated, maybe.
I personally am more afraid of what "someone" can convince other people to do rather than listening to me. Sadly there are enough people that are easily manipulated that probably the "smarter" people are completely ignored.
If I would be to place a bet I would place it on mass propaganda targeting people below average - it might be simpler, easier and cost effective. So lots of this talk about "encryption", "privacy" might be in fact great for those "actors": smart people worry about their precious technology and principles, while "they" talk to "the masses".
This. I know some people who work for the former and they are always having to say "no, I don't work for that Motorola". The shared name is entirely historic.
I did. There's long term patent cross-licensing agreements between the two companies. Motorola mobility may be a separate company now, but they didn't start from scratch.
The mororola mobility is a Chinese company with Chinese management. They bought the brand and the patent portfolio. They sure as hell are not supplying Israel or NSA.
They did. You're nitpicking to not lose face while you could have easily say "OK, didn't know they were separate brands" and we'd all move on with our lives.
If you're not in country X which spies on you, but you live in country Y, is it preferable to have country X or Y to spy on you, given one is further away and cannot really impact your daily life, compared to the other country?
Let me give you another perspective - you cannot fight a foreign state that wants to hack your device and access your personal data. Even Apple iPhones, who often taut how "secure" their devices are, remain vulnerable to state spywares. A secured device, at most, will protect your data from the police or lay cracker or malware, who lack the means to use more sophisticated methods to access your data. When Android forks (like Lineage OS or Graphene OS) advertise that their Oses are more "secure", with better "data protection", what they mean is that their OSes try and prevent data leakages to the OS vendors (like Google or Apple or other BigTech) or to online services integrated with the OS or through system and user installed apps. In other words, "privacy and security" primarily means that they try and prevent surveillance capitalism.
You should probably ask the parent commenter. I think GrapheneOS is a good choice even for those that don't have something to hide. Reminds me of iOS, really (in a good way).
None of it matters. If the device has a SIM card (virtual or physical), it will execute commands sent over the network. It's required by the GSM/LTE standards. The best you can hope for is to have separate SoC for the OS and separate SoC for the GSM/LTE connectivity, but that means double the power consumption.
defcon21 is from the pre-snowden world (2013), for anyone else wondering. Mobile landscape (our reliance on them, the central role they play in our lives) back then was a little bit different and indeed I'd not be surprised if most models support that the carrier can remotely read out any memory location or something
Perhaps you may be interested in Librem 5 or Pinephone, both of which have hardware kill switches for modem and available schematics. The latter even has most of the modem software freed.
Those devices have atrocious security at a hardware, firmware and software level. Their microphone kill switch also doesn't prevent audio recording. They aren't open hardware despite many attempts to mislead people with the marketing.
> The latter even has most of the modem software freed.
Pinephones have entirely closed source baseband firmware. They use a highly unusual cellular radio which includes both an incredibly outdated Qualcomm baseband processor with atrocious updates and security combined with an extremely outdated proprietary fork of Android running on an extra CPU core which isn't present in any mainstream smartphone. It's only replacing the unusual extra OS which has been done. That whole component doesn't exist on other smartphones and the only reason it's possible to replace it is because the whole radio has absolutely atrocious security. The radio is connected via a far higher attack surface USB connection providing far less isolation for the OS and the USB connection can be used to flash the proprietary Android OS via the fastboot protocol. The baseband firmware itself doesn't have any replacement available.
> Pinephones have entirely closed source baseband firmware.
> The baseband firmware itself doesn't have any replacement available.
Same with the Google Pixels and their Samsung Exynos modem. Neither you nor GrapheneOS users have any idea at all what's going on in their cellular transceivers. What will it be for the upcoming Motorola phone?
Neither. It's great that the Pixels' baseband ACPU doesn't have free reign in system memory, but if we're gonna underline the deficient state of the cellular modem in the Pine Phone we should also remind ourselves that the firmware situation with the Pixels is an almost equally sore thumb.
There's a lot of hand-wringing in this thread about Motorola's location, and a lot of support from a few for a modem made by a company headquartered in....Shanghai. If consistency here is what we claim to be pursuing, then let's actually pursue it.
The opacity of the firmware situation isn't great on either, but one contains numerous excellent mitigations and is very proactively maintained, and the other is something that relies heavily on reverse engineering and community projects to even use.
And it has a physical switch and has some physical distance between it and the CPU, both of which given the previous limitations are mostly theater, in practice. "My modem is so vulnerable it needs to be turned off during extra-important times, but I don't mind leaving it on during times that are merely important." As if a compromised OS can't just wait to exfil data. If your goal is to make it to Checkpoint Charlie and don't want the hassle of having to buy a new phone after you reach freedom, fine, but I haven't seen many well-articulated needs that would be satisfied by a hardware switch when everything behind that switch is filled with vulnerabilities.
For my threat model, using the modern modem with a bounds sanitizer, an integer overflow sanitizer, stack canaries, control flow integrity, automatic initialization of stack variables, very active updates and a large commercial user base and a large market cap in part depending on it, makes a lot more sense.
Google's highly lucrative ad tech business is what makes everyone nervous about anything Google, rightly so, but their share price would plummet if they were caught using Pixel hardware in nefarious ways, or did an unreasonably insufficient job in securing it. I'm not saying it's not possible that the modem is compromised, but for my threat model I have to put a lot into the possibility of an undetected backdoor inside a modem which is by all indications constructed very well, to make using a weird old modem known to be massively lacking in dozens of ways, running an OS with all kinds of issues, make more sense.
And I say that as someone who tried the PinePhone at one point. Fun idea, but no commercial or state organization with an elevated risk profile would trust their data to a PinePhone as it stands. It's fun for hobbyists, but it doesn't belong in the conversation with iPhones and Pixels from a security standpoint. It won't be making it onto the DoDIN APL any time soon.
Hi daneel, what would you like GrapheneOS to do while you develop your own formally verified, open hardware, open source firmware/OS baseband processor they can use? Sit on their hands doing nothing or making the best of the least worst options currently available?
The Pixels already are the best of the least worst options currently available. Anything new must categorically bring improvements, and the closed source firmware of the Pixels is a pressing point.
Qualcomm is an American company, and it sounds like the GrapheneOS team is working directly with them on developing the spec for this, including hardware MTE support. That's promising and I think could bring improvements over the current situation, if not open source modem firmware, unfortunately. I'm hoping to be surprised, though.
> Unless you provide some evidence, I will consider this false accusation.
The line of thinking is, if you're so concerned about your device being compromised that you need to enable the mic kill switch (because of aforementioned lack of trust in the device), then other sensors which have been demonstrated to be able to capture audio can't be trusted, either, and in many demonstrations some of those sensors have been shown to be capable of recording what is effectively audio. That's old news, so you shouldn't have any difficulty finding evidence of your own.
On a device that's that compromised one would have to physically power off every sensor on the device, and even then there would still be some things to consider. Air gaps are a thing for a reason, and yet some incredibly clever exploits have been demonstrated to jump that gap. Many components that aren't microphones, cameras or radios can be turned into cameras, microphones or radios pretty effectively.
Still, I see the appeal of hardware switches as another practical layer against basic human factors, like a webcam lens cover adding another step beyond firing up the camera's permissions/appVM. But if we're being practical, a phone I can get wet is much more practical than a phone with physical hardware switches when I already have a high degree of trust the OS's ability to control sensors, and a low degree of rust in the OS's ability to control liquids and debris.
> Which was freed and can run new Linux kernels now:
Unfortunately that has kernel dependencies that haven't been updated in years. If you think the kernels in well-maintained Debian and Fedora VMs still need to be separated by a hypervisor to be trustworthy, you're in for a bad time trying to run that kernel on a PinePhone.
> Your walls of text are disingenuous.
You've got the attention of one of the sharpest security minds on the planet and that is what you come up with?
"Unless you provide some evidence, I will consider this false accusation." is bizarre, especially given your audience. You're capable of learning all this stuff on your own without asking everyone to do that for you.
Regardless, nine sentences across two paragraphs isn't a wall of text. The guy took time out of his day to respond to banality and that's what he gets.
It's becoming increasingly difficult to see you as anything but someone who deliberately attempts to derail any threads relating to Graphene OS. Help me out: why shouldn't I?
> then other sensors which have been demonstrated to be able to capture audio can't be trusted, either, and in many demonstrations some of those sensors have been shown to be capable of recording what is effectively audio. That's old news, so you shouldn't have any difficulty finding evidence of your own.
You (and strcat) have no idea what you are talking about. And you are constantly shifting goals. Sensors are much harder to use as microphones. Was it ever caught in the wild, not in a lab? Sensors are also switched off on Librem 5 by the three kill switches: https://puri.sm/posts/lockdown-mode-on-the-librem-5-beyond-h...
> If you think the kernels in well-maintained Debian and Fedora VMs still need to be separated by a hypervisor to be trustworthy, you're in for a bad time trying to run that kernel on a PinePhone.
This is misleading. There are different degrees of security. Qubes provides the highest achievable degree (for certain threat models). It doesn't mean that Debian and Fedora have no security at all. Moreover, if you only run trusted application, they are reasonably secure, unlike OSes with (partially) closed source.
> You've got the attention of one of the sharpest security minds on the planet and that is what you come up with?
I don't care about personalities. Famous and smart people are wrong more often than you seem to think.* I care about arguments. This is why I'm on HN.
> Regardless, nine sentences across two paragraphs isn't a wall of text.
I am talking about all comments together, not one comment.
> It's becoming increasingly difficult to see you as anything but someone who deliberately attempts to derail any threads relating to Graphene OS. Help me out: why shouldn't I?
I do not have any hope that you try to understand me, since you immediately started fighting with me, without even considering my point of view. Many of your replies (see example in this very answer of mine) did not address my concerns. Some of your replies ignored my links (LoC).
* (Me included; I argue here, because I want to find out where I'm wrong.)
Sure, if you switch off every kill switch you're in pretty good shape for the time being. Same as if you turn off all radios and sensors on a GrapheneOS device. And then you're way ahead of the game when you turn all of the software switches back on.
The trusted application thing is hard, same as the trusted kernel thing is hard. Some monolithic kernels are adding bugs faster than they're being addressed. It's a really hard problem and I don't see monolithic kernels as being the best solution of the future. That's relevant to threat modeling, which is why virtualization is so valuable, but it needs to be built on a secure hardware platform. Part of the benefits of significant sandboxing, much like virtualization, is you can ultimately run all apps as some degree of untrusted. Both together would be best. Saying you can't imagine how something could be more secure than your Qubes setup is a better indication of your ability to imagine than it is of any security reality. And then you recommend people check out two solutions with the benefits of neither approach (and other issues).
Anyway, I'm still going at this because your comments (which frequently commit the errors of which you accuse others) go unreplied in too many threads, so I engage so that others who skim threads containing questionable assertions will at least see a different viewpoint.
When I recently didn't continue to play along with you, you tried to use that thread as evidence supporting some kind of weird dunking on me, and others. It's a project you claim to care about and want to see succeed, and then you repeatedly approach it in a highly insufficient way, often invoking the project in threads not even about it just to go ahead and dismiss it. You ask basic, easily researched questions relentlessly and when people stop answering point to the lack of a final response as justification, despite your claims of awareness of your own ignorance. There's an actual name for what it is you're doing.
It's a weird axe you have to grind, and I'm content to let others see it all in context and decide for themselves. I only bother because I think it's an important project, genuinely want to see it succeed, and think on this important site of tech culture, you're damaging it unfairly. Whether that's intentional or not, I don't know, nor do I need to.
> Sure, if you switch off every kill switch you're in pretty good shape for the time being.
So you confirm that you and strcat were spreading false information about Librem 5 with a convincing tone, while saying that you're "sharpest security minds on the planet" and calling me "disingenuous"?
> Same as if you turn off all radios and sensors on a GrapheneOS device.
This is plain false. Software switches can never be as secure as cutting power from hardware components. Are you saying that GrapheneOS can reliably save you from tracking by a state actor? This is very unlikely. The number of lines of code in Trusted Computing Base of GrapheneOS is likely similar to one in the monolithic Linux kernel (10 MM lines of code, https://doc.qubes-os.org/en/latest/developer/system/security...). (I would be happy to be corrected if I'm wrong here.) This is why it can never be as reliable as hardware virtualization relying on 100000 LoC. I'm happy that GrapheneOS is going to add the virtualization btw.
> Saying you can't imagine how something could be more secure than your Qubes setup is a better indication of your ability to imagine than it is of any security reality.
You walls of text are so large and not always constructive, because they frequently contain personal attacks like this one (and words like "disingenuous" I mentioned above).
> You ask basic, easily researched questions relentlessly
If this is so basic, I don't understand why you are making so many false or implausible claims and do not just give me a link with a simple, high-level explanation for noobs like me. Instead you keep attacking me and presenting yourself as very smart, with words like these.
I agree with you that GrapheneOS is a very important project. I disagree that trying to point out its weaknesses or ways to improve it harms the project. I also would like to add that Librem 5 is similarly important project, and you unnecessarily harm it with your false claims. Some people come to discussions about GrapheneOS asking to get root of rely more on free drivers, or expand the supported devices by lowering security requirements. My replies about Librem 5 to these people do not harm GrapheneOS, since they aren't your target audience anyway. I just help them to find what they want.
Security theater, it has absolutely no use. If you can't trust your hardware that it won't actively listen to the microphone without your knowledge and permission then what are you even doing with that device?!
I do trust my device. However in specific circumstances where privacy may be critical, an additional protection might save me even from a state-sponsored attack.
If your threat model is state-sponsored then I hope for your sake you're just LARPing, because if not you're in for a bad time with some of the solutions you advocate.
This is just a shallow dismissal. I'm sure state actors can break into my phone. I'm also sure that they can't track or record me when kill switches are off (unless there is another device nearby). Tell me why I'm wrong and please stop repeating how surprised you are that people are so very stupid.
For kill switches on a device with otherwise comparatively abysmal security to be the better security choice over a device with thorough and comprehensive security paired with OS-level radio and sensor switches, you would have to demonstrate that the infinitely more vulnerable device's physical kill switches are somehow significantly more effective at addressing your threat model than software switches in a trustworthy OS. If they are approximately equally effective then you have given up a lot for no benefit, and are net much worse off.
Again, I get the human factors appeal of physical kill switches, and if all else were equal they may be worth having, but people are place far too much faith in the value of physical kill switches.
> For kill switches on a device with otherwise comparatively abysmal security to be the better security choice
Same strawman as earlier: I already replied that I never said that Librem 5 was more secure. At least you accepted that the kill switches do work, so there is progress.
> If they are approximately equally effective then you have given up a lot for no benefit, and are net much worse off.
(I won't claim they are, but) there is another benefit in freedom, apart from the security. Some people care about freedom. When I see that, I suggest Librem 5 in my replies, and not as a more secure solution. Maybe you should read my replies more carefully before answering.
> Not sure how I feel about this. Motorola seems to be the exclusive provider of encrypted cellular networks and associated devices to the Israeli military [1][2].
You're confusing Motorola Mobility with Motorola Solutions. These haven't been part of the same company since 2011. We would happily support devices from Motorola Solutions with their collaboration too but have no contact or partnership with them as they're an entirely different company. We want to support more devices meeting our requirements and if people have issues with one of the choices due to their opinions on geopolitics they can use another.
You're confusing Motorola Mobility with Motorola Solutions. These haven't been part of the same company since 2011. We would happily support devices from Motorola Solutions with their collaboration too but have no contact or partnership with them as they're an entirely different company. We want to support more devices meeting our requirements and if people have issues with one of the choices due to their opinions on geopolitics they can use another.
This is a fallacious argument that has been thoroughly debunked countless times, and frankly it has no place on a platform where we expect a baseline level of digital literacy.
Privacy isn't about hiding crimes, it's about limiting how much power one government has over you.
History has shown stuff that’s totally fine today can be treated like a problem tomorrow. A surveillance system built under a “good” government can be handed to a shady one.
You're confusing Motorola Mobility with Motorola Solutions. These haven't been part of the same company since 2011. We would happily support devices from Motorola Solutions with their collaboration too but have no contact or partnership with them as they're an entirely different company. We want to support more devices meeting our requirements and if people have issues with one of the choices due to their opinions on geopolitics they can use another.
all technology companies are to some extent in cahoots with secret agencies. but israel has no room for mistakes, they only work with the best.
no doubt they will ask for backdoors. but no phone is safe from governments anyway - grapheneos or not.
I'd say you're paranoid. Nobody cares about you, and they won't invest billions just so they can see your hot nude pictures. There are much easier ways to get information out of a phone, no need for a backdoor.
If there were ever any backdoor in some phone, it would have been found. No smartphone company is gonna take that chance that someone will find their backdoor, it will literally kill the company.
Sometimes you become a target purely by chance. You may witness something you should not have seen, are at the wrong place at the wrong time, the "algorithm" glitches and increases your "thread level" by 5000%. In most of these situations preparations like running graphene os can be quite the boon.
Or think of friends and family. When they become the target, you are prepared, you have the knowledge and tools ready, you can be the guide that helps them navigate a hostile digital world.
This is such a low-iq argument I cannot even. Yes, nobody cares about OP, you, me, whatever - until they do. Not to mention general harvesting for profiling and propaganda reasons.
General: What do people in this city/country/region/etc are thinking - This is the main one where the data is used and collected, then grouped. It is extremely powerful information for targeted agenda whichever it might be.
Targeted: Oh, you or someone from your close ones went to a political protest? Too bad we have all this information to put you and your family in jail - This is where suddenly they will care about you, even when it is NOT YOU but someone from your close circles were the ones upsetting them.
Whether parent is paranoid or not, Pegasus literally is used to spy, just because the state might not care about his hot nude pictures does not mean they don't care about other phone usage.
"While NSO Group markets Pegasus as a product for fighting crime and terrorism, governments around the world have routinely used the spyware to surveil journalists, lawyers, political dissidents, and human rights activists."[0]
Information these they can be much as powerful as a bomb, for example, I could learn more about your calls and discover that you do something immoral but not illegal and use it to blackmail you.
As if spying on “governments around the world have routinely used the spyware to surveil journalists, lawyers, political dissidents, and human rights activists” wasn't already alarming, Pegasus has also been used to spy elected officials.
A recent court case investigating spying on 37 elected representatives [1] (including the prime minister, three ministers, and regional politicians) had to be closed in 2023 and again in 2026 “for lack of cooperation of the Israeli government”.
I'm guessing you missed out on the Snowden revelations? Or the news articles about federal agents literally laughing at private dick pics.
And your second paragraph seems to go on the premise that the average person care if there is a backdoor.
I don't know why you wouldn't take security seriously, when even the US government is telling everyone to be careful where they supply their devices because of spying. Just don't trust them to point the finger the right way.
The UK government is known to spy on anti genocide protestors.
The US government is known to spy on anti ICE protestors.
If you have an opinion your government doesn't like, or a potential future government doesn't like, there's a good chance you have or will be spied on.
Perhaps you lack a single opinion worth caring about, but most people do not.
>If there were ever any backdoor in some phone, it would have been found.
Not only have MANY been found, but the whole security industry is aware of them and works with/against those backdoors.
This is kind of like a mechanic not knowing what a car's exhaust does...
Somewhat related - I've been working on a design using Nordic's NRF52840 SOC for work; Intensely focusing for the past few weeks on antenna tuning for maximum BLE range.
Part of the testing involves using the 'nRF Connect' app, which lists all nearby Bluetooth devices, plots signal strengths, and allows for some rudimentary communication. It doesn't seem to be Nordic-specific.
I'd frequently leave the app open scanning during development late in the evening, and rarely, an unidentified Bluetooth LE device would pop up for a few minutes then disappear.
Turns out it was my dad's pacemaker, which sends telemetry via Bluetooth to a 4G gateway they gave him (this only happens after he lies down with little movement apparently).
This prompted me to look into pacemakers and deactivation after death of course. I wish I hadn't, it turns out they leave it in the corpse unless it's scheduled for cremation.
Because of the aforementioned research, and the open field tests I was performing, it somehow devolved into me having a nightmare where I was RF testing at a graveyard, and the app suddenly displaying a bunch of pacemakers underground.
...I really hope this isn't possible - The signal through 6ft of dirt and concrete would be marginal but still detectable.
Hi, sorry I missed your reply - Unfortunately it's a proprietary design, the vendor provides the firmware, I do all the schematic capture / PCB layout.
Schematic and PCB design relating to Lighting and Control Systems for my main job. Schematics and PCB Design after hours as a contractor too, because I have a daughter now, my wife can't work, and life has become /very/ expensive in Sydney.
What I'd love to be working on: Try to initiate a high voltage arc through the air to a target device, and modulate it to send "Data over Lightning", like Alyx does in Half-Life 2. It won't work the way it does in the game, but I'd it's an idea I've had for a long time and I'd love to prototype it some day.
Critical information for those that aren't aware: MLCC capacitance decreases with applied DC voltage, like, a whole fucking lot. [1]
Those 10uF/100V/X7R/1210 capacitors you love for your space constrained designs might only be 1uF at 48V. And it gets worse when choosing smaller package sizes.
This caught me completely off-guard. I've always thought an MLCC with a reasonable Dielectric at a given Capacitance would perform at least as well as an Electrolytic or Tantalum (minus fire hazards).
Notably as the capacitance goes up in a given package size this effect increases dramatically. Every good manufacturer provides a plot of this for each product.
If you really need to be on the lowest column (highest capacitance) for a given voltage rating, you'll either pay for it in voltage derating, temperature performance, tolerance accuracy, package height, or just pay for it in literal cash.
You cannot go below the lowest column, they have not figured out how to build a 10uF/25V/X7R/0603 MLCC, that is just not a thing you can buy.
With a given dielectric, material properties science only go so far. You're leaving performance on the table if you select a given package size with less capacitance and a lower voltage rating than what's available. (Assuming decoupling, not analog stuff where you need exactly 438.6 pF for a particular resonant frequency or something). Each package size has basically a constant inductance, and usually, capacitor height isn't that critical - you don't want to be oversquare, but they don't sell many of those. Each manufacturer publishes a waterfall diagram, but all manufacturers are working with the same physics.
Conversely, if you've selected an X7R dielectric and an 0603 package for a decoupling capacitor, there's not a great reason to go with a 0.1uF value, or to restrict yourself to 6.3V rating - eg [2]. They make a 0.47 uF 25V capacitor that's otherwise identical! [3] And because designers are lazy and default to 100nF, the part with 1/5th the performance is literally 6% more expensive!
Note that for 0402 packages, the 100nF capacitor is typically the right part to select! You can't get a 120nF/X7R/0402 at any voltage rating above 6.3V, the 220nF and 470nF are exotic parts that sacrifice stability and accuracy for maximum capacitance in a volume, but a 100nF/16V/X7R/0402 is a pretty good default.
Thats because of the MLCCs you are considering, you can get ones with different voltage coefficents if you want. Like ones that keep 95% at 100v or even better. They cost more and have different materials.
I was once caught by this issue too. The problem was that I didn’t know about the basic phenomenon (MLCC losing capacitance with voltage) so I didn’t know that I was expecting extreme parts.
Honestly, my Sunni relatives from Tartus, Homs and Dimashq are elated. My alawite and druz relatives from Tartus and Latakia are almost distraught.
There is a massive disparity between the treatment of Alawites/Shiites/Druz and Sunnis in Syria (Re: employment opportunities, etc)
I've always heard horror stories about starvation and torture from my father (Sunni) who served over a decade in Hafiz Assads military, as well as constant fear of the "Mukhabaraat" (government informants), leading to huge amounts of self-censorship when speaking on the phone or in public.
My alawite/druz relatives are generally well off and would tell me "eh, it wasn't so bad", despite having the same informant fears and self-censoring
It's not uncommon in Tartus, but far less common in Homs and Dimashq. Oddly enough it's usually Sunni husband and 'x' wife.
For example we have Sunni/Shia, Sunni/Druz, Sunni/Christian and most recently Sunni/Alawite in our extended family, all from Tartus.
Our relatives from Homs/Dimashq are almost exclusively Sunni, religious, and tend to marry from their own sect and even city.
There are irreconcilable differences between (for example) Sunnis and Shiites that would usually prevent marriage if the husband is 'stricter' in faith, not to mention the rift caused during family gatherings by the politics behind each sect (ie: Alawites are generally pro-Assad, Shiites are usually pro Hezbollah, Sunnis are usually against both)
Edit: This is obviously a gross oversimplification, basically less religeous more intermixing.
Having a similar experience with our first child this week. Almost a full day of labour only to have a c-section at the very end due to complications.
Even the c-section seemed absolutly brutal, at one point I was convinced one of the surgeons placed his foot on the table for leverage, given how much movement there was to her body.
As if the physical trauma wasn't enough, being in a room with multiple first-time parents struggling to breastfeed as both they and their children cried, then being visited and probed every hour by medical staff with ineffective pain relief, /and/ having work out how to care for your child when the only communication path is basically through
an amplitude modulated scream -
Honestly, I've had some low points in my life, I thought I had a high tolerance for physical and emotional pain, but I can only describe what my wife experienced this week as total, crushing anguish.
I buy a couple of pinewood storage crates for them to play in and destroy every month. I also spend over half an hour every morning cleaning all their food and water containers, and cooking them breakfast (sweet potato, corn, fresh apple, assorted greens), I don't even make myself breakfast!
reply