The Librem 5 is a smartphone manufactured by Purism that is part of their Librem line of products. The phone is designed with the goal of using free software whenever possible, and it runs on PureOS, a GNU/Linux operating system.
History
In 2017, Purism started a crowdfunding campaign for the Librem 5, a smartphone aimed not only to run purely on the free software provided in PureOS, but to " on security by design and privacy protection by default". Purism claimed that the phone would become "the world's first ever IP-native mobile handset, using end-to-end encrypted decentralized communication". Purism cooperated with KDE and GNOME in its development of Librem 5. Ubuntu Touch was also planned as an option. Purism announced on 4 September 2018 that the launch date of the Librem 5 would be April 2019, later than initially planned, because of two hardware bugs and the Europe/North America holiday season. The two "silicon bugs" in components provided by NXP Semiconductors caused extreme battery draining, discharging the phone in about an hour. Development kits for software developers were planned for release in October 2018, mostly unaffected by the bug, since developers would normally connect the device to a power outlet rather than rely on the phone battery. Finally, the launch date had been postponed to the third quarter because of the necessity of further CPU tests. Specifications and pre-orders, for $649, to increase to $699, were announced in July 2019. On September 24, 2019, Purism announced that the first batch of Librem 5 phones had started shipping. A video of an early phone was produced, and a shipping and status update was released soon after. However, the first batch, called Librem 5 Aspen, was shipped only to employees and developers. On November 22, 2019, it was reported that the second batch, called Birch, would consist of around 100 phones and would be in the hands of backers by the first week of December. In December 2019, Jim Salter of Ars Technica reported "prototype" devices were being received; however, they were not really a "phone" yet. There was no audio when attempting to place a phone call, and cameras didn't work yet. Matthew Humphries of PC Mag reported American-made versions of the $699 Chinese-made devices would be sold for $1,999 for extra supply chain security.
Hardware
The Librem 5 features an i.MX 8M Quad Core processor, with an integrated GPU which supports OpenGL 3.0, Vulkan, and OpenCL 1.2 with the default drivers; however, since the driver used is the open source etnaviv driver, it at present only supports OpenGL ES 1.1 and 2.0. It has 3GB of RAM, 32GB of eMMC storage, a 13MP rear camera, and an 8MP front camera. The left of the phone features three hardware kill switches, which cuts power to the camera and microphone, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth modem, and the baseband modem. The device uses a USB-C connector to charge its 3500mAh lithium battery. There are two M.2 slots present, which support replaceable modem cards. The 144mm display has a resolution of 1440×720. A 3.5mm headphone jack and MicroSD slots are present.
Mobile security
The hardware features three hardware kill switches that physically cut off power from both cameras and the microphone, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, and baseband processor, respectively. Further precautionary measures can be used with Lockdown Mode, which, in addition to powering off the cameras, microphone, WiFi, Bluetooth and cellular baseband, also cuts power to GNSS, IMU, ambient light and proximity sensor. However there is no hardware kill switch for the internal and external speaker, so speakers are vulnerable to acoustic cryptanalysis. Librem 5 is the first phone with a hardware kill switch for the baseband processor. This is possible due to the fact that the baseband processor is not integrated in the CPU like in conventional smartphones, and is instead integrated in a replaceable M.2 card.
Software
The Librem 5 ships with Purism's PureOS, a Debian GNU/Linux derivative, and users can switch between mobile versions of the GNOME and KDE Plasma Mobiledesktop environments. The phone is a convergence device: if connected to a keyboard, monitor, and mouse, it can run Linux applications as a desktop computer would. Many desktop Linux applications can run on the phone as well, albeit possibly without a touch-friendly UI. Purism claims the "Librem 5 will be the first ever Matrix-powered smartphone, natively using end-to-end encrypted decentralised communication in its dialer and messaging app". File:Phosh, the GNOME mobile shell, developed by Purism and GNOME.jpg|thumb|, the GNOME mobile shell, developed by Purism and GNOME The operating system uses a GTK-compliant user interface called Phosh. Purism was unable to find an open-source cellular modem, so the phone uses a modem with proprietary hardware, but isolates it from the rest of the components rather than having it integrated with the system-on-a-chip. This prevents code on the modem from being able to read or modify data going to and from the system-on-a-chip.
