Epoch Times - New Smartphones That Protect Users from Surveillance & Tracking
Aired: 2025-11-21
Duration: 03:09


=== Bringing Manufacturing Back (03:09) ===

[00:00:00]  Another big thing we're focused on with our with our work is not just designing systems and products that protect data, but bringing manufacturing back here.
[00:00:09]  So we're standing up an assembly line right now to build our product here, which is this is not easy.
[00:00:14]  I mean, we have for a generation, more than a generation, we have funded the atrophying of this capability.
[00:00:23]  There are not many people in the United States who know how to make a smartphone here.
[00:00:27]  It's basically a non-existent specialty here.
[00:00:30]  So building this muscle, we're having to really start from the basics, starting with assembly and then, you know, various component manufacturing.
[00:00:38]  But this is going to take work and ingenuity, but it's doable.
[00:00:40]  And we're Americans.
[00:00:41]  This is what we do.
[00:00:42]  We innovate, we work.
[00:00:44]  It's time to roll up our sleeves.
[00:00:45]  So I think in many ways, the metaphor of surrendering the manufacturing to China, oh yeah, take care of it for us at a nice margin.
[00:00:54]  And we see what's happened.
[00:00:56]  Their cities have gone up and our cities have turned into slums.
[00:00:59]  In the same way, we've surrendered the rights to our data as these massive companies of software designers have grown up and mom-and-pop businesses have withered.
[00:01:09]  Right?
[00:01:10]  So yeah, I think that this is a national security issue.
[00:01:13]  It's an economic issue.
[00:01:14]  It's a cultural issue.
[00:01:16]  It's a civil liberties issue.
[00:01:18]  And it's time for us to kind of get in the ring as innovators, as primarily as customers.
[00:01:25]  This to me is the big battleground.
[00:01:28]  The main message I want to send to people is explore alternatives.
[00:01:31]  And we have, I believe, the best one of them, but find the right one for you.
[00:01:36]  But find alternatives.
[00:01:37]  And there are many.
[00:01:38]  This notion that we have to sacrifice freedom and safety for convenience is an illusion.
[00:01:44]  And a lot of technology trends are making possible today what was not possible even a few years ago for new platforms to exist.
[00:01:50]  And we're one of them.
[00:01:52]  So what do we offer?
[00:01:53]  We offer a smartphone platform, meaning it's a phone and it's a software ecosystem that is designed on a few really key differentiating elements.
[00:02:02]  Number one, we make no money at all, directly or indirectly from customer data.
[00:02:07]  And we give customers tools to make it harder for third parties to get their data.
[00:02:13]  And there's layers of this.
[00:02:15]  So the way I would describe the smartphone data safety sphere, it's like a diamond with different facets.
[00:02:23]  And we're trying to bring and we're bringing protection to each one.
[00:02:26]  So the first key here is when you're talking about this space, there's a tendency to think like, how do I get off the grid?
[00:02:34]  How do I totally remove myself, turn the signal to zero?
[00:02:37]  And I would encourage us to take a less black and white attitude towards this.
[00:02:41]  Obviously, we want to get the number, we want to get the signal as close to zero as possible.
[00:02:45]  But I think that there's a tendency to look for fantastical scenarios that are not realistic.
[00:02:53]  Our goal here is to get better and better and better and reduce the digital footprint in many, many ways.
[00:02:59]  So what is one of the most important ways that our digital footprint grows out is with this third-party data harvesting.
[00:03:06]  This is the big open front door.
[00:03:08]  There are other ways to.