➡ It’s crucial to manage your phone’s app settings and permissions, particularly location permissions, which should be limited to when you’re using the app. You can find your phone’s identifiers in the ‘About phone’ section, and you can choose different security methods to unlock your screen, such as pattern, fingerprint, swipe, or pin code. To manage your active apps, swipe from the bottom bar to see all running apps and stop any by dragging them upwards. The Files app is where you interact with your files, and it’s important to understand how to use it. When moving data from another phone, you typically only move contacts and photos, and you can use a USB storage device or a computer as an intermediate device for this. Be cautious about the apps you install, especially those that require location or access to your contact list. Some apps won’t run on certain phones, but you can usually use the browser as an alternative.

➡ You can use most websites, including banks, on your browser without needing Google, except for some European banks that require Google safety net. The Brax 3 phone comes with open-source ECIM software, allowing you to manage ECIM identifiers without secret storage. The phone also has an updater app for over-the-air updates, and MicroG, which mimics Google Play Store but doesn’t actually install it. If you see unusual options on startup, don’t worry, it’s just the bootloader mode activated by pressing certain buttons. Join the Braxme community for more help and to learn about additional features like the Brax virtual phone, VPN, and Brax mail.

So now you’ve received your Brax 3 phone and some of you don’t know what to do and are afraid to start. Today I will tell you some specific instructions that will help those who don’t know the first step or have more advanced questions. First of all, what did you buy? Well, this is what I would refer to as a no identity phone or a privacy phone. It’s a phone that is invisible to big tech and there’s no identifier that can be used to track you and your locations. Now bad user actions can affect some of this so this guide will at least ensure that you don’t make major mistakes.

Don’t worry, mistakes are very hard to make here. The safety is already built into the design. To start, the assumption here is that you’re using a Brax 3 pre-delivered with EOD OS which is the default currently but this may change later as Ubuntu touch is coming soon. This is a Brax 3 phone right here and I’m going to start from scratch. Let’s assume you just open the box. The first thing I would suggest you do is to plug it into some USB charger. Just make sure there’s sufficient battery before you proceed.

Otherwise, let it charge for a bit. You were given a cable and I’m sure in today’s world you have tons of USB chargers. Otherwise, you can buy one anywhere for five bucks. SIM card install. It is best to install the SIM card immediately if you already have one from another phone. Again, you can even use it temporarily so you can always bring it back to the carrier to change later and you can move SIM cards around back and forth all day. No issues. Sometimes I forget that some people really know nothing about mobile phones so if you’re in this category, the phone needs a SIM card to get cell service.

Otherwise, temporarily you will need some internet through Wi-Fi. To install a SIM card, use the SIM pin provided. Pay attention to the orientation of the phone which faces away from you. Then the SIM tray is on the right side. Push the pin to the hole and the SIM tray will come out. Now lay the SIM card on top. There’s a notch on it so it can only go in one way. Do not force the SIM tray in. It should be completely flat if you put it in correctly. Then push the tray in gently again without forcing and now you can turn on the phone.

If you want to install an eSIM, you can do that later. For now, you’ll need some Wi-Fi instead of a SIM card. As we’ve announced, the only carrier that does not support Brax 3 is Verizon USA and their MB&Os. This is in the world. We are otherwise not aware of any carrier in the world where it will not work. And the phone is a registered phone model with GSMA. SETUP First turn on your phone. It is the lower button on the right side. Just depress that until the power comes on and it should show the options I will show here.

Now for simplicity sake, I will just select all the defaults it presents. There’s no need to worry about customization at this moment since you can do it later. First click on start. Then language. If you did not insert a SIM card, you will get a SIM card missing message. You can hit next if this is intentional. Next it gives you the option to pick from your local Wi-Fi. Hit next to proceed or skip if you don’t want to choose a Wi-Fi. Then you get the option for notifications. Just hit next. Then you will set the date and time.

Mostly you just choose a time zone. Then you have the option to restore apps and data which may be possible only if your current phone is using seed vault. Otherwise hit skip. Then leave the locations to defaults. Then set a PIN. After that you have to re-enter the PIN. This is important. The PIN code initializes the encryption of the phone so don’t skip this but do not forget it either. You may lock yourself out of the phone if you forget this code. Next it has four fingerprint setup. You can do this later so scroll down and select not now.

Select dark or light theme. Up to you. Select the app navigation method. I’ll often choose gesture because this is the mode most similar to an iPhone. Then hit start and you’re done. Now I didn’t tell you to modify some options so I can discuss those later and you can choose to turn them on and off at a later time. Something you will learn now. The first gesture to dismiss an app is to swipe from the bottom where that bar appears. The first screen you see is the home screen where you would put your most common apps.

I’ll show you that in a moment. But first to see all the apps just swipe from the middle of the screen. Not from the bottom. Swipe up is always the complete list of installed apps. If you swipe right or left you will see your additional app pages where you can organize your apps the way you want. The first page being the home screen. Alternatively you can just always pull from the list of installed apps which is alphabetical. To move an app icon to a particular page just drag the icon and then you will be able to drag the icon to any page you want.

If you want to delete an icon drag the icon to the top of the screen and there will be a remove area to drag the icon into. This will not delete the app just the icon. To delete apps you will see app info when you click on the icon. If you tap app info you will see options to uninstall, disable, or stop the app. Not all apps can be deleted. The protected ones are system apps. EOD will update these apps directly during regular updates. Although you cannot delete system apps you can disable them if you wish.

Installing apps The first thing you’d want to do is to install apps. On a standard production phone you go to the Google Play App Store or the iOS App Store on iPhones. No such thing here. This phone does not connect to Google by default. The base store for apps found on Google Play Store is the Aurora Store. This is a spoofer app that pulls the app from Google Play Store for you indirectly. And when you use it you only choose the anonymous login. Always. Aurora Store is a spoofer store so Google always tries to shut it down.

Thus it doesn’t always work. So the option is to go to your EOD browser at the bottom. This is actually Firefox so just go through the initial setup questions once. After Firefox is running go to the URL apkpure.com. From here you can install the apkpure.com as an app. There’s an option to download the app. Download it and it will give you the option to open the file. Open it and then it will ask you permission to install the app and allow from this source. Go ahead and grant that permission. If you lose your place the apkpure app is in files.

Download. You can just install it from there by clicking on it. Then you should see the apkpure.com app. Now while the apps are the same from apkpure.com and Aurora Store, apkpure.com is very spammy so you may accidentally install apps from all that spam. Just delete what you install accidentally. There’s no problem with that. Next optionally you can do more private apps and these are apps on the fdroid store. These are typically apps not as common as the ones used by most people so you may not be familiar with them. However I will assure you that fdroid apps are by default much safer.

Installing Braxme. Since many of you already use the Braxme app then you should learn how to install it. Braxme does not use any store. You can install directly from our website. First go to the browser and navigate to the url Brax.me. Then click on the three dot menu on the right and click on add to home screen. That’s it. Now you will find it on your home screen and you can drag it around to other pages. When you log in it should then remember your login so you just start the app automatically when you click on it.

By the way Braxme is an open source site so it is obviously very safe and lots of encryption provided for private conversation and file storage. Settings. Settings is a very important part of controlling what’s on your phone and so let me tell you the important things to know. First you need to be familiar with the network and internet section of settings. That’s where you go to see if your sim card is enabled and you can set up additional wi-fi there as needed. It is also where you would disable the sim card or go into airplane mode.

I’ll go into more advanced settings in another video but the important thing is just learning to enable or disable your sim card or your data. The second most important thing you need to know is how to control the settings for your apps and the permissions you’ve granted. Earlier doing setup I ignored the prompts for location for example and that’s because you can set location permission by app. So this is the place to do that. By default you should limit location permissions to only when you’re using the app and if the app deserves that information.

I grant location permissions to very few apps and often just temporarily. Normally I would leave it off depends on the app. If it’s a known app that sells locations then I would be very wary. Next you need to know about the system menu. This is where you would see the reset options if you want to start fresh. About phone is where you can find your phone identifiers. If the carrier asks for the IMEI you go here and then tap on the IMEI button to view the actual number. Some carriers use this to block certain phone models but Brax 3 IMEI is fully registered with GSMA so they see it as Brax 3.

Next you should finalize your security settings. So far I’ve only asked you to put in the pin code which initializes the encryption of the system but now you have a choice of security methods to unlock the screen. If you tap on the device unlock and enter your current pin you will have the option to use pattern fingerprint swipe or pin code and password. My suggestion for a light user with a trustworthy household is to use pattern. It is much easier. If the household has non-trustworthy members or just for speed of entry then fingerprint is best.

Fingerprint is based on capacitance of your finger by the way. It is not able to record actual fingerprints and you cannot duplicate fingerprints from this data. So don’t be afraid of it. This is likely the most secure and the fastest way to start the phone. The actual encryption is based on the pin code. This generates a very large random key for use in file by file encryption but the fingerprint or pattern is tied to the pin code. Managing active apps. To see what apps are running just do a slow swipe from that bottom bar and you will see all the running apps.

You can stop an app by dragging it upwards. By the way this page also has the screenshot button. This is where you take a screenshot. Pick the app you want the screenshot and tap on the screenshot button. Screenshots will then show up in your files app. Files app. It is important to understand the files app on a phone. This is where you interact with the files you create. There is a folder structure in your phone storage and is organized into sections. The most important ones are going to be downloads and images and videos.

These will be used by the most common apps. Images and videos is where the camera app will put your photos and videos and this is also where you would copy existing media from another device. I’ll tell you how to transfer your data a little later. Most camera apps create a folder called DCIM. So just be aware of that name. That’s just where your photos are. You can make any folders on your own here using the file app options to create folders. Then you can move the files around as you need. If you go to the internet and download files or apps it will typically be placed in the downloads folder.

So this is the first place to look when you download something. Often you just click on a file to install an app for example. Just be careful here. Do not install apps you do not know. Moving your data from another phone. This is often the most complicated part of having a new phone. So I will try to give you a basic instruction for this. First of all typically you can only move contacts and photos from one phone to another. The rest is usually handled within the app. For example if you’re running signal you need to follow signals instructions for moving from one phone to another.

This will not give you instructions on a per app basis other than contacts and photos. What do you need? First you need some sort of intermediate device to transfer contacts and photos. This can be a USB storage device or it can be a computer. Let’s use a USB storage since this is the simplest. All phones can interact with a USB storage device but be forewarned that the Brax 3 and most modern phones use a USB-C connector. So you will need one that has a USB-C connection. A very common device is an SSD drive like this one.

A Samsung T7 one terabyte which is $89 from Amazon. We’ll put a link in the description. Plug it into your old phone. Then using the files app on that phone copy your files from the device to the storage SSD. Typically you just copy the entire DCIM folder or camera folder or however that phone stores it or names it. Next you need your contacts. So run the contacts app on that phone. I can’t give you the specific instructions for your phone so it is different per app but you can search the internet for exporting your contacts to a file for your particular phone, model or OS.

Typically you can figure it out. Go to the settings of your contacts app and you should find some export option. Then perform the export and you should see some file like contacts.vcf on your download folder. If you did it multiple times in the past you may see several so pick the newest ones. Then copy it to your SSD drive. When you’re done plug the SSD drive into the Brax 3 and from there you will see a drive. Like in my case I just see the option T3 which is my old Samsung T3.

Then from here just manually copy your photos to your images folder on Brax 3. You should copy the contacts.vcf file to your download folder. Next go to the contacts app on the Brax 3 and in settings select import and import from file. Then pick the contacts vcf you transferred over and it should import the contacts. I would not do the option ever of exporting contacts to simcard or importing contacts from simcard. There is limited space in a simcard so this may not allow a large context list to transfer. Now the computer option is pretty much the same except here’s the rule.

You can only see the Brax 3 or your original phone on the computer if the phone is logged in. So you must manually log into the mobile device first and then it should be visible to finder in macOS, file manager in Windows and files in Linux. The rest is the same. Copy the files over directly from phone to phone using the computer as your intermediate storage device and again using a USB-C cable. What apps can you install? As a general rule you are using this phone as a privacy tool meaning a no identity phone so it doesn’t make sense to break that capability by willingly installing every app.

The apps you should not install are meta apps all of them Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp. I cannot offer a way to protect against meta they are the ultimate in spyware. You can install Google apps as long as you never never log into Google on those apps. So it is safe to install YouTube, Google search, Google maps, Google translate. Google cannot identify a Brax 3 phone specifically there’s no unique identifier so while it may know your IP address and the phone model they do not know whose phone it is among many thousands. Google’s primary way of tracking is the Google ID and that doesn’t exist on this phone.

Some apps that require location like Yelp, Craigslist, Waze, Weather Channel app are very dangerous in my mind while location is active so I would turn off location for these apps other than the moments you have to use them. Other than these really few limitations you can really install anything but for your safety never never allow any app to read your contact lists. Never for example TikTok will do this so never give it that permission. There’s a reason I do not worry about other big tech apps like Amazon, Amazon Kindle, eBay, PayPal and so on.

Just in general be aware that I’ve studied this and these apps do not capture data outside of their own platform unlike Google and meta. As a general rule do not install apps you don’t know. You can always uninstall apps that you no longer use but the fear is that you install so many apps and you don’t remember them and then you don’t realize you installed a dangerous rogue app. Fortunately apps can be controlled and deleted. System apps or hidden apps cannot be installed secretly on a Brax 3. What apps will not run? Some apps will not run.

There aren’t many but in almost all of these cases you can use the browser. For example, ride sharing apps tied to Google Pay will not run or apps that require you to pay for the app. The solution is just to use the browser it will work fine with the browser except for the paid apps. In fact just about every site works with a browser including all banks. In the US I’ve tested a dozen bank apps and the major banks all work but if some banks uses Google safety net then they are forcing you to tie yourself to Google.

Mostly this is an issue I found in the Scandinavian countries and other parts of Europe. So it’s not a dead end just use the browser. If you need to log into Google for example to use Gmail I recommend using the browser and use a specific browser only meaning install several browsers on the phone and reserve one for Google. I would use Chrome for Google so you don’t forget it’s a Google only browser. ECIM The Brax 3 comes with ECIM capability but unlike most production phones the ECIM software here is open source so we can be certain there’s no secret storage of ECIM identifiers.

Each carrier that uses ECIM will likely give you an app to run to install the ECIM credentials but you should be able to manage it using the app Open EUICC which is the app I’m talking about. This is where you can enable or disable a stored ECIM. The EOD OS comes with its own updater app which will allow over the air OTA updates. If you have stable connections you can always get updates. So just click on the updater app and you see if there’s a version you can download. Downloads are huge typically 1.4 gigabytes so it takes a long time.

Then when it downloads it gives you the option to install it and then reboot. MicroG the Google Play Spoofer You will get notifications from the Aurora Store that you need to update the Google Play Store and that is enough to cause panic from multiple people. Don’t panic there is no Google Play Store and there’s no way to install it on a Brax 3. It’s not possible. The reason the store thinks there’s Google Play is because MicroG is a Spoofer and it sends a signature that is sensed as the Google Play Store. Actually it’s just the existence of the Google Play file which is the same name as MicroG.

So just ignore such messages as it means nothing. Don’t worry. Weird options on startup If you see something weird on the screen like something like this, don’t panic. You weren’t hacked. It’s just because you started pressing buttons like crazy. This is the bootloader or fastboot mode. It is activated when you press the volume up and power simultaneously. Just hold down the power until it turns off and then turn it on properly using just the power button. We have a great community talking about their topics and helping each other on the Brax 3 phone. So just come visit us on Braxme and interact on the community chats.

There’s a lot of people there and there are things that I don’t know about the phone that some of these other power users have figured out. I taught you how to install the Braxme app so make sure it’s on your phone. Then you can also think about other things you can add to your phone like the Brax virtual phone, VPN, Brax mail. Lots of stuff to add to the privacy agenda. Thanks a lot for watching and enjoy your phone. [tr:trw].

See more of Rob Braxman Tech on their Public Channel and the MPN Rob Braxman Tech channel.