Hi,
i have fully updated librem 5 with disk password and much stronger lockscreen password. I use 4g connection from redo. I use an app on librem 5 for listening online radio and i keep getting attacked over internet. When i use my bluetooth ear buds being connected there is a lot of sound anomalies indicating that i am under attack against librem 5. If they dont have malicious code anyone anywhere why do they still try to hack me. First it starts with bluetooth anomalies then the sound starts every few seconds until it dies. It does not help if i change the ip address by disconnecting the mobile internet and to connect back.
It only helps if i turn the modem switch off and on to get the new ip address.
Face it i am a tergeted person, no doubt about it. I have no peace of mind not even on pc.
Would it help to use a vpn for 4g connection on librem 5? I am safe on wifi, i have a good firewall with fingbox protecting my wifi from intruders.
Your advices are welcome!
Well, for starters I call bull* on this as a valid indicator for any malicious activity. Knowing L5, it’s more likely you have some sort of technical problem. That being said, sure, you could be attacked, but it’s more likely automated mass attack of somekind, and not specifically at you (could be something general, something related to that stream or to your 4G provider’s network).
Sound anomalies could mean that the codec and encoding/decoding of the sound isn’t working properly at some point - at the source (server problems), at transport (congestion), L5 (too heavy load), or BT (not working properly). You’re hinting at that L5 firewall would be under so heavy load that the phone couldn’t process the stream properly, which seem a bit unlikely as it just drops unwanted tries - that’s why I’m thinking of alternatives. L5 has firewall too and that can be set to log, if you want to see if anyone is knocking your door (for that, search online). The congestion could be due to poor signal, poor network availability, low transport speed offered by our service provider, full network lowering latency, or that some 4G connection settings with L5 aren’t right. BT has also been picky, so I’d also check first if the problem persists while using headphones via cable.
So, a bit more details are needed to analyse this. Prudent course of action is to use VPN in any case (with the caveat that you then need to trust the VPN provider [a challenging but interesting an alternative could be that, you create your own VPN connection that connects to your own router at home that you consider bit more safe - if it has such feature - weather you’re using 4G or wifi somewhere else]).
Edit to add: If you don’t have any service open that has/requires login from outside into your device, there’s nothing to bruteforce (it’s not applicable method of attack with audio streams or web browsing as such), so if you have for instance SSH, that can be hardened against bruteforce (not sure if Fail2Ban is usable on L5). If ports aren’t open/listening, firewall should be configured to drop those pesky knockers.
Bluetooth is not reliable, so use physically connected earphones instead.
Depends on which Bluetooth/Wi-Fi card is installed too. You can also install your own card and drivers if you want. But that’s up to you to do.
Its no good, i have used wired physically connected earphones of librem 5 included in the package but the online radio still dies very soon? Does Librem 5 really have a firewall, is it built in or is installable as an app? I use shortwave app for listening online radio and as i said it will die very soon!
My experience with Bluetooth is that once I connect to Bluetooth earbuds, I then close the settings app, or at least get the Settings app off the Bluetooth screen. If I leave it on the Bluetooth screen in Settings, then audio tends to stutter.
I love Shortwave 
For me, Shortwave works better on Wifi or Ethernet (at home I connect it to ethernet), rather than over cellular. Shortwave over cellular can drop in and out, and some music channels recover better than others.
Playing internet radio over the 4G LTE network is always a little glitchy for me. I don’t think the data speed is quite high enough
That would also depend on the stream’s bandwidth requirements.
Linux distros as a general rule have a firewall. PureOS (L5’s operating system, which is based on Debian where they used to use iptables, but now) uses nftables. Powerful tool but more for command line use.
What PureOS/Librem 5 doesn’t have by default, is a GUI app (like the popular gufw, the Gui for Uncomplicated FireWall, which is one option - not perfect on L5 screen though, so it goes under “Show all apps”, and even there its name shows “Firewall Configuration”), if you don’t want to use terminal commands. Installing gufw is sudo apt-get install gufw and for more info on using it, I suggest Set Up Firewall with GUFW on Linux Desktop [Beginner Guide] or Gufw - Community Help Wiki