Darkmatter Katim: The most secure phone you've never heard of
The Arab smartphone manufacturer presents its Katim Phone at the Mobile World Congress. The secure smartphone breaks new ground in terms of security. But: You are almost certainly not the target group of the Abu Dhabi-based manufacturer.
You will probably never be able to buy the Katim Phone, officially just "Katim", and most likely never see it in real life. Nevertheless, you should know that it exists, what it can do and that it is one of the greatest smartphones in the world in the here and now and a real eye-catcher at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
That's a lot of advance praise, especially when you read that the Katim is a flagship with an 821 Snapdragon. Plus a camera that can't even begin to keep up with the weakest of the current generation flagships. And to round off the confusion: the Katim, made of plain black metal, does not have a fixed price. The Katim costs what the Katim costs. If you want one, you don't care about the price. Then you live a life in which the price of the katim doesn't matter.
The manufacturer, Darkmatter, doesn't want to sell you the phone either. Because you are almost certainly not the phone's target group
What the Katim is
Katim is an Arabic word. According to the manufacturer Darkmatter, it comes from the word secrecy. The Katim Phone is a phone that guarantees you absolute security in the context of a smartphone, according to Darkmatter.
The hands-on shows that Darkmatter is not kidding. The operating system is undoubtedly an Android in terms of handling. But the Google Play services are completely absent. Instead, the phone comes with a suite of secure messenger and mail apps. I do some research and press my way through the settings under the watchful eye of at least one Marketing employee. Android 7.1.2 with security patch from March 2018, the current date is 27 February. But there are no hints about the Android distro. Only the keyboard settings provide the decisive clue. Because it says "Keyboard (AOSP)".
AOSP stands for Android Open Source Project and is essentially the version of Android that Google makes available to developers. That alone is not so interesting, because some manufacturers go to AOSP and tinker with the distro. I'm asking: What exactly has Darkmatter been tinkering with AOSP
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"We've added relatively little," says an eloquent American in an orange shirt and suit, "we've removed a lot more."
Darkmatter has ripped out all the AOSP components that pass on data to third parties, turning the basic operating system into something that is actually just the interaction between the user and the local phone. That sounds a bit abstract, but most Android distros often transmit telemetry data to various servers of manufacturers and service providers with the user's consent, sometimes without. Darkmatter puts an end to this on the Katim OS. Hardening ranges from the bootloader to app isolation.
Then Darkmatter rebuilt. As a result, the Katim has internal authentication factors that monitor the integrity of the phone. The device keys delete themselves if the software detects tampering with hardware or software. The Katim becomes unusable and a 175 gram paperweight.
The apps are end-to-end encrypted. While I am a strong proponent of the Signal messenger, I can't help but like the elegant and proprietary Darkmatters solution. The same goes for email, contacts and others.
The Katim Phone has the disadvantage that it is somewhat inconvenient for normal users because Google services are not installed. This means that there is no app store and the services either have to be retrofitted or all apps have to be installed via sideload.
The Katim also looks quite special on the hardware side. Although it is rounded, it has hard edges. It is heavy, far heavier than any current flagship. The metal unibody is kept simple. Only a small lever above the volume control stands out. Below it is the symbol of a shield.
This button activates the shield mode. This cuts off all systems on the hardware side that allow transmission. In other words, GPS, microphones, Bluetooth, cameras and mobile phone connections.
Who is Darkmatter anyway?
Last year, Darkmatter had a small stand at MWC, with a few people, black walls and a phone. The phone was set up between glowing green strings and nobody was allowed to touch it. The reason: the Katim was a prototype at the time. One was on display at the stand, in the inside pocket of a Darkmatter employee. He told me at the time that it wasn't functional.
Today at the MWC, things look different. The stand has grown. A white floor, white walls, seating areas, a selfie challenge and a very active Marketing team are on site. Even engineers who are labelled "Darkmatter LLC" on their official badge, but who can neither confirm nor deny that they work on the Katim, are on hand to answer questions in what must be the strangest off-the-record interviews of my career. Questions such as "What is your favourite unknown feature of the phone, which I won't name and which you haven't officially worked on?" are asked in a kind of Orwellian doublespeak. The answers are similarly bizarre and completely useless, but the engineers are clearly proud of their work, which they may not have done. It's all a secret.
The fact is, however, that Darkmatter LLC, the manufacturer of the Katim Phone, has had a year that is probably the envy of many a start-up. Since the last MWC, the Abu Dhabi-headquartered manufacturer has been aggressively recruiting and currently still has 46 vacancies. Right on the page next to the vacancies, Darkmatter wants to make life in the United Arab Emirates tasty.
The CEO of Darkmatter, Faisal Al Bannai, is not a professional. Darkmatter is his first cybersecurity company. But Faisal is no stranger to the telecoms industry. In 1997, he founded Axiom Telecom. A company that is now worth 2.2 billion US dollars. Faisal certainly didn't go away empty-handed. He is now investing some of his money in Darkmatter and gathering talent around him. Faisal studied economics in Boston and London and, apart from the vision, probably has no professional knowledge of cryptography, security and other things that are built into the Katim Phone.
The vision is a very special one. Faisal doesn't see himself as someone who gives tinfoil hat wearers a toy, but as a kind of pioneer:
We at Darkmatter believe that we can only continue our economic and social growth in the region if we offer cybersecurity expertise. Here in the region, under one umbrella.
It remains unclear whether he is referring to the repressive regimes of the Middle East and Africa. However, a certain appeal for the people who have fought for more rights as a result of the Arab Spring, but who still have a long way to go and often suffer from censorship by the state, cannot be denied.
First and foremost, however, Darkmatter is aimed at customers who want to roll out the device widely within a company, have their own secure and centralised server infrastructure and for whom data sovereignty and confidentiality are important. Hence the lack of a price tag on the phone.
Despite this, Darkmatter seems to be on course for success. This is because the current version of the Katim is considered almost obsolete. A flagship with the latest flagship components is on the horizon.
I will endeavour to obtain a Katim as a test device. It is unlikely, they say at the stand, because the broad market is not being targeted at all. I inform the PR ladies that I don't really care about the market. I want my readers to know more about mobile security, have an informed conversation about the topic and maybe, just maybe, think twice about the risks of the digital age. The ladies understand that. One promises to see what can be done. It remains exciting.
Journalist. Author. Hacker. A storyteller searching for boundaries, secrets and taboos – putting the world to paper. Not because I can but because I can’t not.