I have a new Fairphone 4 and was surprised that I’m only asked for my PIN on boot. From my previous smartphone (stock android, similar to Fairphone’s version) I know that to make encryption work, one has to type in a PIN or password at boot. From my desktop computer (Fedora Linux with LUKS) I know that I have to provide a password to open the encrypted disk.
From a different post:
it seems like there is a way to set a password to type in at boot – which is NOT the PIN because you wouldn’t need any keyboard for it. Even the default keyboard (Gboard) is not being used for the password I’m getting asked at boot.
Now the question: Is there any way I can configure a password to be asked on boot instead of my PIN? If yes, how do I configure it? And does it give me any security benefits?
Change your screen lock to Password (Settings → Security → Screen lock) and you will be asked for a password at boot.
It used to be possible to have an independent password at boot time and still use a PIN for the screen lock, but I have no idea if that is still possible, haven’t used that in a long time.
Even if you find a way to make it work, I would strongly advise against it. There were some rather problematic quirks, like when you accidentally set that prompt to the wrong type you would get a keypad instead of a keyboard and wouldn’t be able to input your password.
No idea if that’s still the case, but I wouldn’t try it unless you have a good reason why you need it.
Sadly, that does not solve my use case of having a separate password after boot and to unlock the device, but as you wrote this hardly seems to be possible and is discouraged
