@privacy How to be private with google services and noroot.
I can’t disable google play services for a lot of reasons (school apps, UPI, etc). I have three main google apps enabled. Gservices, gmail+meet, gpay. I have replaced as much apps as possible. Any guide for being private for me?
Impossible. Get a second device.
Island work without root. It is based on a “work profile” feature of android devvices. It is not a complete privacy, but at least it allows to separate google apps from other apps.
I wonder how good it is compared to shelter
It is an interesting question… It seems to me I compared it and I chose Island. But I cannot remember why :D
UPD. I chose Island/Insular only because it is updated more frequently:
- The latest release of Insular was at May 20, 2024 and frequency is ~ a release per two months
- The latest release of Shelter (on F-Droid) was at Dec 12, 2023 and frequency is ~ a release per year
Take a look at this:
https://www.privacyguides.org/en/android/general-apps/
Shelter is recommended over Insular and Island as it supports contact search blocking.
When using Shelter, you are placing complete trust in its developer, as Shelter acts as a Device Admin to create the Work Profile, and it has extensive access to the data stored within the Work Profile.
I also remember starting with island but changing to shelter because it supports app pausing without using a third party proprietary app to pause work apps
Man… there has to be a “security” wiki - a living document, that instructs you on how to be as anonymous as possible and how to setup all the required tools to stay anonymous.
Somewhat O/T:
Recently I discovered that Amazon store app spies on your Google searches. If I search for a solution, say a pool heater and Google lists websites, including stores with pool heater products, as soon as I open my Amazon store app and type p - o, it lists pool heater at the top. This also happened when I was searching for a pool ionizer, literally I Googled, “keep pool clean without chemicals”, without clicking any of the links provided on Google, I saw a product listed, “ClearBlue Ionizer”, open the Amazon store app, I wanted to find just general ionizers so I didn’t start with the name of the brand, instead I wanted to search for ionizer, by the time I finished typing “ion”… it listed "Pool Ionizer by ClearBlue Ionizer (25,000 Gallon) … "
At that moment I realized Amazon is tracking my searches. I get they want to be convenient but I don’t remember Amazon giving me the option to opt out of information sharing amongst other apps.
Hopefully sooner or later there will be a way to sandbox every app so they’re not communicating with each other.
It’s probably Google sharing that information with Amazon. Amazon isn’t actively spying on Google searches. I could be wrong though, but that is what Google “Ad Privacy” spyware is really about. To let Google share your interests with other companies.
I just ran a test on my stock Pixel 8 Pro connected via Proton VPN:
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I opened Firefox and searched DuckDuckGo for “pool heater”.
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I scrolled down until I saw an Amazon link, then closed the tab and Firefox.
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I opened the Amazon app. I scrolled through the “deals” on the app’s home page and did not see anything pool related at all.
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I typed “pool” into the search slowly, to see if and when “pool heater” was suggested as a search. I typed in “pool” entirely, yet “pool heater” was never suggested.
I don’t know what that implies, but it seems like if I am using Firefox, DDG, and Proton VPN, Amazon isn’t monitoring my Internet searches.
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How to swim without getting wet without a websuit?
Get secondary device for private privacy stuff.
You might be able to get a large part of google functionality with a degoogled device running microG or something similar.
