The op in that post is 14 years old at most. Just look at how that shot is tailored.
Wouldn’t it be better to at least put a modicum of effort in to have some privacy, than to put zero effort in and have none at all?
If everyone started using encrypted messaging software, using devices that are resilient to all but the highest levels of forensics, and stuck to social spaces which prevent bots and alt accounts hosted on servers in countries their own nation’s law enforcement doesn’t have access to, it would massively increase the costs of surveillance. Every layer of that increases the price.
When you let surveilling you become profitable and easy, expect it to get worse. More obtrusive. After all, you’ve displayed compliance up to that point.
Yes, that’s it. As I’ve told friends on several occasions, you know why I encrypt my online life and guard my privacy as if, you know, freedom depended on privacy? Because fuck them, that’s why.
It takes my time and effort, but I just can’t let the bastards win just that little bit more easily. All cops and corps are bastards (ACAB).
Is that the same as the misnomer or fallacy that privacy is dead?
Reddit be like.
Yeah a very reddit moment
The one saying they use copilot for math problems is the worst part. It demonstrates their complete lack of critical thinking.
“No, they would never track us. But if they were, it would be a good thing.”
The mindset about privacy is just all wrong. It’s not an all or nothing game. Any privacy gain is a net positive to no privacy at all.
To many people conflate privacy with anonymity or try “accomplish” privacy without understanding what they want to be private from and why.
Exactly. Now to click the “copy text” button and keep your fine words handy for my next convo with a friend who thinks life with Facebook and Google is grand.
Why? It’s because they never arrived at their current behavior by a systematic progression of logical steps. Most of the behaviors we exhibit aren’t that way. We just offer a post-hoc explanation/justification. They use edge, so they defend their action with any argument assertion they can think of.
It’s also (sort of) because they want to tip the proverbial scale towards their current use. Change takes effort and can be irritating. They have their list of positives about edge (faster, easier, etc.), and they downplay the negatives such as privacy.
Privacy also doesn’t exist when you have the entire website being indexed
I’m also a firm believer in you don’t need to freely give up your data
I did not realize “spezit” was “spez” and “reddit” until I reread your commnt lol. I thought was some reddit privacy frontend with the German pronunciation of “z”.
A similar argument I hear is “If they want me, they will find and arrest me no matter my precautions”.
Kinda yes… But why are you talking about threat models that include someone deliberately hunting you down? We are not high-ranking dissidents or criminals that they would put effort and money into finding. Our concern is passive surveillance - maybe the collected info doing us a disservice (like being leaked for scammers or sold to an evil ex), maybe even something mundane getting flagged and us being arrested just to serve as an example.
e.g. Period tracking apps being used as evidence when prosecuting people who seek abortions
those can be open-source and selfhosted, no?
Yes, absolutely! But that wasn’t the point - rather that the spyware ones are popular for some reason, and thus can serve as a sad example of “low-hanging fruit to make an example of”.
(TBH I don’t get the need for a separate app in general, seems gimmicky, I just use a normal calendar)
they collect data about every user, not just abortion seekers, propably
Yes. There are a lot of reasons why any one of us could turn into a high value target at the drop off a hat. If not to a government, then to an organisation or a lone lunatic.
When they realized they DO actually have something to hide, they moved the goalposts to now say nothing is private online anyway.
I mean, that is pretty close to the truth. Especially for people whose skill level is at “Firefox sucks at loading HTML sites”.
That’s such a weird statement. People who don’t like Firefox at that level don’t know what html is.
Is it me or do those comments feel very shill-like?
Yea this has really big astroturfing vibes.
Yes some subreddit is piviting hard captalism recently, giving up their dignity to defend corporations with their life.
My “progressive” friends are this way - “everyone already has everything, whatever who cares”
Gen Alpha doesn’t care about privacy online. They need to be guided by their parents to care, e.g. when they buy a laptop, they install some Linux distribution.
they most likely want to game on their laptop as well. Linux is capable, but usually requires good configuration and troubleshooting, that a gen alpha kid can’t do, and parents are busy. This is why it is not a widely practiced thing
we’re doomed then
They’ve been primed not to. They’ve grown up surrounded by social media where oversharing with your legal name attached is incentived, both by the companies and the lonely, drama-hungry users. I wish we’d pushed harder against this back in the early days of Facebook, but I doubt most of us saw this coming.
Copium
Microsoft Edge, based on Google’s Copium engine-
Copium indeed