Privacy

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A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.

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much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)

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651
 
 

I will be upfront with this, and say that I've never been a huge fan. But I did reinstall a Matrix server, and some clients to see if it'd gotten better in the year or so since I've last used it.

This just... Kind of feels like a more centralized XMPP with group chat folders that sort of function? The spaces feature is neat, but I've tried 4-5 clients, and every single one of those throws all of them into the same screen as the DMs by default, and I can't find a way to change that.

Am I missing something here? Like. I want to at least see what people like here, I just can't.

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Curious what everyone here uses for their weather app or website of choice ?

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The recent federal raid on the home of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson isn’t merely an attack by the Trump administration on the free press. It’s also a warning to anyone with a smartphone.

Included in the search and seizure warrant for the raid on Natanson’s home is a section titled “Biometric Unlock,” which explicitly authorized law enforcement personnel to obtain Natanson’s phone and both hold the device in front of her face and to forcibly use her fingers to unlock it. In other words, a judge gave the FBI permission to attempt to bypass biometrics: the convenient shortcuts that let you unlock your phone by scanning your fingerprint or face.-

It is not clear if Natanson used biometric authentication on her devices, or if the law enforcement personnel attempted to use her face or fingers to unlock her devices. Natanson and the Washington Post did not respond to multiple requests for comment. The FBI declined to comment.

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submitted 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) by T3CHT@sh.itjust.works to c/privacy@lemmy.ml
 
 

Received request from a friend in Minneapolis.

I suggested FairPhone/Murena and they found this Cape.co. The finding a compatible wireless carrier and managing a VPN piece thru them off. They need an easy solution that gives them peace of mind, but they are not techy at all. "Being able to research and pick a carrier, phone and OS was overwhelming."

This person is not nefarious, but they rightly believe the government is being nefarious in their town and they want to resist while being safe. The marketing from Cape hit the nail, but it's marketing.

I'm not there to help, so looking for experienced condensed advice on the device.

I should add - this will be a daily driver and I've already advised to leave the device home for protests, etc. due to tower tracking. We're at the next layer.

655
 
 

To the surprise of no one...

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submitted 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) by bridgeenjoyer@sh.itjust.works to c/privacy@lemmy.ml
 
 

Im stuck with an s23 for a while yet. Is it even worth the trouble of trying to use f droid, shutting off google play services and disabling all the other shit on my phone, when at its core its all spyware?

I really wish an alternative existed that wasn't just a prototype or $1000.

657
 
 

Whit some tips for bringing devices when you travel to the US.

658
 
 

Translated from German (with DeepL):

The Swiss messenger service Threema is being acquired by the German investment company Comitis Capital. Both the company and Threema itself emphasize that the arrival of the new investor will not lead to any significant changes for the time being. The company headquarters and servers will remain in Switzerland, and the management team will stay unchanged.

A financial investor with a broad portfolio

Comitis Capital is a young private equity firm, not a technology company. It invests in various industries, including a UK-based supplier of vegan meat alternatives and a manufacturer of dog accessories.

Its business model consists of providing financial support to promising companies so that they can grow and establish themselves internationally. “Comitis now clearly sees this potential in Threema too,” says SRF digital editor Tanja Eder.

Data protection as a business model

The strong focus on data protection is considered a key strength of the messenger. Precisely because US tech companies are coming under increasing criticism and digital sovereignty is gaining in importance, Comitis sees this aspect as a clear unique selling point.

Whether this will remain the case in the long term is unclear, according to Eder. If Comitis were to conclude at some point that it would be more profitable to collect Threema customer data or sell the company, no one could prevent them from doing so.

Trust in the authorities remains an issue

In Switzerland, federal authorities and the military also use Threema for internal communication. Even though everyone involved is aware that there is no such thing as absolute security, Threema still has advantages over its competitors.

For example, Threema's source code is openly accessible. Experts in the fields of data protection, IT security, and research regularly check whether the company is keeping its promises. Government agencies can also carry out their own checks.

Hardly any alternatives on the market

Good alternatives to Threema are rare. “Apart from WhatsApp, which dominates the market, there is simply not much room for other messenger services,” notes the digital editor.

Signal is considered another secure messenger alongside Threema. However, it is operated from the US, albeit by a non-profit foundation and financed by donations. In Switzerland, Proton offers encrypted emails, but does not have its own messenger service.

“Given this limited offering, we can only hope that privacy-friendly communication services will gain in importance in the future,” says Eder.

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submitted 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) by tdTrX@lemmy.ml to c/privacy@lemmy.ml
 
 

Data can be transferred using ultrasonic frequencies,

Legit Uses -

Google Tone Google Tez

Bad Thing -

It has been used in the past for malicious activity by governments (if you know, you know).

I can be used to track people, like people's devices screaming their ID and devices receiving other devices IDs.

Imagine a mall with ultrasonic beacons, and for iOS and Google Play Services, hear that.

Reports -

https://techcrunch.com/2018/01/02/some-apps-were-listening-to-you-through-the-smartphones-mic-says-report/

https://thehackernews.com/2017/05/ultrasonic-tracking-signals-apps.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1n_8zDIFmQU

Solution ?

How to stop my devices like browsers, Windows PC, macOS, Android, and Android apps, from sending and receiving these frequencies

THis is a dead Chrome extension - https://github.com/ubeacsec/Silverdog

660
 
 

I only want to use it for facebook marketplace, but jeez i didnt know they were taking it this far with this crap...

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Looking for some perspective on this, interested how y’all think about it and if I’m isolated in my concerns.

I’ve grown to be a bit anxious when I’m out and about in any neighborhood. The wide use of doorbell cameras that connect to the internet and save data on company servers, listen in to your conversations, and could be used for spying on you as an individual gives me a sinking feeling.

I like walking around, I walk my dogs around the neighborhood and I know my neighbors. I’ve started being so aware that it’s changing my habits. I don’t turn my face towards houses while I’m walking if I notice a doorbell camera, and I’ve put my shirt over my face when dropping off something to a neighbor who has one. I probably gave them a fright but I don’t feel like I should’ve expected to be OK with you surviving me in a way that compromises my privacy that expansively. I’m considering keeping a bandana with me to cover my face if I need to go up to a door, but of course that would make people think I’m a bad actor and just a paranoid privacy nut.

I feel a bit like Winston in the 1984 novel, always feeling watched and trying to find an isolated corner where I can’t be seen. How have y’all been feeling on this? Would love to get perspective, thanks

663
 
 

Yesterday I saw someone with Meta smart glasses in public for the first time. Even just standing near him was unpleasant. It doesn't matter whether it's recording, pointing a camera and mics at somebody who didn't agree to it feels rude and a bit shocking.

I worry that this is becoming more acceptable or do others feel the same way? Companies keep pushing forward, now with smart neckleses, smart headphones, (all equipped with camera and mic). Are these all doomed to fail? What feature would convince me or others to actually start using them? It's certainly not chatgpt strapped on your face, or a shitty quality spy camera either.

If any of my friends or family wore these, I wouldn't feel comfortable speaking to them.

Im interested in your experiences. Thanks for reading.

664
 
 

I have been following the talk about Chat Control in the European Union and similar regulations elsewhere. Many people are still not aware of these developments, and I believe a fiction story can reach more people than a technical explanation ever could.

This is my short story about the logical conclusion of these laws. Please let me know what you think and share it with those who might benefit from seeing where this path leads.


For the Children

I feel the cold on my face. The only part of my body that is not covered by cloth. In this temperature you need to have good insulation or you will not be able to get far. And we have to get far. The whole path is 10 miles long and we are almost halfway there. We went as far as possible with the car, but the forest here is too dense and the snow too deep. It looks beautiful. But it is hard for me to recognize this beauty for more than a few seconds.

I look behind me and see the footsteps that I am leaving behind. Around twenty meters behind me is Elena. I know she is there, but because of the snow and fog, she looks like a black dot on a white paper. I can't see her face, but from her body language she does not look tired. We are already late, so I know I have to walk in front of her to keep up the pace.

I have lived in the Union my whole life. More than thirty years. I still remember the last trip I made out of it, about five years ago. It feels like yesterday in some way. But so much has changed since then.

It happened gradually. It was supposed to be a land of freedom and liberty. We always looked at other countries and felt disdain for their political systems. In school they always taught us that we are the promised land for other people and a beacon of democracy in this world. I do believe that it was actually like this in the past. But it all started to change with the acceptance of laws that seemed very innocent at first.

The first thing the Union did was pass the so-called "Child Abuse Protection Law". It required all internet companies to scan every message passing through their platforms. Not even that much has been talked about it. They said it had to be done to catch all human traffickers. They said it was for the children.

It didn't make much of a difference for the regular person yet. Some people complained about it, and there were some protests in the larger cities. But soon after they accepted it, nobody was talking about it anymore. We thought that was the end of it.

Then, they blocked access to some of the foreign websites. Some social media platforms that were deemed to be extreme and some news websites. Most of us just installed a VPN, thinking we were smart.

Last year, all the unofficial VPNs were banned. The only one that was allowed was the official VPN of the Union. They said some hackers used connections with the outside world to share fake news about the Union. But we knew that the reason they did it was to be able to look at everything that goes in and out.

A few months ago another rule was accepted. Now, every device that can connect to the internet has to be registered with the government. The government justified this by claiming that drug dealers used old burner phones for communication. Now every phone has to have a registered user, otherwise it is denied access to the internet. This means that the authorities now monitor every conversation and post on the internet all the time. Everyone is trapped in the system, and there is no way for someone to escape it.

Well, actually, there is one way left.

The only way to communicate with the outside world now is a satellite phone. It connects directly to orbiting satellites, which grants unmonitored access to the global internet. With it, the user can communicate privately to the outside world. The only problem is that they are very hard to get.

But lucky for me, I have one. It has been in my backpack since we started walking this morning. Without stopping, I move my backpack to the front and open the zipper. I pull out a satellite phone. I can't take my gloves off because it is so cold. So I type with my bulky glove one letter after another: "All good. T-1 hour." I press send.

I look back at Elena.

"Just a little further, then we switch!" I shout through the wind.

"Okay," I hear her voice through the cloth that covers her mouth.

The phone will send a message when it connects to the satellites. It should take around a minute, and Jack will receive the message. It takes noticeably more time than a regular internet connection. He is probably already there. Waiting for us.

I have known Jack since childhood. He always challenged authority. In school he debated teachers who hated his nonconformity, and later became obsessed with privacy, warning us how online surveillance works and how our digital lives are tracked. It could be tiring to talk to him, which was why our friend group meetings became less and less common. I was never as extreme as him, but always took his side when we were debating topics among friends, though I would push back when it was just the two of us.

So when they first started talking about the messaging scanning law, he was the first one I knew to talk about it. I remember a conversation between me, Jack, and some of our other friends whom we knew from college.

"What do you hide on your phone that you are so concerned about, Jack?" Brian asked Jack in the pub.

"It's not about having secrets," Jack snapped back immediately. "It's about where this can lead. You wouldn't want a government agent sitting in the corner of this room, recording us just in case one of us mentions something illegal, would you, Brian?"

"But as long as you are not doing anything wrong, you don't have to fear it," Brian dismissed nonchalantly.

"It's about the way the system is designed if they decide at any time they want to censor you, nothing will be stopping them," said Jack.

Brian seemed unwilling to engage further. He didn't have a good reply, or at least didn't want to think of one.

"Anyway, what are you going to do about it?" he asked.

A moment of silence followed.

"I'll fight it as best I can," he said. "But if all else fails, I'll leave the Union. I tell you, this is a slippery slope. It will get much worse from here."

"If you really leave the Union just because someone might read what you write to your friends in a group chat, you're even crazier than I thought," Brian laughed. The rest of the night passed with lighter talk.

And he was really that crazy. At least it seemed crazy at the time. We had long conversations about it. He was convincing me to take Elena with me, and that we all should leave. But I couldn't at the time. Although I agreed with him, I really thought it would not be that bad. Or at least I hoped so. But soon after they accepted the law, he left abroad and never returned.

Leaving the Union is pretty much impossible now. It is not because of a heavily guarded border, but because of the immense power the Union holds over its neighbors. If a neighboring country identifies a person from the Union, they must return them or risk losing vital trade agreements. For these governments, we are not people. We are just a threat to their economy, where a fugitive is nothing more than a risk to them. Occasionally, you hear of someone who tried to escape but was handed back and no one heard from them again.

"Stop, I'm getting tired. Can you carry him?" Elena's voice cuts through the wind.

I turn around and see her walking behind me, making small steps uphill.

"Of course," I say and stop.

"He has been sleeping this whole time," she says and opens up her poncho.

His eyes squeeze as the snowy white scenery flashes before him. Our little Max, so small and vulnerable, bundled against the cold, our precious little secret. I look at Elena who has tears in her eyes. I know we could spend hours gazing at our beloved child, memorizing every tiny feature of his, if we had time. But we don't.

"Give him to me, we have to carry on," I say.

She unravels Max from the poncho with which he was attached to her. I tie him to my chest and cover him with another blanket to keep him warm. I kiss Elena on the forehead.

"You go first," I say. She nods and takes the lead.

She was so strong in the past few days. I know that these were the saddest days of her life. The same is true for me. It was a hard decision we had to make. But once we made it there was no turning back.

It all started about a year before Max was born. Elena's father was a relatively popular journalist who worked his entire life for the national program. He was always critical of the government and of the politicians, even before things began to change. So when the Union first started censoring news in the media, he was writing articles about it wherever they would let him publish them.

He talked about how the censoring is not only done by the law but also pushed through bureaucratic incentives that you have to follow. Social norms change and some things are labeled as inappropriate. He said that the problem would not be that people would be punished for speaking, but that because of fear of punishment they would never speak at all.

Shortly after he began his exposé mission, he was completely blacklisted. No outlet would touch his work. His editor refused to even discuss the facts, only muttering, "If I run this, the Union will label us a 'High-Risk Platform' we’ll lose digital banking access by morning." Overnight, his internet accounts vanished and even his bank account was frozen. The official reason was that he was "spreading hate by spreading misinformation". Almost no major media covered it. And he was not the only case, many who spoke out at that time suffered the same fate. On platforms where free speech was still possible, it was a much talked about topic and people warned about where this can lead. If you search for his name now, there is only one side of the story.

For me, this was the breaking point. Elena felt immense stress at that time. I only felt anger. Anger that we let that happen. I know we probably couldn't have done much anyway. But at least we should have tried.

"When we have a baby, he can’t have a life like this.”

When Elena said those words, it was the first time this idea was spoken out loud.

We were planning to have a baby for a while. But because of the conditions, we knew that it would not be a good life. Elena's dad getting blacklisted changed her. Ever since she said that sentence that winter afternoon, we have been talking about it almost every day. We knew we would have a child, but it became clear to us that the conditions would get a lot worse.

At that time, I still spoke to Jack through an encrypted messaging platform on the internet. Then no satellite phone was needed. I told him that we wanted to have a child completely off the grid and that we wanted him to live outside of the Union. At that time, it was already obvious to us that we would not be able to go with him. The regulation was already too strict for traveling.

Jack was not hesitant one bit when I told him we wanted him to take care of our child. During the years he lived abroad, he met a girl there, and they were both open to this "adoption".

"We have to put all our electronic devices in a box when we’re at home,” I told Elena some time before Max was born. "We can't risk the existence of Max being recorded anywhere.”

We were already very careful not to leave any trace anywhere. But him being actually present in the real world meant an even greater challenge. I was buying all the baby equipment from a black market on the other side of town, trying to buy it in bulk, so I minimized all the possibilities that someone would catch on to something. We were very precise about covering all the tracks because we knew that if anyone found out about it even years later, we could be in trouble. We did not even really know how much the authorities actually monitored our data. We burned all the trash that could have been associated with Max and padded all the walls with foam to make it impossible for anyone near the house to hear him cry. I remember one night, Max had a fever and a cough that wouldn't stop. We sat in the dark, clutching him, terrified that a neighbor might hear us. We couldn't even take him to a doctor because every clinic required an ID scan just to enter the waiting room.

"I can't believe this is the last week we three are all together," Elena sobbed.

I was crying too.

We were looking at the pictures we had taken of the three of us. The good old analog Polaroid photos would be the only physical evidence that Max had ever existed.

The forest is beginning to thin out. I increase my tempo so that I can catch up with Elena. She reaches out her hand to me. I grab it and squeeze it. She squeezes back.

"We are almost there," I say, trying to hold back tears.

Elena nods, eyes fixed ahead through the fog. "He’ll run through forests like this one day,” she whispers. "Laughing. Free. That’s all that matters.”

We walk like this for about a mile. It seems like an eternity. We know we had to do it. As parents, we have an obligation to provide the best life for the children.

A fence around two meters tall appears through the fog. The border between the Union and the outside world. We see Jack already waiting there beside the fence. He has sawed a small opening in it, just large enough for Max. We didn't want to make it visible. My dear friend, who I have not seen for so long, and we will not even have time to have a short conversation. He lifts his hand as a sign of greeting. I wave back.

Max will only remember us through stories Jack will tell him. He will only have a few analog pictures that will remind him of where he truly came from. But at least he will be able to live a free life. For us, the people in the Union, this is a long forgotten idea.


Note: I self-hosted a formatted web version and PDF of this story here for easier reading or sharing: https://gigaprojects.online/post/1

665
 
 

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/41387733

I used to self-host because I liked tinkering. I worked tech support for a municipal fiber network, I ran Arch, I enjoyed the control. The privacy stuff was a nice bonus but honestly it was mostly about having my own playground. That changed this week when I watched ICE murder a woman sitting in her car. Before you roll your eyes about this getting political - stay with me, because this is directly about the infrastructure we're all running in our homelabs. Here's what happened: A woman was reduced to a data point in a database - threat assessment score, deportation priority level, case number - and then she was killed. Not by some rogue actor, but by a system functioning exactly as designed. And that system? Built on infrastructure provided by the same tech companies most of us used to rely on before we started self-hosting. Every service you don't self-host is a data point feeding the machine. Google knows your location history, your contacts, your communications. Microsoft has your documents and your calendar. Apple has your photos and your biometrics. And when the government comes knocking - and they are knocking, right now, today - these companies will hand it over. They have to. It's baked into the infrastructure. Individual privacy is a losing game. You can't opt-out of surveillance when participation in society requires using their platforms. But here's what you can do: build parallel infrastructure that doesn't feed their systems at all. When you run Nextcloud, you're not just protecting your files from Google - you're creating a node in a network they can't access. When you run Vaultwarden, your passwords aren't sitting in a database that can be subpoenaed. When you run Jellyfin, your viewing habits aren't being sold to data brokers who sell to ICE. I watched my local municipal fiber network get acquired by TELUS. I watched a piece of community infrastructure get absorbed into the corporate extraction machine. That's when I realized: we can't rely on existing institutions to protect us. We have to build our own. This isn't about being a prepper or going off-grid. This is about building infrastructure that operates on fundamentally different principles:

Communication that can't be shut down: Matrix, Mastodon, email servers you control File storage that can't be subpoenaed: Nextcloud, Syncthing Passwords that aren't in corporate databases: Vaultwarden, KeePass Media that doesn't feed recommendation algorithms: Jellyfin, Navidrome Code repositories not owned by Microsoft: Forgejo, Gitea

Every service you self-host is one less data point they have. But more importantly: every service you self-host is infrastructure that can be shared, that can support others, that makes the parallel network stronger. Where to start if you're new:

Passwords first - Vaultwarden. This is your foundation. Files second - Nextcloud. Get your documents out of Google/Microsoft. Communication third - Matrix server, or join an existing instance you trust. Media fourth - Jellyfin for your music/movies, Navidrome for music.

If you're already self-hosting:

Document your setup. Write guides. Make it easier for the next person. Run services for friends and family, not just yourself. Contribute to projects that build this infrastructure. Support municipal and community network alternatives.

The goal isn't purity. You're probably still going to use some corporate services. That's fine. The goal is building enough parallel infrastructure that people have actual choices, and that there's a network that can't be dismantled by a single executive order. I'm working on consulting services to help small businesses and community organizations migrate to self-hosted alternatives. Not because I think it'll be profitable, but because I've realized this is the actual material work of resistance in 2025. Infrastructure is how you fight infrastructure. We're not just hobbyists anymore. Whether we wanted to be or not, we're building the resistance network. Every Raspberry Pi running services, every old laptop turned into a home server, every person who learns to self-host and teaches someone else - that's a node in a system they can't control. They want us to be data points. Let's refuse.

What are you running? What do you wish more people would self-host? What's stopping people you know from taking this step?

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I have been thinking a lot about digital sovereignty lately and how quickly the internet is turning into a weird blend of surreal slop and centralized control. It feels like we are losing the ability to tell what is real because of how easy it is for trillionaire tech companies to flood our feeds with whatever they want.

Specifically I am curious about what I call "kirkification" which is the way these tools make it trivial to warp a person's digital identity into a caricature. It starts with a joke or a face swap but it ends with people losing control over how they are perceived online.

If we want to protect ourselves and our local communities from being manipulated by these black box models how do we actually do it?

I want to know if anyone here has tried moving away from the cloud toward sovereign compute. Is hosting our own communication and media solutions actually a viable way to starve these massive models of our data? Can a small town actually manage its own digital utility instead of just being a data farm for big tech?

Also how do we even explain this to normal people who are not extremely online? How can we help neighbors or the elderly recognize when they are being nudged by an algorithm or seeing a digital caricature?

It seems like we should be aiming for a world of a million millionaires rather than just a room full of trillionaires but the technical hurdles like isp throttling and protocol issues make that bridge hard to build.

Has anyone here successfully implemented local first solutions that reduced their reliance on big tech ai? I am looking for ways to foster cognitive immunity and keep our data grounded in meatspace.

667
668
 
 

But in all seriousness, this is a continuation of a previous post, namely: https://programming.dev/post/43003673

TLDR

I wanted to contribute to decentralization and to fighting censorship from home. This is were the project is right now. I bought a shower rack, discarded its wheels and just attached it - with wires, ouch - to the underside of a shallow support table on which my TV stands.

1a

I get my 1 Gbps connection from a pretty generous ISP. For one, they hand out static public IP addresses for free! Not that I understand what that would cost any ISP...

1b

The connection is distributed with a gigabit switch - which by the way supports jumbo frames 🤙 - to two routers.

2a - router one

This router is configured to route everything through a WireGuard interface (peers set to some Mullvad server, been "subscribed" for over six years now). Everything that goes through this router is encrypted. Too bad they still don't support DAITA on routers... I'm working on a workaround though, where I'm playing with the thought of forwarding traffic within a Linux machine through its DAITA-enabled Mullvad app, but that's another story...

3a - access point one

This is where I access the internet whenever I need encryption. Both wirelessly and wired. Here you will find endpoints such as PCs, smartphones and my only one IoT - a vacuum. This is also where a PC is running an i2pd daemon to share some bandwidth and a Snowflake proxy to enable Tor for people that live in places that ban normal Tor connections.

2b and 3b - router and access point two

Router two simply routes traffic between my unencrypted LAN and my ISP. Access point two is where I access my various servers residing on 4b. They are, for now, a Tor bridge. Upcoming: A Headscale "server"? Because the Tailscale control server is one of the few parts of Tailscale that isn't open source.

Hardware and software

  • 1a - some ONT provided by the city
  • 1b - TL-SG105E
  • 2a,2b - Raspberry Pi 4 with OpenWrt
  • 3a - ASUS RT-AX58U with Asuswrt Merlin
  • 3b - ASUS RT-AX58U v2 with Asuswrt Merlin NG
  • 4b - Raspberry Pi 5 with Raspberry Pi OS Lite

Good night

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submitted 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) by emotional_soup_88@programming.dev to c/privacy@lemmy.ml
 
 

There is a lot of totalitarian shit going on, this being only one of the recent tragedies: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fshsk8MCAf4

I always try to say to myself: don't wallow in grief, organize and act!

Except for advocating for online privacy in one's everyday life and being politically active when I have the ability to, do you have any tips on what one can contribute with technologically, from home?

I have:

  • A 1Gbps up/down connection
  • An RTX 3080
  • A few Raspberry Pi:s
  • 20TB storage
  • A static public IP if I ask for it

What I have found so far:

  • running a Tor bridge or guard/middld relay - bridge for the sake of our peers living in places where Tor in inaccessible and middle relay to contribute with bandwidth
  • running a Monero node - although my GPU is LHR, so perhaps it wouldn't contribute much to decentralization...?
670
 
 

Smart TVs with an internet connection: Lets grab screenshots and send them to cooperate analysis advertisement department.

671
 
 

I think it is possible to embed invisible information into videos and images. This way peopple could track where you got an image from, the source from which you copied it, and people who copy your image to share it again. https://github.com/ShieldMnt/invisible-watermark

Services like youtube or twitter could embed such watermarks into content they serve to specific users without them knowing; Smartphone-cameras could mark images in secret.

I guess blurring, rotating or dithering the image could destroy watermarks. Or maybe just sharing a screenshot of an image instead of the original image. Format conversions may help too.

Keywords: digital-watermarking. tracking.

672
 
 

I'm gonna delete the account after selling my Quest 2 for the Steam Frame

673
 
 

This is a year-old paper but now there is an easy-to-use implementation of the attack: https://github.com/gommzystudio/device-activity-tracker

Signal developers' verdict is WONTFIX: https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android/pull/14463

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I haven't finished watching it, but it has some very interesting data points on privacy and how your privacy is being exposed even when you think it isn't.

675
 
 

According to complaints filed this Monday in Texas state courts, the TV makers can allegedly use ACR technology to capture screenshots of television displays every 500 milliseconds, monitor the users' viewing activity in real time, and send this information back to the companies' servers without the users' knowledge or consent.

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