this post was submitted on 14 Jun 2025
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Before going to a protest, demonstrators or observers should note that their cellphones may subject them to surveillance tactics by law enforcement. If your cellphone is on and unsecured, your location can be tracked and your unencrypted communications, such as SMS, may be intercepted. Additionally, police may retrieve your messages and the content of your phone if they take custody of your phone, or later by warrant or subpoena.

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[–] ininewcrow@lemmy.ca 96 points 1 day ago (9 children)

Burner phone ... leave your main one at home ... ABSOLUTELY DO NOT BRING YOUR MAIN PHONE

Set up your burner phone with one or two accounts to things you might want to upload to ... encrypt as much as you can. Do not load all your social accounts ... only log into the bare minimum. If you are organized, log into temporary or fake or secondary accounts if you can.

Start the day without any prior history, photos or content on the phone and keep as few contacts as you can ... memorize numbers that are important to you.

Always be prepared to give up or lose your phone.

And as always ... SAFETY GLASSES .... bring a pair of industry rated CSA approved safety glasses (try to get a pair with a tint so you can pass them as sunglasses). Look for safety glasses with anything marked ANSI Z87+, sometimes written Z87.1+ (note the plus) rated or CSA Z94.3 rated are ensured to safely withstand a direct high energy strike.

.... additional things if you want to do more

Bring a small new blank paper note book you can keep in a pocket with a small pen or pencil ... you might be taking notes like license plates, name tags or names of people or places ... its always faster to just write something down than in taking a shaky photo or tapping away a note on an app

Wear a big scarf ... for guys or girls ... a scarf comes in handy for all kinds of emergencies including using it as something to cover your mouth, dress a wound, tie something or cover something up.

Wear a good pair of running shoes ... be prepared to run and be on your feet all day.

Bring a small backpack and bring a couple bottles of water and some energy bars ... keep it light because you'll be on your feet all day and if things go bad, you might be targeted if you have a large pack ... plus an empty pack can be used to carry things later if you need to.

Dress for the weather ... if its going to be hot, wear light clothing but if things go bad and you have to stay out over night or longer, bring a light jacket ... if rain is forecast within a day or two, bring a small poncho

[–] Rivalarrival@lemmy.today 27 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Ideally, that burner phone never goes anywhere near your home or any place you frequent from the time it is acquired until the time it is destroyed.

Briar is a good messaging app for you and your group. It will work (to some degree or another) over bluetooth even after they shut down the cell towers. Keep posting information about law enforcement deployment numbers and locations.

Airplanes.live provides unfiltered ADS-B data, useful for identifying and locating law enforcement aircraft, including drones.

For uploading media, choose overseas fediverse instances for your account, which are not subject to US law, and won't get shut down or raided by US law enforcement if you upload something they don't like.

I've been suggesting this everywhere: pick a dozen different protest locations, and share your list with everyone you meet. If and when law enforcement deploys in force at your current location, leave for another. Force them to constantly redeploy to multiple locations.

[–] Rumo161@feddit.org 2 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Do not use Smartphones. For the scarf use an unmarked tubescarf, its easely hidden in any collar. Cary bandages and lightsalt solution, like you use for contacts, to treat teargas and light wounds. If they get you you want nothing outside oft your memory that has any link to others. Depending in the effect of carrying your passport with you in your country decide wether to take it along.

[–] Rivalarrival@lemmy.today 6 points 22 hours ago

Smartphones are far too valuable to our efforts to be left at home. They are the difference between personally observing law enforcement atrocities, and being able to prove them. The media isn't covering the protests. We need as much video as we can get. We need to be able to coordinate efforts, passing along troop deployments and numbers.

While our main phones and accounts are probably linked to more information than law enforcement should ever be allowed to touch, burners add too much to our efforts to seriously consider not bringing them.

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