With the Trump Regime looming on the horizon, it’s time to get your digital habits locked down as much as practical. We all know how quickly corporations will bow to government requests. Don’t rely on the big corporations to do the right thing when it comes to your digital rights.
Step away from using WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger as your primary means of communication. Zuck and friends will be deep into the pockets of the Trump Regime, and nothing you do on any Meta owned property is private. NOTHING. I encourage folks to get familiar with Signal Messenger.
Microsoft Windows is probably the least secure of your desktop/laptop OS options. MacOS is more secure, and Apple’s marketing machine really focuses on the security of Apple’s products, but there are gaps, and again, you’re handing over control to a large corporation. For those not technically minded, I recommend getting off Windows and onto a Mac if you can. Luckily, you no longer have to sell a complete kidney to get a Mac, the MacBook Air is quite affordable and capable for 92% of what most folks need. Of course, if you want to go full blown geek there’s Linux. When it comes to Chromebooks and the like, that’s up to you, but you’re relying on Google for everything and Google is scanning your data for ad revenue opportunities. So, it’s not really that private.
And lastly (for now), make sure you’re giving location permissions only to applications that actually need it. Solitaire on your phone does not need your location. Mail does not need your location. Your book reader does not need your location. While you might not worry about sharing your location with these apps, if you’re attending a protest or something and it makes the Trump Regime cranky, which it probably will, you don’t need your coupon clipper application tattling on you. And if you’re using the dating apps, be extremely careful; bad actors have and will continue to use those apps for bad purposes, especially since the American people consider cheap gas more important than those that aren’t 100% heterosexual (wink, wink) and trying to perpetuate the “American dream” from the 1950s.
Picket fence optional.
Yesterday was finally enough to get the husband to agree to go to Proton. We’re only using Apple OS’s but we aren’t going to leave our iCloud data to Time should he want to impress Trump. Last year I was lucky enough to score Proton’s Visionary plan (the highest you can get, not normally a buy option) during the holidays and I’ll drop a large wad of money on that renewal. I wasn’t expecting to have to move back to Proton but I also wasn’t expecting the end of America. So.