Lemmy is not going to be Reddit. It will not inherit the reactionary behaviours. Ensure civillity and disengage if uncomfortable. Have a good time!

> Their latest round of stupidity pops up a new EULA and forces you to take it or, again, you can't access your stuff. But that's just more unenforceable garbage, so who cares, right? Well, it's getting worse. >It seems they are planning on dropping an update which will force you to log in. Yep, no longer will your stuff Just Work across the local network. Now it will have yet another garbage "cloud" "integration" involved, and they certainly will find a way to make things suck even worse for you. >If you ever saw the South Park episode where they try to get the cable company to do something on their behalf and the cable company people just touch themselves inappropriately upon hearing the lamentations of their customers, well, I suspect that's what's going on here. The management of these places are fundamentally sadists, and they are going to auger all of these things into the ground to make their short-term money before flying the coop for the next big thing they can destroy.

[Panquake](https://lemmy.ml/post/139820) have released some source code. Not for Panquake itself, but for a link shortening service. I suppose it's a brand-exposure exercise. https://talkliberation.substack.com/p/panquake-early-release-pnqk-now-available

Related material, not all as optimistic as the ABC news article: - [Video interview with Dr Katharine Kemp](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-09-28/government-flags-changes-in-response-to-privacy/102913552). - [Government response to the Privacy Act Review Report](https://www.ag.gov.au/rights-and-protections/publications/government-response-privacy-act-review-report). - [Govt kicks Privacy Act can down the road - Only commits to a handful of review recommendations.](https://ia.acs.org.au/article/2023/govt-kicks-privacy-act-can-down-the-road.html).

- [f-droid.org](https://f-droid.org) - [F-droid onion](http://fdroidorg6cooksyluodepej4erfctzk7rrjpjbbr6wx24jh3lqyfwyd.onion) - [direct download apk on signal.org](https://signal.org/android/apk/)

> > > From September 2023, we will be gradually rolling out our new unique search offer. This will happen over several months and won’t apply to everyone at the same time. This means that when you search through Ecosia, we work with either Microsoft Bing or, with your consent, Google to provide you with search results and ads. In order to do this, we automatically collect data required by search partners to prevent bot attacks and ad fraud - which includes your IP address and search terms. > > > > For a growing number of users we can now provide Google results and advertisements. In order to supply these results and ads, Google requires a cookie to be set on your browser and access to your device’s local storage to store information. We will ask for your consent before doing this and if you do not agree, we will provide non-personalized results from Microsoft Bing. > > > > In order to provide non-personalized Microsoft Bing results and ads, we are contractually obliged to implement Microsoft Clarity to capture how you use and interact with our website through behavioral metrics, as well as sharing your IP address and search terms. This behavioral data is captured in individual search sessions and is not tied to a user profile unless you consent. The processing of this data is necessary for the provision of our service. Although Ecosia does not use this information, it is used by Microsoft Bing for site and advertising optimization, as well as fraud protection. For more information about how Microsoft collects and uses your data, visit Microsoft’s privacy statement and Microsoft Clarity documentation. > > > > Microsoft Bing does also offer personalized search results and ads. This service requires a cookie to be set on your browser which creates a personal profile. We will ask for your consent before enabling this and you can change your choice at any time in your cookie preferences. More information on cookies and how to take control of your preferences can be found in the “What about cookies?” section. > >

Would internet services be subject to, let's say Swiss privacy laws, if you were connected to a Swiss server from your VPN? And if they do, would it make that much of a difference that it's worth the occasional hassle of having to change the language and region?

**Summary** A recent privacy study from Cornell University reveals that Amazon Alexa, the virtual assistant found in smart speakers, collects user data for targeted advertising both on and off its platform. This practice has raised concerns about privacy violations. The study also highlights that Amazon's and third-party skills' operational practices are often not transparent in their privacy policies. Amazon Alexa is designed to respond to voice commands and is present in various Amazon devices, offering a wide range of functionalities, including controlling smart devices, providing information, and playing music. While Amazon claims that Alexa only records when activated by its wake word ("Alexa"), research has shown that it can sometimes activate accidentally, leading to unintended recordings. Amazon employees listen to and transcribe these recordings, raising concerns about privacy. Amazon links interactions with Alexa to user accounts, using this data for targeted advertising. Advertisers pay a premium for this information, making it highly valuable. Although Amazon allows users to delete their recordings, compliance with this feature has been questioned. Additionally, third-party "skills" on Alexa can access user data, and many developers abuse Amazon's privacy policies by collecting voice data and sharing it with third parties without proper oversight. The recent FTC fine against Amazon highlights its failure to delete certain data, including voice recordings, after users requested their removal, violating the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). While Amazon Alexa offers convenience, it comes at the cost of privacy. Users looking for more privacy-friendly alternatives can consider Apple's Siri, which offers stronger privacy protection. For those interested in open-source options, Mycroft provides a natural language voice assistant with an emphasis on privacy, but note that the company may be shutting down soon.

I want to be able to create an account without providing an email

>A viral TikTok account is doxing ordinary and otherwise anonymous people on the internet using off-the-shelf facial recognition technology, creating content and growing a following by taking advantage of a fundamental new truth: privacy is now essentially dead in public spaces.

I use wire (wire. com) for daily chatting. I like it but I couldn't find any good communities in wire. In session, or simpleX, there are privacy (and other) groups in which anyone can participate.. Can we start a privacy group in wire so we folks can also hang around?

[Searx](https://searx.space/) is a metasearch engine that aggregates results from over seventy sources while protecting the privacy of its users. This utility forwards your search query to one of 39 random volunteer-run public servers to thwart mass surveillance. [Bookmark this link](https://searx.neocities.org/#q=%s&category_general=on) (select categories above) and add a keyword for fast searching (e.g. s ). Firefox will recognize it as search engine you can add in address bar

Ive opened user.js and set browser.startup.page to 3. according to the gui that should resume previous session (0=blank, 1=home, 2=last visited page, 3=resume previous session) It does say, however, that "Session Restore is cleared with history (2811), and not used in Private Browsing mode", so I set user\_pref("privacy.clearOnShutdown.sessions", false); // [DEFAULT: true] to false, but still it opens to a new tab. other issues: ff opens windowed, and Enhanced Tracking Protection settings dont save (I changed it to block all cross site cookies) help appreciated :)

Twórcy stron internetowych często dostosowują je w taki sposób, że przeglądarka użytkownika nawiązuje połączenia z zewnętrznymi serwisami bez wyraźnej zgody użytkownika. Co istotne, w wielu przypadkach jest to związane z udostępnianiem prywatnych informacji użytkownika innym firmom lub organizacjom.

I'm only just hearing about the suite from skiff.com and curious if anyone here uses it. They've been around for 3 years and apparently offer an open sourced encrypted suite. They're mainly known a Google Docs alt, but I just learned they offer encrypted mail, calendar, and cloud (10GB for free) along with their docs. Sorta blew my mind as I'm pretty acitve keeping up with privacy news. Is it just cause I use Cryptpad this is news to me and its some folks go to?

I'll start off by saying everyone's economic situations are just as varied as their threat models and how people make decisions on which services can be specific to themself and not one that can apply to anyone else. The services one chooses to use for free or to pay for may be based more on what they can afford vs what's the best broad reaching plan. That being said i'd like to see what others think about the proton suit of services. I've been eyeing it as an option for a paid service for a while but am hesitant to put all my eggs in one basket. I'm interested in a vpn, mullvad seems to be the other popular choice. I'm also interested in email address anonymizing service like anonaddy. At $5 for mullvad, $3 for anonaddy, and $3 for base proton email it comes out to a dollar more than protons premium tier which gets cheaper if you pay for 1 or 2 years at a time. As said above would the biggest reason not to use proton for all of these separate services be not putting all your eggs in one basket?

I've noticed that dark reader on occasion phones home to darkreader.org, also with a increasing amount of sponsored links on their page. So what does everyone think, are they safe right now or should they not be trusted?

I just discovered this amazing app! It lets you remove (or just disable) preinstalled apps like Facebook, Netflix, etc. and system apps like samsung knox apps, diagnostic, bixby, and even One UI (but you must have installed other launcher). You can’t brick your device, worst case it falls into a boot loop and after 5 reboots it will factory reset. Debloating your device will make it faster, more private and more secure (less atack surface).

**Summary** The FBI has requested a significant budget increase for 2024, specifically for its DNA database known as CODIS. This request, totaling $53 million, is in response to a 2020 rule that requires the Department of Homeland Security to collect DNA from individuals in immigration detention. CODIS currently holds genetic information from over 21 million people, with 92,000 new DNA samples added monthly. This increase in funding demonstrates the government's commitment to collecting over 750,000 new samples annually from immigrant detainees, raising concerns about civil liberties, government surveillance, and the weaponization of biometrics. Since the Supreme Court's Maryland v. King decision in 2013, states have expanded DNA collection to cover more offenses, even those unrelated to DNA evidence. The federal government's push to collect DNA from all immigrant detainees represents a drastic effort to accumulate genetic information, despite evidence disproving a link between crime and immigration status. Studies suggest that increasing DNA database profiles does not significantly improve crime-solving rates, with the number of crime-scene samples being more relevant. Additionally, inclusion in a DNA database increases the risk of innocent individuals being implicated in crimes. This expanded DNA collection worsens racial disparities in the criminal justice system, as it disproportionately affects communities of color. Black and Latino men are already overrepresented in DNA databases, and adding nearly a million new profiles of immigrant detainees, mostly people of color, will further skew the existing 21 million profiles in CODIS. The government's increased capacity for collecting and storing invasive data poses a risk to all individuals. With the potential for greater sample volume and broader collection methods, society is moving closer to a future of mass biometric surveillance where everyone's privacy is at risk.

I know it's an odd question, but where I live phones get stolen often. My phone doesn't have the option for an eSim, which is a problem because 90% of the time when a thief steals a phone they take out the SIM card immediately, meaning I wouldn't be able to remotely lock or wipe my phone. Should I consider glueing the SIM tray shut? Or are there alternative less permanent measures I can take to keep my device secure?

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/5635914 > Back at FOSDEM [we announced the idea of Matrix 2.0](https://archive.fosdem.org/2023/schedule/event/matrix20/) - a series of huge step changes in terms of Matrix’s usability and performance, made up of [Sliding Sync](https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-spec-proposals/pull/3575) (instant login/launch/sync), [Native OIDC](https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-spec-proposals/pull/3861)(industry-standard authentication), [Native Group VoIP](https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-spec-proposals/pull/3401) (end-to-end encrypted large-scale voice & video conferencing) and [Faster Joins](https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-spec-proposals/pull/3902) (lazy-loading room state when your server joins a room). > > Now, we’re excited to announce that as of today everyone can start playing with these Matrix 2.0 features. There’s still some work to bring them formally into the specification, but we’re putting it out there for folks to experience right now. Developers: watch this space for updates on the spec front. > > Practically speaking, this means there are now implementations of the four pillars of Matrix 2.0 available today which you can use to power a daily-driver Matrix 2.0 client. The work here has been driven primarily by [Element](https://element.io/), using their new [Element X](https://element.io/labs/element-x) client as the test-bed for the new Matrix 2.0 functionality and to prove that the new APIs are informed by real-world usage and can concretely demonstrably create an app which begins to outperform iMessage, WhatsApp and Telegram in terms of usability and performance… all while benefiting from being 100% built on Matrix.

or can I just use the desktop one somehow

Hey /c/privacy, Similar to the idea that was proposed [a month ago](https://lemmy.world/post/3566276) by [@to_urcite_ty_kokos@lemmy.world](https://lemmy.world/u/to_urcite_ty_kokos), I built a little web app that allows one to "emulate" EAN13-based loyalty cards. I call it the [Loyalty Card Emulator](https://apfelkompott.codeberg.page/loyalty-card-hosting/). 🪄 The app allows you to either select one of the built-in card numbers that I have found on the internet. (Only for demonstration purposes, of course!) Or you can just enter a code manually and create the loyalty card from it. The link to a card can be shared (e.g. if you and your SO use the same loyalty card). At the moment, it is very basic and only has one single design that is supposed to visually mimic one of the biggest loyalty card providers that I know. Architectural-wise, the app is written in TypeScript, powered by React and Vite. The app does _not_ transmit and/or store your codes anywhere but on your device; it's a single-page application that runs entirely in your browser, without any server component. The source code is publicly available [here](https://codeberg.org/apfelkompott/loyalty-card). The hosting is taken care of by [Codeberg Pages](https://docs.codeberg.org/codeberg-pages/) - cheers for that! Adding new card designs and/or preset codes can be achieved quite easily, so feel free to fork and contribute!

The table is quite big (190+ lines of hand-written HTML) and it doesn't fit on mobile phone screens unless you zoom out. It should be fine on desktop. It also specifies the criteria followed and has analysis of some of the IMs in the table (not close to all of them, I hope to add more analysis in the future). Counter-arguments are always welcome. Sources and additional information too. Note that the typical privacy recommendation (Signal) is not recommended here. It does not meet our criteria, being centralized and requiring a phone number. I don't want to hate on Signal since it's doing a decent job spreading the importance of E2EE, however we can not recommend it for the given reasons.

For example, I have been using Google or Apple for 7 years, and seeing that I was fingerprinted, tracked through third-party cookies, etc. I want to switch to a more private option. But is it worth it? They know about me, they have now AI that can just use the behavior pattern for the last 7 years and still track me. Again the question comes, should I become "privacy-focused" despite my data before I was "privacy-focused" used and sold?

Is there a GUI which I can just click and disable and enable packages debugging Samsung Android phones? I heard that there are options which are much simpler than vanilla ADB. I just want to get rid ofll the Samsung/Google/Meta bloat prepackaged with the phone. Appreciate any pointers/advice.