Category: Privacy & Security

“Arguing that you don’t care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don’t care about free speech because you have nothing to say.”
– Edward Snowden, 2015

Freedom of Speech in the Age of Privacy Policies

Freedom of Speech in the Age of Privacy Policies

(I got access to thinkspot beta and this was my first post on that platform. I decided to crosspost it here to increase awareness of thinkspot, and also because the issues I raise here are relevant on other social media platforms as well.)

 

Hi, I’m Joel, and I eat Privacy Policies for breakfast.

I’m thrilled to be among the first users a social platform that encourages free speech and exchange of ideas, driven by the idea of diversity of minds – the true diversity – not the superficial diversity of how we look or where we come from. However, there can be no free speech without privacy. In a similar vein, Snowden famously wrote few years ago that “Arguing that you don’t care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don’t care about free speech because you have nothing to say.” Well I care about both. It makes a lot of sense then for my first contribution on this platform to be an analysis of thinkspot’s Privacy Policy.

All comments are made about Privacy Policy that’s dated to be effective starting August 8, 2019. It seems that they don’t keep an archive of old policies, so I took the liberty to archive this one myself. They do however notify users “in advance of any material updates to this Privacy Policy by providing a notice on the Website or via email”, so that’s a good thing. Here’s some of the most notable parts of the policy.

Continue reading “Freedom of Speech in the Age of Privacy Policies” →

Yksityisyyden ikuinen arvo

Yksityisyyden ikuinen arvo

(Tämä on suomennos Bruce Schneierin vuonna 2006 julkaisemasta artikkelista “The Eternal Value of Privacy”. Käännetty ja julkaistu hänen luvallaan.)

Yleisin vasta-argumentti, mitä yksityisyyden puolestapuhujat kuulevat – ja tämä argumentti tulee yleensä niiltä, jotka kannattavat henkilötietojen tarkastuksia, valvontakameroita, tietokantoja, tiedon louhintaa ja muita valvontamenetelmiä – on tämä: “Jos et tee mitään väärää, niin eihän sinulla ole mitään salattavaa?”

Tässä on joitakin käteviä vastauksia: “Jos en tee mitään väärää, niin sitten sinulla ei ole syytä tarkkailla minua.” “Koska valtiovalta päättää mikä on väärää, ja he voivat vaihtaa väärän määritelmää.” “Koska sinä voit tehdä jotain väärää minun informaatiollani.” Ongelma näissä vastauksissa – vaikka ne toisaalta oikeita ovatkin – on se, että ne hyväksyvät yksityisyyden olevan lähtökohtaisesti jonkin väärän piilottelua. Se ei kuitenkaan pidä paikkaansa. Yksityisyys on ihmisoikeus, ja edellytys arvokkaan ja kunnioitettavan ihmisarvon ylläpitämiselle.

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Instagram Hardening – Private Profile is NOT Enough!

Instagram Hardening – Private Profile is NOT Enough!

First things first: Instagram is owned by Facebook. As such, no matter your settings or how you operate the app, you can never obtain real privacy on the platform. There exists a decentralized, ad-free alternative called Pixelfed that seems to have been getting some praise, but without personal experiences I can’t say much about it. Still worth the look if you’re thinking about migrating from Instagram.

Alright, now on to the guide. Here are the concrete steps you should take in order to increase your privacy and security on Instagram.

Continue reading “Instagram Hardening – Private Profile is NOT Enough!” →

How to Setup LinkedIn for Better Privacy and OPSEC

How to Setup LinkedIn for Better Privacy and OPSEC

When it comes to privacy and social media platforms, LinkedIn is the necessary evil we have to put up with. While it’s a no-brainer to delete your Facebook account, but as so much of job recruitment revolves around LinkedIn, it’s a lot harder to severe ties with it. Many companies don’t even post their career opportunities anywhere else than on LinkedIn, and prefer applications that come directly through the platform. It’s also a great tool for headhunters to find suitable candidates.

So let’s assume you have a LinkedIn profile, you want to build up your online resume and personal brand, and want to be able to jump on an opportunity if it presents itself. However, you can accomplish all that without revealing every aspect of your professional self for the whole world to see by default. Let’s start of with LinkedIn settings and then move on to behavior on the platform, and other tips.

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4 Steps to Harden Your Twitter Account

4 Steps to Harden Your Twitter Account

As data breaches and identity thefts are happening left and right, day and night, the best time to secure your Twitter account was yesterday. Here’s four straightforward steps you should take in order to significantly decrease the possibility of your account getting accessed by an outsider. Most of these things are applicable to other online services as well, so once you’re done hardening your Twitter account, take a critical look at your other accounts both on and off social media.

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The Best Online Privacy Guides (updated July 2022)

The Best Online Privacy Guides (updated July 2022)

This is a collection of the best, most reputable and generally most acknowledged online privacy guides on the web. The list is updated frequently.

Links are sorted in alphabetical order to avoid any biases, and each of them contains a short snippet quoted from the respective sites. I have not and will not add privacy guides that are created by VPN “review” sites or other such entities that create content just to spam it with affiliate links.

I dare to say that these guides together cover all the bases when it comes to the best privacy practices, OPSEC, and basic online anonymity – even for the advanced users. However, if you think I’m missing a guide, please leave a comment below and I’ll happily review and possibly add it to the list, thank you.

Continue reading “The Best Online Privacy Guides (updated July 2022)” →

Why Quitting the Big Five is Bad Privacy Advice

Why Quitting the Big Five is Bad Privacy Advice

The big five – Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google & Microsoft – have got a stranglehold of our digital life. Not just our digital identities, but almost all of our web experiences are reliant or connected to the technologies of these five companies.

Recently, Daniel Oberhaus from Motherboard and then Kashmir Hill from Gizmodo both experimented by completely “quitting” the Big Five, for four and six weeks respectively. Both of their stories are very insightful and definitely recommended reading for anyone. However, quitting the Big Five is exactly the kind of take on privacy that turns many people off from becoming more privacy aware.

I’ve seen this happen time and time again in r/privacy, where people who have just tipped their toes in the world on online privacy and security are getting barraged with comments like “LOL IF YOU’RE NOT USING LINUX YOU’RE SCREWED” and “YOU NEED TO DELETE ALL SOCIAL MEDIA ACCOUNTS”. But if we as a privacy community would dial back our tone just a bit, I think we could do way more good than what we’re doing right now.

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Is DNA Based Healthcare Worth the Risk?

Is DNA Based Healthcare Worth the Risk?

All of us are built differently. That’s why our bodies can handle different foods in different ways, different workout routines yield varying results between individuals, and some of us seem to always get the seasonal flu while others stay stuffy-nose-free (seemingly without trying really hard to do so). So figuring out what’s the healthiest – the best – way of eating, exercising and living your life seems like a reasonable and even rational goal.

So how can we figure that out? With DNA testing, or to be more exact, analyzing genome and blood biomarkers. However, this type of testing has some obvious privacy repercussions. Let’s weigh the pros and the cons.

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Controlled Identity Exposure as a Doxxing Countermeasure

Controlled Identity Exposure as a Doxxing Countermeasure

Usually when talking about personal data in the context of increasing (online) privacy, the discussion is revolving around either one or two of the following subjects:

  1. Removing as much of your data as possible
  2. Populating data about you with disinformation

What I see talked about less (or barely at all) is the active management of your online data and the controlled method of data disclosure. Maybe some dismiss this as a no-brainer, but in my opinion there’s some easy and powerful wins to be gained by giving this third subject the attention it deserves.

Continue reading “Controlled Identity Exposure as a Doxxing Countermeasure” →