I’m wondering if this, or a similar solution, would help (I mean whether apps would see the phone as ‘protected’ / locked down).
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There’s a plethora of alternative viewers for YouTube. Any thoughts on which are best for privacy? The answers are likely different between desktop and Android.
Regarding Fastmail storing data in the US:
The jurisdiction of where data is stored isnt really the issue, data should be stored end to end encrypted regardless of jurisdiction for proper privacy. Countries with supposedly good privacy laws have began introducing new bills, such as Switzerlands proposed VPN regulations, so it’s not something to rely on as it can change drastically very fast.
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Agreed. But then there’s the common situation where the person you are communicating with is on something like Gmail or Hotmail.
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Minitube is an interesting solution for the desktop.
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Newpipe for Android https://newpipe.net/
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I stumbled across this site; there might be some nuggets for those that want to chase every possibility.
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I’ve gone the full self hosting route for all my services, I’m my own dropbox, google photos, LR Cloud and now even my own search engine. The last thing I need to do is roll an email server and I’ll be free of google for all my essential services. I run all of this on a second Dell Optiplex running an i7 4770k with 12gb of RAM, it can all be done very cheaply.
For those who are interested in self hosting https://www.linuxserver.io/ is an excellent resource to help you dip your toes in. For the services i run personally I recommend:
Reverse Proxy and Web Server: SWAG is just a preconfigured nginx web server that comes packaged with configuration files to make you life a lot easier. It has additional security built into it with fail2ban integrated out of the box and it has optional settings for things like Authelia and Crowdsec that make it easier for beginners to navigate and use these tools.
File sharing: Nextcloud or Copyparty. Nextcloud if you want to sync between devices or copyparty if you’re OK with a file server and web frontend. If you don’t know which to choose I’d go with Copyparty as it’s very light and performant.
Mobile photo sync: Immich is just a stellar application that does everything google photos does but it’s all your own data.
DAM: Photoprism has been the most polished solution I’ve found for accessing and sharing my photography online.
Search Engine: SearXNG is a metasearch engine you can self host. It allows you to a truly private search you can configure to scrape any other search engines you like.
Security/2FA/Oauth2: Authelia is identity management for your webapps. It allows you to use 2FA to access all of your apps whether or not they have native Oauth2 or OIDC compatability. You can use a text file as your use database backend but I use LLDAP instead. This one is a bit of work to set up but it is very worth it.
Bouncer/Smart Firewall: Crowdsec is a community database of log parsers and bad actors that ban malicious users and bots based on their IP or actions they take trying to access your server.
As for removing google completely from my life my phone and apps I need wont allow me to ditch them entirely. I’ve gone with LineageOS + microG so I can still use google services like maps and Android Auto anonymously and still do my banking, government ID and log into my work PC with Microsoft authenticator. It’s the best solution I’ve found so far and limits the invasiveness as much as I can.
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Thanks very much everyone. I wish I knew how to implement half of this stuff. I have a great local tech, who is great with hardware (we built an awesome new desktop system together), but he only knows the mainstream stuff, such as Windows, macOS, and Ubuntu. Finding someone knowledgeable to do paid phone/zoom consultations would be great (i.e., to guide me through setup). These days I’m too overwhelmed with work, insomnia, life, and trying to save my very elderly in-laws from self destruction (hoarding, dangerous denial about needed repairs on their house!)
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I can recommend tuta mail (with limitations). It all works incredibly well but:
- no good option for making local backups
- Pricey if you want your own domain and have a family
- No automated forwarding possible
- Some other strange things that I forgot
I’m also in the process of leaving big tech. For google mail/calendar/drive i migrated to Proton (https://proton.me). It is a Swiss privacy first company that is in the process of delivering a google suite like environment. It also comes with a great password keeper and fast VPN service. It even has private AI. I’m a big fan.
For school I still need to use google docs because the Proton version is not mature enough yet (its completely pageless for instance). For all the other stuff I ditched google.
Edit:
Just read up on what was said about Proton… That is unfortunate…
I am pretty much in a similar situation, my own email server is the final frontier that I haven’t tackled yet. The challenge is not running a secure email server, but making sure that email is accepted by third parties. The gist of the accounts I have read is that it can be done but involves continuous work.
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I try not to be paranoid, but this is scary.
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A couple of additional resources:
The first is from a Canadian perspective, and the second is mainly useful for the lists of apps you can extract from it.
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