People have called me paranoid for years. They said I overthink, that my fears were unlikely, that I was imagining futures that would never arrive. Time has not been kind to that dismissal.

As a child, I worried that our calls and messages were being monitored. I was told that was impossible. Now we know that vast systems were built to collect, store, and analyse our communications at scale. What felt like instinct turned out to be observation.

I watched the internet change, too. Early on, it felt open, experimental, human. Then Web 2.0 arrived, and with it the rise of centralised platforms. X, Google, Facebook, Instagram. Services that felt free, but quietly turned people into products. Data became currency. Behaviour became inventory. I warned that something was wrong, even if I could not yet name it.

Now the shape of it is clearer.

Countries that once claimed to defend free speech and privacy are rolling out systems of control. Digital ID schemes. Online Safety laws that normalise surveillance. CBDCs that risk turning money into a permissioned tool. Australia is restricting social media by age. The EU is pushing for chat controls that scan private messages. VPN bans and restrictions are being discussed. Proposals to pre-install surveillance software on devices.

This is not progress. It is a regression.

How did we move from restraint to total oversight so quickly? From rights to permissions. From trust to monitoring.

We cannot ignore this. We have to respond.

The good news is that alternatives exist. Nostr offers a censorship-resistant social Protocol built on keys, not accounts. No logins, no central authority. Matrix provides self-hosted, end-to-end encrypted communication that you can control yourself. These tools are not perfect, but they are a start.

Freedom does not disappear overnight. It erodes quietly, wrapped in safety language and convenience. If we want to keep it, we have to choose tools that respect autonomy and learn how to use them.

Education matters. Participation matters. Building matters.

This is not about paranoia. It is about paying attention.

#Nostr #Privacy #DigitalRights #Decentralisation #Freedom #Surveillance #SelfHosting #Encryption