Subnostr

But my phone IS a computer with access to the internet. Built in. On a platform that is fairly easy to use nearly anywhere.

I grew up before internet connected phones. I know HOW to do things without, but... It's a hard sell to not have many of the things that I currently have that are, quite frankly, amazingly useful. That convenience is certainly being used to nefarious ends, but... That happens with any new tech.

ChipTuner 1y ago

100% accurate. When I started paying attention to all of the things I was addicted to and started cutting them out, the phone was high up there due to my privacy paranoia. I believe so long as your putting information onto an electronic device, it has the possibility of leaking private information. The only solution IMO is to stop using it. Now you don't even need to use it, as long as it travels with you they can know exactly what position you were standing in when it sent the sample back to the mothership. Plenty of these things not even a privacy OS can protect you against.

First, I started logging DNS, then I saw all the connections my device was making even when all apps were closed. Freaked out, then I started stripping apps down to only what I could tolerate. And over the years dropping more and more. I recently stripped down completely, removing google services and switching to obtainium and manually installing apps. Finally I turned off mobile data.

I currently have

- Obtainium

- Wireguard

- Organic Maps (for trails)

- Firefox

- Keyboard

- Contacts

- Phone

- QUIC (qksms clone)

- File manager

- Signal

Everything else I use firefox and pin pages.

I have all notifications turned off except for phone calls (most don't work without google anyway). I regularly lose it. I forget to charge it. It maybe sees 30 mins of screen time/day.

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Discussion

The Beave 1y ago

I'm still behind you but also on a similar path.

I could do without a "smart" phone, but, that would compromise me further in that communicating with my family would be unencrypted, and that's a much worse situation.

Also, suddenly going dark with any electronic device is a sure sign that your behavior has changed and that's a big tell to anyone paying attention. I live too far from family and care about them too much to just stop communicating unless it's a really big thing. I still have many things to do that are similar to your list but struggle since I'm not where near as savvy as you.

ChipTuner 1y ago

Totally get it. Family should be a big deal, I wouldn't cut them loose for the extreme privacy, but I probably would prioritize only chatting when I'm not working or driving or something, like most do anyway.

Tell me about it, I just probably had more time on my hands man, it was brutal just getting this far with the 6y/o junker device I have now.

I remember growing up playing the answering machine back to see who called and making a list to call them back. The only time you could talk was when you were at home or work. Anything else wasn't possible. You'd change the message if you were going somewhere, change it when you got back. And if you didn't answer people weren't upset. Miss those days.

Not much of a Blake Shelton listener but Austin comes to mind every time I think of this stuff :)

The Beave 1y ago

I do think that I'm moving more in that direction.

My vision is for my phone to only be connected to a home server, so that all the data is going to hardware I control through I tunnel that I also control. That has some vulnerabilities and some tradeoffs, especially since I do want to live in the mountains and I might not be able to do that due to connection speeds alone. (I refuse to use starlink.)

I'm honestly not sure what my tech future looks like. Some of my more ambitious ideas are clearly out of my ability.

ChipTuner 1y ago

The future of tech is going to happen with or without me. At least if I can put some effort in I can maybe change some things.

Sometimes I think not all problems need to be solved with more technology you know. Like maybe we had it figured out as best we needed.

Yeah and I think more self hosting movements like umbrel and start 9 self hosting may be the future. We tried once in the late 2000s early 2010s but the software just wasn't there imo. It's cool to see VC funding investing into self hosting. Hopefully I won't look like a fool for being hopeful!

The Beave 1y ago

I don't think you'll end up the fool in this case. I'm just a fool since I try too much, too soon and can't get anything to work. 🙄

Sandor Clegane 1y ago

There are plenty of ways to do it without a mobile phone...