Start sending invites to Signal. Setting up group chats can help too, as invitations to those create mild FOMO in the mind of the invitee, then once they have the app they can use it for things besides group chats.
There’s a balance between principles and practicality and for a lot of people it just hasn’t tipped yet. I’m kind of in that boat myself.
On principle, I’d like to eliminate Google from my life entirely.
In practice, there is no good alternative to Google Maps. I’ve tried a bunch of OSM-based apps and they’re just not there yet. So I use Google Maps. Not happy about it, but I still use it.
Ironically I found the best way to watch YouTube on the TV was to pay Google for a “Chromecast with Android TV” (or whatever it’s called) and install SmartTube on it. I could have spent a while tinkering around with my Raspberry Pi to create some custom solution and given Google no money, but this cost less than 2 months of YouTube premium and now I’ve got a device I can do whatever with.
I’m paying for the convenience of a tv-optimised android device. It’s relatively versatile in that you can install most android apps, but much more robust than trying to build something myself. And all I use it for is watching video so there’s not really much it can data-mine compared to something serious like my phone.
I use osmand in conjunction with gps-coordinates.net so I can get the GPS coordinates of addresses to put into osmand since it has a serious lack of addresses
Open street map data is created by volunteers. Where I live, you can practically put in any address into OsmAnd and it’ll know it. Maybe you live too far out. Or there aren’t enough people contributing in your area. Putting in the house numbers is a tedious task.
Ah, okay. Different continent, ~500k people here. More if you count the neighboring cities. I’ve programmed in a few house numbers like 10 years ago. But generally speaking, OSM knows most hiking routes and illegal mountainbike trails in the woods. And it rarely does silly mistakes while routing me in the car. Something it used to do regularly when I started using it. Guess the experience heavily depends on where you live, then.
The onion router was a clue in itself as to how you connect to the Internet, especially when you need to hide. Add more than a normal vpn into the mix, proxies, ssh tunnels, dns tunnels, net cat, and maybe i2p. Once done, you could even fire off an ion cannon in a particular orbit if you fancy.
Just bear in mind that some vpn companies are owned by companies who also own other companies that own large networks, so they don’t necessarily need the vpn to log traffic to get your meta data.
‘Madzikanda had used his work laptop for personal activity, including saving his passwords for online banking, emailing from his personal account and accessing his online cloud storage.’
Keep in mind that he was using a company device. Just do not do that. Similarly never use personal device for work. Similarly do not leave email on the server. This has always been the thing at least in the US.
Tuta (free): you can send only like 6 email per day. Otherwise, Tor-friendly. No onion. Support forum on Reddit 😞 Germany.
Posteo.de: 1 €/mo affordable. Nothing fancy. Support via PGP like that’s common sense. Germany. Non-crypto anonymous payments w/ various options (e.g. a prepaid CC): they don’t even ask your name (much less address, cell phone number).
Disroot.org: Free, pop/smtp, community-based, trusted even by the Tails team. w/ onion. Netherlands.
Cock.li: Free, pop/smtp etc. Very Tor-friendly w/ fast onion. It’s good if you think it like disposal. Irresponsible in a way (aka Freedom), but actually 10-year-old & stable. Romania.
Proton (free): bloated, very mixed opinions, yet better than Google. w/ onion (slow). Switzerland. A simple feature like Plain Text view is missing (HTML by default: not serious about privacy).
Not a recommendation but I too trust Disroot pretty much. You can get a custom domain there without “buying a paid plan” once you make a donation. Would that be an option for you?
Using multiple providers (having multiple accounts) is a good idea, though. Don’t put all the eggs in one basket. I’ve never heard the two providers you mentioned, so I can’t tell. If you can sign up anonymously via Tor, if they’re Google-free + not behind CF, and (most importantly) if you feel them “good” (subjective but gut feeling…), I think they’re usable.
If their support use PGP, that’s a good sign too. (Proton even doesn’t share its pub key iirc.) If they also accept the privacy coin like Disroot and Tuta do, that’s nice too. Ultimately, though, believe your gut feeling, because everyone has different priorities, different threat models, etc.
Don’t worry about e2ee: Even if you get the most expensive plan from e.g. Proton, it’s not e2ee unless both parties use Proton. There is a free, “easy” way to realize true e2e: OpenPGP in Thunderbird (convenient), GnuPG (more secure), etc.
Also, technical score of mailbox.org has been relatively low, not improving: internet.nl/mail/mailbox.org/1080449/(Don’t worry too much about this score, though. It’s only technical; human factors (philosophies, trust, etc.) are more important when it comes to privacy.) This is not a recommendation. DYOR; ultimately, believe your own intuition.
I agree. I use Proton and I have exactly one service which supports GPG. It’s a cherry on top but it’s not all that useful.
The big thing is to use a trustworthy service that you pay for. It’s not bulletproof but at least the incentive is there to keep your email private and away from advertisers.
Your boundaries on cost make it tough, but aside from Tuta you might have a look at mail.ee which has very basic features (no E2EE for example) and a retro web UI, but very high storage limits. They offer free accounts too, and support SMTP/IMAP/POP3. It's Latvian-based so comes with the "100% GDPR compliance" feature if that's of interest.
Zoho.com is another that comes to mind. It's very feature-heavy/slick (you can tell they're attempting to market mainly to small businesses looking for a cheaper Google Workspace), has been around a long time and I've read positive comments from others about the service. It's an Indian company though so you don't get GDPR protections (or similar) as far as I know. The low-end plans are in your price range and I think they still offer a free plan - that's what I have anyway.
I've been a Fastmail customer for decades now and it's exactly what I want a mail service to be, but it's out of your price range and has no free tier.
The main downside of Tuta free for me is that you can’t create filters for free. The main downside of proton free is that you can’t remove their signature…
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