Off The Cuff: Time to Ditch the Beasts!

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Originally published at: https://peakprosperity.com/off-the-cuff-time-to-ditch-the-beasts/

One thing has become clear – the unholy alliance of Big Government with Big Tech has been conspiring to steal everything that matters; our privacy, our data, and our money.

While this is currently being dismantled, a bit, at the government level, Big Tech as run by the psychopaths out of Silicon Valley is charging ahead.

Microsoft and Google are perhaps the worst of the worst in terms of being greedy and grabby, but so too are all the apps and services that run on your typical Windows, Apple, or Droid OS.

Worse, AI is accelerating at a pace that we cannot really comprehend, but we can feel its raw power for both good and bad. The chance of those ill effects being properly managed before they do immense damage? Close to zero. First the harms, then the reforms. That seems to be the way of things.

What can any of us do to protect our private data and browsing habits from the predatory grasp of Big Tech?

Glenn Meador of the Privacy Academy has a way we can both resist the worst of being tracked and become part of the resistance. How? By opting out of the predatory operating systems (O/S) and switching over to the open source (and vastly more secure) Linux O/S for computers and to the mobile O/S Calyx and a de-googled phone for communications.

Glenn is hosting a free webinar to introduce people to the idea of switching over and the steps people can take to ensure their own private data isn’t harvested and turned against them in future marketing campaigns.

Tune in to hear more…

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I love this topic because it is right in my wheelhouse!

There’s one news that I’m frustrated it is not receiving enough press coverage:

Security officials in the United Kingdom have demanded that Apple create a back door allowing them to retrieve all the content any Apple user worldwide has uploaded to the cloud…

The British government’s undisclosed order, issued last month, requires blanket capability to view fully encrypted material, not merely assistance in cracking a specific account, and has no known precedent in major democracies.

The basic facts of this are:

  • The UK government ordered Apple to provide a backdoor to bypass the end-to-end-encryption of your iCloud files protected by their Advanced Data Protection.
  • The UK government wants to see EVERY user’s protected iCloud files, including Americans, Australians, Europeans… basically the WHOLE WORLD!!
  • This is a SECRET order by the UK government. Apple is not allowed to disclosed that this order even exist.
  • If you are targeted by the UK government to see your encrypted iCloud files, Apple is forbidden to inform you.

Advanced Data Protection (ADP) is deliberately engineered by Apple such that it is IMPOSSIBLE for even them to see what your iCloud files are. The UK government’s order basically wants Apple to re-engineer their servers and operating system to bypass or break the end-to-end-encryption.

Even if you’re not an Apple user, this issue will affect you. If the UK government can SECRETLY coerce Apple to do that, they can also coerce Google and Microsoft to do the same.

The good news is that US lawmakers are doing something about it to thwart the UK government’s secret order:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2025/02/13/apple-uk-security-back-door-adp/

What is not clear are the measures the US government will take to thwart the UK government’s order. Depending on what the measures are, the question is this: will they only protect Americans? Or will it benefits all Apple users regardless of nationality?

What can you do?
As suggested by Glenn, switch to Linux and GrapheneOS. And I will add that you roll your own cloud solutions like NextCloud. But there are heavy prices for you if you go for the DIY route.

For one, setting up your own cloud solutions like NextCloud will mean that you’re responsible for your own cybersecurity. Last year, NextCloud had to issue an emergency cybersecurity patch to prevent hackers from breaking in. If you are going to host your cloud files in your own home’s network, you have to secure your home network as well. And then, the traditional insurance risk of fire, flood, natural disaster and theft applies.

Switching to GrapheneOS is a pain as well. I’ve looked through their documentation on their website to access how feasible it is for the everyday folks to switch to them. Examples of the pain points are:

  • App notification will not work as reliably. Or if you want it to work, you have to pay a price in terms of battery life. App notification works so beautifully because it has to go through Apple/Google’s notification servers. If you want privacy, you have to take the notification server out of the picture. Consequently, you can’t have nice things like notifications.
  • Your favourite apps may not exist in the GrapheneOS. If you want your favourite apps, you have to set up a Google Play service in your GrapheneOS phone. It’s a hassle, and if you want it, you will need a Google account. That defeats the purpose of having a de-Googled phone in the first place.
  • Some banking apps will not work because of their anti-tampering mechanism will freak out inside the GrapheneOS environment.

GrapheneOS is excellent for privacy. They’re structured as a project/organisation so that they cannot be forced with a legal order as a company. But it is EXTREMELY painful and inconvenient to use it. It takes significant amount of effort, change of habits, technical knowledge and sacrifice of convenience to implement. There is going to be significant teething problems.

For those technical people who have the time, it may be feasible to work out all the problems and issues and come up with workarounds. But for most non-technical folks, it may not be a feasible option.

And also, the most convenient way to use GrapheneOS is to buy a Google Pixel phone and follow their technical instructions to install it over your Pixel phone. Hopefully there is no backdoors in the Google Pixel phone too!

As for Linux…

As for Linux, the question is, which Linux? Ubuntu Linux? SUSE Linux?

Linux is open-sourced. But conveniently-packaged Linux distributions like Ubuntu is from a corporation, Canonical.

The question I have is this: what is stopping rogue governments like the UK government from issuing secret orders to Canonical to backdoor their Ubuntu Linux?

Rabbit hole
I know all these considerations are a massive rabbit hole to go into. I wish I have easy answers, but I don’t think any exist. As Chris said before, there’s no solutions. Only trade-offs.

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PNWDefector has spoken at length about IT security, particularly on phones.

I’d love to migrate from Android to GrapheneOS, but GrapheneOS is only available to users with a Google Pixel phone. Everyone else is in the cold.

There are other non-Google versions of Android out there, but they are (for the most part) very restricted on what hardware they will run on.

V.

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Just think about it when you go to get a new phone, in the mean time turn your phone off for periods of time. That should worry the shit out of them.

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Bring on the Penguin, Linux user since 2016. And Debian is a very stable OS, can’t recommend it enough.

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And also, the UK is not the only government having legislation that can allow such outrageous secret order to Apple.

Australia has similar legislation too:

The difference is, if the Australian government issue outrageous orders to Apple, they can just quit the entire Australian market. The Australian market is small enough for Apple to quit completely.

Then Australian politicians will have to deal with their population’s backlash of having all their iPhones stop working.

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I haven’t watched the video yet but from the discussion here, it’s becoming clear that there are few places online in the digital world that are actually private. The US Government has been hoovering up all electronic comms for probably decades and I’m sure they are quite good with the AI at tracing and following anyone who they think is suspicious or has something to hide.

The UK seems like it is becoming a disaster of a country to live in. This Starmer government is a disaster. I kinda felt that way about the US under the Bidet/Harris regime but feel a little better now. But then so is Germany, Canada, Australia and perhaps most Western countries. Let’s not limit this insanity to Western Countries, China, Singapore Malaysia, Vietnam, maybe anywhere is subject to varying degrees of surveillance.

We don’t seem to have privacy much anymore, the laws are meant not to protect the citizens but to protect the Government from the Citizens.

The question is, are there any really safe communication apps? Last year the CEO of Telegram was kidnapped by France and released perhaps only when he promised to give back doors to governments.

At some point, we must just live and assume everything is monitored. If you aren’t actually planning to do bad things, perhaps the trade-off is worth it.

Maybe the Luddite/Amish lifestyle is better. Give up all the modern conveniences for peace of mind.

We all know that email, messaging, mobile phones are tools to control you and keep you a prisoner on their system. Convenient perhaps, entertaining usually but at what cost?

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Released in parallel, Louis Rossmann just put out a rant about Amazon editing books that you’ve already downloaded to Kindle, and as of next week you’ll no longer be able to download by wire (if I understand it, that means you won’t have a means to back up, and possibly access your original purchase.) This goes beyond their 2010-era retraction of 1984, and Rossmann goes over the under-disclosed “sanitizing” of Roald Dahl books.

You can also skip the video and read the known situation and edits at their Consumer Action Taskforce wiki.rossmanngroup.com and searching for “Amazon Kindle removes download feature of purchased book”.

This discussion (below) IS a youtube link (to “angry man ranting at camera”, his words not mine).

I recommend using an alternative video platform, or at least not being signed into any other accounts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfcoUdWCB9M

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I know there are some really good computer types here who could help, I’ve personally been a Linux user for 20 years now and I can still listen to a podcast (like this one) and learn new things.
My take is that the technology battle is already won by the spooks as far as most of us go.
The privacy invasion of our devices is a terminator that never sleeps, and no matter what I’ve been able to learn the state of things is always ahead of me and has a few hands behind it’s back if I ever get close.
Maybe I’m just a slow learner, but I think anyone really concerned about their privacy would be better served to just join up with the Amish and call it a day.
I wish I didn’t believe that, but based on my own experience that’s the truth as I see it.
If we really want to take digital privacy seriously it will be a serious and intensive crash course all on it’s own, and it could be done, but there’s going to be price paid for the capability.

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Chris, if you want to switch to Linux, I’m here to help.

No, don’t wipe your system. You will need to run parallel for a while until your are ready to make the cut.

Get a second computer. Most new systems are Linux install friendly. Lenovo is a good brand, as with many others. I’ve never worried about Coreboot. Maybe save Coreboot for later. You simply create a boot USB drive and install the OS.

Probably the biggest decision is which distribution (aka distro) do you install? Any of the mainstream distro’s are probably fine. There are some minor differences. Some are more security focused, privacy focus, or usability focused. You probably will want usability focus for a while until you know your way around. Honestly, the most important factor will probably be which OS does the person/people help you prefer to support.

I run Fedora Linux on my home systems, but that’s because I support Redhat systems for work. Fedora is good, but you will need to upgrade every year.

Rocky Linux is good for professional work stuff.

Ubuntu Linux is common.

Help to help. Good luck.

-Travis

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I’ve been around computers since the early 80’s as a field technician for several major computer mfgs. My take on the internet long before I realized that NO i’m not a conspiracy theorist, is that it was released in the mid 90’s and made available to the public and actually encouraged by the government for one sole purpose. To get people hooked on the internet and ingrain it into the fabric of society, why? The simple answer is for control and that is where we are today. It is hard to function without the internet, hell utility companies can’t function without it. If that weren’t the case then only the USA would have the internet.

The internet is the tool used to track the population, to see if you are using too much energy, your Tweets or any messages you post on social media. It will be the tool used if a particular government decides to use a digital currency.

Economist and forecaster, Martin Armstrong believes that Bitcoin was a government CIA psyop and that Satoshi doesn’t exist. It was created to condition people to accept the idea of digital currencies.

So, regardless of what operating system you are on or what devices you use to access the internet, once you are on the internet expect to have someone watching, logging your keystrokes and anything you post on the internet.

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To be fair the UK is poor and inconsequential on top of that, so they should really just pull out of that market. I was appalled at how poor and lowly paid English citizens were in 2016-2020 when I ran some consulting operations there. It was a backwards country in 2007, and even more so in 2020 when I stopped going there. It was just poor and miserable and nothing worked. It was even less functional than Germany! (Which is where I ran part of the business operations out of, and that was a catastrophic mistake of mine, but another store to tell on that)

The English worked hard, but were miserably compensated, and the whole country just looked, smelled, and felt like a down trotted has-been. Someone that’s done for life, but not quite dead yet.

The country was definitely feeling like a has-been at that time. Infrastructure, cities, the people felt tired and like they’d given up. And I must say it did as well in 2007 when I did consult in Scotland. Just to a lesser degree. They still had energy to say they liked the English as long as they stayed south of the Scottish borders. Other than that energy, they were also worn out and done over.

How a country can come from ruling nearly a quarter of the world to being a poor house being run around by invaders, and welcoming them, less than a century later is a story to research and tell! It’s quite the story.

Under Joe Biden, I am sure that the US wouldn´t have raised an objection with that sort of demand. Because he wanted the same 1984 atmosphere, and his regime.

But I am hoping that Trump will not tolerate that, and I feel quite certain he wouldn’t if he learned of it.

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Agree completely re Debian.

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If you agree with Martin that would put us both on the same page. (I’ve heard him say what you quoted).
We’re a solid 30 mainstream years into this now and there’s a full generation that hasn’t known life without the internet.
I am expecting the gauntlet to be thrown down soon.
That said, I’m still more dependent on the interwebs than a sane person should be.
And you’re right - Linux doesn’t fix that.

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My 2 cents regarding custom ROMs. I switched from iOS to Calyx about 4 years ago, then from Calyx to Graphene last year. Graphene is a much more powerful privacy tool, especially if you separate your use of the phone into different profiles (ie, “work”, “personal”, “finance”, “private”, etc). If you value privacy enough, then the inconvenience may be worth it.

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Great topic. I used to specialize in this stuff. I ran my own business as a computer repair, tech support, and consultant for micro businesses.

The first time I knew for sure that software companies were spying on me was in about 2001. I had a 1999 version of Intuit quickbooks and two things started happening after an update. One was that my computer would send data out Everytime I entered a deposit. Another was that a feature was being changed after the update.

I had to set my zone alarm firewall to not allow QuickBooks or any of its parts to communicate outside to the internet.

I have an old laptop with no hard drive and lots of ram. If I want a clean machine for research etc, I install a fresh copy of Linux into its memory from a DVD. There is no where for any data or cookies to be written and no where for it to be read from. It remains until I reboot the system and install a new os once more.

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TAILS works great on a computer like that. It is an OS runs off a USB only via RAM. Each time you boot it, it’s like a fresh OS install. Each time you remove it, it leaves nothing behind on the host computer.
https://tails.net/

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Analogy:

BIOS (basic input/output system) is the “brain stem” of the PC

OS is the cerebellum

Apache Open Office is what I use on my laptop. I refuse to use the M$ garbage when possible.

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Chris, the solution to this is already here. Bitcoin SV - the original bitcoin.

How does it do it?

Micropayments - the ability to pay fractions of cent over the internet. Using that model you can pay as you go, and never have to give up any private data because you’re using a “free” app.

For it to work it must be able to handle huge throughput?

Correct, it already has the highest of any blockchain, but scheduled for the end of Q1 is Teranode - it can sustain 1Million transactions per second and can scale much further.

As before, I would urge you to get Kurt WucketJr (the no.1 bitcoin historian imo) on the show for an interview to educate PP members about the real bitcoin and not that stunted, bank controlled one, BTC.

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Perhaps I could burn it to DVD or find a USB with a write lockout. Some of the SD cards still have them.

But yes the portable distros are a simple way to eliminate the spying overhead.