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This guy gets it. A privacy expert talks about the coming loss of privacy.

Internet Privacy Guy(sm)-f6af38ca

I found this video on the tube of Yoos. He is, to use his own words, “the Internet Privacy Guy. I’m a public interest hacker and technologist. I use my extensive knowledge of cybersecurity and tech to serve the public good. I care about privacy.

I warn you of digital manipulation, disinformation, mass surveillance. I also discuss alternative communication modes especially with a prepper focus. I discuss HAM radio, SDR, QRP modes, Digital modes when running portable. I am a General Class licensed HAM radio operator.

I’m a successful software architect and have built many enterprise systems. I also have an open-source social media app Brax.Me“

I recently watched a couple of his videos about phone privacy and “de-Google-ing” phones, from back in October of 2020(!) Talk about prescient…

He just dropped this video, after the events of the last week, and I think he says some things that will resonate with this community. Give him a listen. Comment and subscribe if you like.

9 replies on “This guy gets it. A privacy expert talks about the coming loss of privacy.”

Interesting, but I actually think that emphasizing privacy is the wrong way to go. I prefer emphasizing ownership of your own content. The GNU/Linuxy types have been preaching this for a while, and created Mastodon so that everyone owns their own content and data, and Gab is a fork of that code. You own the content you create, and can move it elsewhere if you get in a dispute with whoever you’re using to host yourself. The Inrupt Solid platform is doing something similar, but I don’t believe it’s a social network.

It’s not itself a social network, it’s a software development platform that can be used to develop network software, including social networks, that enforce user ownership of their own personal data. Presently there aren’t any release-quality apps based on it since it’s not itself release-ready yet.

Right. Gab is a social network, Solid is a platform that could have a social network built on it.

I discovered him last week. Looking into what people have said, it’s a mixed bag, with some praising him and others … not.

I installed his Android app and I’m not impressed. It might have good security and what they want to do is great but the implementation to this point is quite poor. The user interface is clunky and confusing and the app has a tendency to freeze. The underlying security might be good but I haven’t seen any third-party reviews of it (the standard for evaluating security, trusted third parties). IIRC, the software is public domain, so that’s promising because anyone can examine it.

I’m talking with them, offering suggestions (I designed and wrote software for almost 40 years) and they’re receptive, so there’s hope for improvement.

So I give him a definite maybe.

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