The title says it all. Part of what i do now is to convince people to care about their privacy. I know I cannot force people to do anything. And I have a charisma level of -1, if this was an rpg. Like its nonnexistent.
I feel lonely in general because it feels like people make me feel like I’m delusional for caring about protecting my privacy. Maybe there is a support group for that🤣🤣🤣
But anything I can specifically say that works best in planting a seed in people’s mind?
You must log in or # to comment.
One thing I love about Germany is that people have this understanding where privacy is fundamental and not something to argue about. Because they know being able to easily identify people leads to disaster. It’s just about a political swing away.
Start by your own privacy.
I boarded that train about twenty years ago. I tried the evangelizing route. I failed miserably. Which led me to care for myself first and foremost.
I started by abandoning Windows. Not of my own volition; I bought a computer that had no OS. Enter Linux. None of my family, friends or acquaintances understood. It was all about the convinience. When my machines started outperforming while outliving theirs, it caused a ripple.
Then came the usual slew of questions: where can I get a free anti-virus, office, media reader, whatever? That was when I introduced FOSS. After the initial resistance, things just settled into place. LibreOffice works. VLC works. PeaZip works. Thunderbird works. Etc.
When smartphones became a thing, I started moving as fast as I could towards FOSS. This made things a bit more laughable as “free” android applications are ubiquous. But they fill your phone with junk and ads. While my apps provided me ease of use, safety, security and privacy.
But when push came to shove, I just refused to join. First I left FBMessenger. I never boarded Whatsapp. I never entered Instagram or any major social networks. I discovered Signal and remained there.
It’s my way or no way.
I typically point to the real world and that seems to work:
- Your garden has a fence
- Your windows have curtains so that you close when you switch on the lights inside
- Your bathroom window uses frosted glass so that you cannot be seen showering from outside
- You sometimes whisper so that not everyone can hear what you say
None of them are super safe, but you still follow these precautions. All we ask is to be as careful on the internet.
The thing is, people by and large don’t want to be convinced. They want their convenience and ease of use, they don’t want to learn a whole new paradigm, least of all one that requires constant vigilance and understanding of the risks. I can’t blame them, they have a lot on their mind, and their existing skill set might not be relevant to privacy issues. People in general resist change and effort. I do. You do too.
It’s less about you, and more about them. People will only start taking steps when it all clicks for them. What the catalyst will be is impossible to tell, since people are wired differently. All we can do is talk about privacy and advocate for it with people who are willing to have the discussions. Don’t expect to go in and change people’s minds. It’s horribly difficult and you will be disappointed. Instead, think of it as giving people perspectives and starting points for their own journeys. If something happens and they are finally willing to start doing the work, they will at least have some context and words, labels to use. They may even come to you for more. They may not.
Important point to think about. People want comvience and comfort. I think we have gotten to the point where switching to privacy respecting options is easy and painless. Using signal is easy, using lemmy is easy, and even installing linux and other os is easy. Its just getting people to spend the time to do it. Even im moving slow as hell.
Thats truu, its more about the other people. I think i get distressed because people dont care and I should stop it🤣🤣🤣
Thank you so much
Not just want, need. Picture having 2 kids and 2 jobs, privacy is less important than feeding the family.
That’s an extreme compared to who you are likely talking to, but try putting their concerns in life under that framework. What would make privacy worth their time? What is a consequence they actually care enough about to take time away from the things they have to do?
-
“Easy and painless” depends on your point of view, and we here tend to be biased. For example, just a couple of months ago I had to explain to “a normal person” how to make backup copies of a folder to a pen drive. She did not want additional backup software (and I still don’t know if W10 would have had the functionality out-of-the-box). Copypasting files was too difficult. In the end she decided to go with “save as”, which sounded like a horrible idea to me, since she’couldn’t remember how to open anything in Word that wasn’t in the recently used list when starting the software, and she is going to lose track of which file is which at some point. I doubt it would be “easy and painless” for people like her, who are very common outside our little bubble.
-
Making someone change their opinion is not a sprint, but a marathon. State your opinion openly when relevant, don’t get into an argument, let it brew, mention it again when it comes up, live as you “preach”. That person I mentioned? Happily using Signal with me. Eager(!) to try Linux once W10 support runs out. I’ve told her I’ll install Mint DE on my laptop and loan it to her for unhurried testing and learning this summer while having her familiar backup to lean on if it gets difficult, and to install the same on her own computer when the support runs out, if she still wants me to.
Its definitely a marathon😭😭 i still have more privacy stuff left to do. Including getting a new email account, switching my main laptop to linux, deleting accounts.
Truu, maybe i have more tech knowledge than i think, so its easy and painless for me🤣 youre right, maybe not for others
It’s a neverending process. 😄 I’ve been at this for some 3-4 years now, and was ready to delete WhatsApp only about 6 months ago, and it’s already left me out of some local groups. Worth it though, and one group moved with me. And just now in the process of hopefully moving from Graphene to PostmarketOS (functional on an OP6) or Ubuntu Touch (to be installed on a FP4), just a matter of deciding which one. In retrospect, I could have skipped this Graphene phase and just gone from Divest to Linux, but I wasn’t ready then.
IMHO if you try to do things before it feels like “okay this works, next I want to try…”, you’re likely to just get overwhelmed and take a step back.
Truu it definitely is😭😭 im trying put linux on my surface tablet, its gonna be a hot mess.
Wait your moving from graphene? Yeah if you dont own a pixel, i guess you have to🙄🙄
Truu linux is a big step but it will work out! Good luck❤️❤️
Don’t get me wrong, Graphene would still be my choice for privacy & security. But what started out as a quest for privacy has somehow morphed to include FLOSS idealism, even AOSP derivatives feel “too google” now and I feel bad carrying a Pixel.
I feel the same. Like why do we have carry a google device to ungoogle ourselves. Its a confusing topic🤣🤣
Personally in my head( just in my head, not facts), i do not believe that pixels have any better hardware than my one plus. I think its suscipious. Graphene is only one not offering to other phones, so hmmm.
-
“You don’t care about privacy? Why not give me your bank login, then”
More seriously, You don’t have to convince people of anything. Sooner than later some huge leak will happen or anythign more intimate that will still impact them, say, like the story of this dad sending a pic of some intimate part of their sick kid’s to their doctor and being flagged by Google AI and being arrested for sharing child porn. And then they will realize why it mattered to protect our privacy.
I just compare it to having a stalker. Imagine being in your bedroom and having someone looking at you from outside the window. Now, would you be ok with it if the person was invisible?
Yikess truuu😭😭 gottta remember to put my phone on airplane mode at night🤣
If you’re in the US, you could point to the news. Even garden variety libs should be a little nervous about the increasing police state
I think if you just publicly practise decent privacy, people will be more inclined to do the same. e.g. all my friends know I’m not on WhatsApp and don’t use proprietary software in general. They know to talk to me on other platforms, and the fact that I’m like this means that others will likely feel more able to do the same if they are inclined. Nobody ever told me to care about privacy; I have always thought it was creepy if others can see all my personal business. I can’t imagine that that’s such a rare innate mindset to have, so other people who feel the same way should feel more able to put that into practice if they see you doing so. If they really want to broadcast all their personal data to the state and tech companies then they are within their right to, and I don’t see the point in trying to convince them to not do what they want to do.
Well, I’m forced to use Snapchat and discord by some dildos at school, who are to lazy to remember my phone number.
Forced? How? Why can’t you just uninstall them?
And not talk to my schoolmates about critical school info?
I don’t know what info is so critical that you can’t miss it but also can only possibly get it on Snapchat or Discord. If you use it to talk to other students you could get them to talk to you on another platform, otherwise it doesn’t really sound like they’re worth talking to, but you do you.
HW, grades, rescheduled tests, etc.
You don’t have any way to find out about these things outside of Discord and Snapchat from your classmates??? How do your classmates find out then? It’s not going to spontaneously generate into a Discord server. There has to be an official channel where people find out about these things.
Well, private chats on teams (with 1 person for some reason) and info sharing by mouth.
I have friends who care about privacy but they need phones that can do Uber and washing machine apps. So I’m the only one i know with a private FOSS phone.
Washing machine apps? Thats wild.😭😭
Oh all they need to do is shelter the app and download from aurora🙌 hopefully. Thats too wishful thinking because sometimes the micro g doesnt work and app from aurora looks like trash.🤣🤣🤣
Yeah the washing machine app is for the public laundromat. I tried it on GrapheneOS with everything enabled but it was lacking something that is only on stock Google Android. I haven’t tried it on a MicroG phone yet.
Oh yeah definitely try micro g!
Wilddd that they need an app for that…
Most people are all like: “derp derp! Nothing to hide nothing to fear duuuuur 🤤”. There’s no reasoning with them. Don’t beat yourself up over it.
Aww thanks!! My issue is i expect too much from people.🤣🤣 so i needa chill.
Correct. Besides, those people aren’t going to be much use in the future war against Elon musk’s drone army.
Ooof truu🤣
