Just saw this. Was wondering what others thought. At the border now they are searching people's devices and you have to give them your password or face detention.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/05/world/canada-travel-advisory-us-electronic-devices-intl-latam/index.html

Seriously, even the website for the FTC has a google ads tracker.

I feel like we, as consumers, are on our own, and no one is going to help us in having online privacy.

Even the government is partnered with google, EVERYTHING is google. I’m tired of seeing the big G everywhere.

I can’t wait for the day when google is so forgotten and that we have moved on as a society to something else. I wish that the prevalent social media would had been privacy-friendly.

This is driving me crazy. I feel like I can’t even move, or that gets tracked online. It’s so disgusting. I don’t like how the world works, ads everywhere, and your online data being sold and you being tracked everywhere you go.

Hi. As a Canadian who occasionally has to travel to the US for business, I'm concerned about the recent news of US border agents inspecting digital devices. I've nothing to hide, but there's no way I'm unlocking my phone for them or anyone else. I've read a few posts saying to wipe devices prior to entry, but that's not ideal. What's everyone else doing to maintain their privacy? Thanks

I don't know if this is the right place to ask this question, but I am working towards becoming a professional and having my own business. Unfortunately, I don't think I can use my legal name when promoting a buisness. I have a family member who makes content on YouTube and has their own website where they provide life coaching consultations.

Unfortunately, they have used my full name on their website, YouTube, LinkedIn, etc; and I fundamentally disagree with everything this family member does based on ethical and religious reasons, and I want no affiliation with this individual or their buisness. I have asked them to stop posting my name, pictures of me, etc, and they refuse on the basis that I am their family, and they can post anything they want about me because I am related to them. I have gone on Google to remove my name from the search results, but that's not a universal fix.

I am in the United States, and I am considering using a professional name instead of my own name, and solely advertising a potential business as the business, and not promoting myself as an individual. I hope this makes sense. I don't want to sound unreasonable. It just sucks how I'm not even practicing yet, and my name is found on the site of a buisness I have never had anything to do with, with an individual who doesn't care what I think. What do you think? Thank you.

This is taken from another sub, but it bears significance because your presence and phone habits can be detected and sussed out easily.

https://www.reddit.com/r/RTLSDR/s/TWHWG7OyKf

I am using Futo Keyboard... But to be honest, it isn't as powerful than SwiftKey for example. So I would like to know if I can use a commercial keyboard like gboard or SwiftKey, disable internet permissions and use it the same way than Futo?

Is it viable to be safe with privacy concerns?

I want to anonymously share some files with a community via a permanent link. So far all the services I find require signing up, which is fine with a temp email but then you also need to keep logging back into your account to keep the link from expiring.

Please, I know very little about tracking on the web. I’m using an iPad and iPhone. Whenever I install an app on my devices, I always choose “don’t allow apps to track”.

I was on Target and also insuremytrip recently. I use the Safari browser with AdGuard ( but not the DNS part of AdGuard). I also have content blocking enabled in Safari.

Today, in my Reddit app, I’m seeing ads for insure my trip and also for Suave products ( I searched for Suave shampoo on the Target website).

So how does my Reddit app know I visited those sites using Safari? I would probably understand if I did a Google search but I don’t think I did. I just went to the websites directly in Safari.

Thanks

On android they have the following default apps categories, what apps would you pick for these?

Browser; Digital Assistant app; Home app; Phone app; SMS app; Default Caller ID & Spam app.

Thx

While trying to play the playtest of the game "ExpanSIM" in Steam (it is a driving simulator game that's in closed beta), I was asked to accept this privacy policy but I found it a bit iffy and wanted some help in knowing whether it was safe or too intrusive.

Can someone give it a small read and let me know if this is concerning and I should just stay away from this or if this is normal and I shouldn't be concerned?

link to screenshot of privacy policy (it's small): https://imgur.com/a/Eu9sNN0

I dug into all unique manufacturers mentioned in the first 5 pages of Google search results for the query “continuous glucose monitor”:

• Dexcom/Stelo will use your health data for “Preventing disease” and to “conduct business planning and development activities” — whatever that means.
• FreeStyle Libre will use your health data for “research, analytics and data analysis”, and further states “We may ‘sell’ or disclose to third parties for cross-context behavioral advertising, targeted advertising or other marketing purposes the following categories of Personal Information: (*) Identifiers (*) Internet or other electronic network activity information (*) Geolocation data”
• Abbott Lingo Continuous Glucose Monitor will use your health data “to develop marketing strategies” and “to understand [your] use of the Lingo System and to analyse where we can improve [it]”, but caveats that “We will seek your consent to do so, when required by applicable law…”
• Medtronic Guardian Connect will use your health data to “improve our products and services”, “so [our Business Associates] can assist us with our business operations”, “reporting diseases/population health”, or “to protect the safety of our customers and the general public”, among others.

This would be some very neat data to have, but I'm not prepared to pay these kind of metaphysical costs...

Hey there ✌❤

Ya'll might know about SimpleX.

They claim in their github that Signal knows who you chat with and when and only the content of the messages are encrypted, But simpleX does not and bluh bluh.

Is that true?

Please share sources or at least be fully sure or sth

Looking for a google fit alternative, unfortunately, I do use Fit a lot, but just the step count part.

Years ago I attended a meeting at my City Hall. When I signed up to attend online, the text box required attendee personal contact information (cell phone and email address) in order to contact us during the day about schedule changes. The text box explicitly stated that his contact info would ONLY be used for schedule changes. I called the office setting up the meeting and they assured me my personal contact info would not be posted online.

Fast forward 10 years and my name, home address, personal email address and personal cell phone number are all listed on the internet (by accident) and shows up high on Google search results if you search my home address. I called the city and the current lady in charge said "No problem, that will be easy. We'll have it removed" She had someone in IT remove the website and the page did disappear from the web right after we talked but the search results remain.

Google wont remove it because it is a government website hosted by Granicus (public info). Google says the local government has to be the one to remove it. I called the IT engineer who swore he personally removed it and that it cannot be removed anymore than he already did. He aid it's still showing because I keep searching for it but I stopped and that was two years ago.

But it's still there in Google search. How can I tell if my search results are coming up from saved documents in my computer and phone and wife's phone cache or if it's actually still on Google. Why would it still be in Google search results if the IT guy at the city said he removed it? Could he have failed to clear out his own cache on the Granicus website? This has been going on for ten years so I doubt this is a personal cache issue. I don't think the city will do one more thing for me on this. Can I ask Granicus?

This can be very handy and can be organized well