Should I care about privacy anymore ?

I had to switch to windows from Ubuntu in my laptop because of driver related issues.
Everytime I use Windows , I feel uneasy because of the data it collects but at the same time I am happy that I can play a couple of video games , my battery life is better and my display is better.

I own an Android phone , and no matter how many add ons I use , or VPN , I know that Google gets sufficient amount of data to know a lot about me.

It's getting harder and harder to keep my data private and it's becoming inconvenient as well.

In my country almost everyone I talk to uses Whatsapp. I removed my Whatsapp account for a few days and I barely talked to anyone and it was not a good feeling.

My point is , is fighting for privacy worth it ? How much inconvenience are we ready to accept ? Can I do anything to keep my data private and still use convenient services ? Please enlighten me .

Exactly why I do less about privacy anymore. Its too inconvenient!

Dude, yes.The entire point of fighting for your privacy is to make protecting your privacy less inconvenient, so companies make less money without you wanting that. Less people caring about privacy means the ones that do care have a harder fight.

Yes privacy is important but only minority have interest in it.

Majority want to live in matrix.

Matrix provides them all they want.

@vane very nice ref. Kudos

Yes, you should. Inconvenient? Is convenience the price worth your privacy?

I use all sorts of evil at work. All the comms apps are storing every message in their servers. I even have to use windows in a libvirt VM! But everytime I write smth I write with a thought in a back of my mind: "can I allow owners of this chat/email know this info? Should I maybe rephrase to mask some data? What if this file I save in my windows VM gets leaked? Can I afford this? Should I maybe use linux for this?" and so. At first it was very mechanic, I was very aware of each message, email, file, action. After some time it became as automatic as turning lights on before entering a room, or lifting a closet's lid before taking a piss.

In the end it's your answer to your own question that matters. Are you willing to be yet another cow they can milk in exchange to convenience? What is more valuable to you in life?

Google listens to everything you say. It knows where you are at all times, whether you select "allow" or not. It knows everything you type. It knows almost every website you visit. It knows who you call, when, and how long, and probably the contents of the conversation as well. Google records anything and everything it can, storing it indefinitely for repeated reprocessing and machine learning. It also sells much of this information, and freely shares it with the government.

Do people living under corrupt totalitarian regimes find the effort of fighting for their freedom too much? This is really not much different.

@netikras This. Except for peeing in the closet. That's ew.

@Root Not to mention your phone is always listening through its mic, even while it's in your pocket. I made a post about this earlier.

@Root wc -- Water Closet. Or do you prefer just spilling it all on the floor instead? I'll try not to judge. But then I'd rather never work with you in the same office :)

@netikras In a better world no one would need to ask themselves all these questions. The more people care for privacy and thus avoid services which are invading it, the higher the interest will be to cater to those. Thus there would be an economic reason for service providers to care more about privacy. Or pretend to do so.

Yes, it is inconvenient. But I'd say care about it but find your middle ground. You probably can't get a 10/10 without trashing all your interconnected devices, but better have some than nothing.

@saucyatom In a better world there would also be no diseases, no propaganda and war. You can continue working on your pipe dreams all you want - it does not change nor justify anything. It's a jungle. Just not with monkeys and tigers. It's rather a technological jungle. Everyone's trying to survive, everyone a tad bigger and stronger is trying to fiest on others, smaller and weaker ones.

And you do NOT have to avoid those services. Just be a sensible human being and only transfer data as if you knew there is a spy reading it and you did not want to let him know you know he's watching. No need to be cryptic.. Just... don't do TMI. And if you have to transfer more sensitive info -- use the fact that you are using multiple competing services: diversify

And as for convenience.. Seriously, what convenience is one losing? Not needing to think? I think that's being a cattle, not a convenience. Frankly I don't feel my XP as any less convenient than anyone's else.

@netikras thanks.

If I may suggest a book “Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence”

@Root even if you do not have a totalitarian regime in your country, your data is saved for decades. So if things change in the future, your data will still be available for them.

A small, out of context, leaked data from you can change/ruin your life. And it is very clear how TV can manipulate the information about something, for example.

So I prefer to keep my data safe, even if I have to use WhatsApp with some people.

@brunofontes It was a comparison. We're living under a regime like that; they just aren't violent yet.

@dudeking Alright and can you guarantee that the stored data (most companies and intelligence agencies store everything for as long as possible) can't be abused within 50 years from now?

@dudeking do not trust too much on that...

https://cnbc.com/2019/07/...

@dudeking I didn't say another employer, I meant in general.

They're already giving data 'away' through the prism surveillance program and except for that there are other companies which aren't ethical when it comes to data handling at all.

WhatsApp wasn't going to share/link data with Facebook when it was bought, that was a hard promise (same as no advertisements).
We now know that they've been doing this all along anyways so I guess you shouldn't trust any big data company with your data.

Things will change within 50 years from now and we can't oversee how that's going to impact us.

@dudeking

PMs are stored and processed on certain platforms. Facebook, anyone?
Location data is used by advertising agencies such as Google to show you badly targeted ads, thus making money.
Purchase history data is used by advertising agencies such as Google to show you badly targeted ads, thus making money.
Search history data is used by advertising agencies such as Google to show you badly targeted ads, thus making money.

@dudeking If you like ads and having your data processed, all good.

However, not everyone likes that.

@dudeking one leak that was published and they had to admit. How many others keep unpublished?

And you could be one of those 1000...

If you want to take a risk because you trust every single Google employee and trust any future government who could ask for this data, that's OK, but I prefer to do not trust them. :)

@dudeking Of course, but that doesn't mean one shouldn't be fighting against illegal mass surveillance programs.

Here a tiny example (they withdrew the plan after it becoming public and public outrage following that):
https://theguardian.com/money/2016/...