We need to stop the attacks against those who are trying to level up their privacy
We need to stop the attacks against those who are trying to level up their privacy
There are lot of people in the privacy communities who are shaming and attacking those of us who want take take privacy seriously. more than just using firefox and a vpn. So many people are trying to influence the privacy community to not use whonix or tor browser. That it's paranoid and extreme to leave your phone at home. And so on.
They keep pushing this propaganda without even knowing what they are talking about. They will keep spamming everywhere that you don't need to protect your firmware from physical access adversaries because the only adversaries who can do something like that are feds and feds will never target you unless you are a cartel leader or running a darknet market or something very terrible.
But these same people who spread this propaganda can't even tell you what the difference is between bios and uefi. Which means they have no idea what they are talking about and are just spreading propaganda/disinformation.
Why would they do that? They are probably american feds. We all know there is lots of evidence of feds like fbi,nsa,cia corruption and they all hate privacy and keep spamming their propaganda about if you have nothing to hide then you don't need privacy. With that in mind it's obvious that they are doing at least some sort of propaganda/influence campaigns to slow down, derail, end privacy activism.
We also know it doesn't take much to become a terrorist. UK gov has officially publicly announced that anyone on X who retweets an ongoing protest is a terrorist and they will be arrested. Elon musk is officially a terrorist and the uk gov has repeatedly asked usa to hand him over. So it's very easy to become targeted by feds, you dont have to do anything bad, just use freedom of speech.
And in france it was many times in the news about a group of friends who were arrested for using Signal. A girl they tried to convince to start using signal called the police and said they are using anonymous communication called Signal and then they were arrested and all their computers taken and forensics went through all the data on their computer and judge said its criminal evidence they have ad blockers on their browser.
It's an infinite list of evidence about how tyrannical the feds are and it doesn't take anything to become targeted by them, just bad luck.
Imagine if you are traveling and go to a hostel and tell the people you're staying there together with that your computer is off limits, no touching it and you will know because you have lots of security to detect tampering. If they start gossiping about this and then call the police you will probably have your computer confiscated and then forensics will go through it. Or maybe they'll send an undercover hacker to try some covert physical access attacks.
And this is just talking about feds being adversary. There are also criminals that are hackers. And feds can be criminals too, like the high ranking cia officer who recently traveled south america and drugged and raped dozens of women before he was finally caught.
This all leads to my suggestion. I think we need to stop the feds influence and propaganda campaigns against the privacy communities. Stop shaming and attacking people for wanting more privacy than you. We need to start banning these people. Are there any privacy communities remaining where you can say you're using tor browser without getting attacked for being an "extremist" and paranoid just because you use tor browser or leaving phone at home?
I'm happy there are so many that agree with me. Remember to not get stuck in the details but it's about the bigger picture I'm saying here. To the few who are questioning the little stories I said and asking for sources: I didn't think it was necessary, i honestly believed most here would have heard of it. Of course you won't find an "official" source because of all the corrupt censorship the governments are doing. That france story was a hot topic in all the privacy and tech communities when it was happening. I found discussions everywhere about it. If you can't find any good sources for these stories then I maybe will have trouble finding it too, maybe it is gone because of censorship. And even if I do find it, then it will just give the feds more meta data about me because they are probably angry at me for making this post and want to find me and punish me for making this post. I bet half the downvotes are from feds.
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I do not mean to sound rude, but this reads like a paranoid conspiracy theorist's diary entry.
There are lot of people in the privacy communities who are shaming and attacking those of us who want take take privacy seriously.
Okay, and there are a lot of people who aren't doing those things and are either supportive or neutral on your choices. The internet is full of people with opinions. I suggest blocking the people you don't like.
And in france it was many times in the news about a group of friends who were arrested for using Signal.
Citation needed. Your third- or fourth-hand account is so vague that I wonder if the devil has been lost along with the details.
This all leads to my suggestion. I think we need to stop the feds influence and propaganda campaigns against the privacy communities.
You haven't demonstrated that this is happening. It probably is to some degree, but you haven't given any kind of diagnostic evidence that anyone could use to detect a "fed" over an earnest human being with a shit opinion. How would you make that determination? What if I earnestly disagree with someone using Tor, because my foundation of information is based on a lie? Do I deserve to be banned, or should I be educated?
Ultimately, I don't know why you care what other people think. If they think you're some weird degenerate for using Tor and leaving your phone at home, that's their problem. If you ask people not to use your computer, and they think you're a degenerate because of it, that's their problem.
By all means, take your privacy seriously and do what makes you feel safe, but that doesn't mean there's bad actors lurking in every shadow. Your desire for privacy should not lead you to paranoia.
And in france it was many times in the news about a group of friends who were arrested for using Signal.Citation needed. Your third- or fourth-hand account is so vague that I wonder if the devil has been lost along with the details.
It piqued my curiosity. The only references I could find were the Telegram CEO being arrested earlier this year (widely reported on) and a group arrested in 2023 for associating with a Kurdish militant faction (YPG). That incident had some misdirected media attention towards the encryption tools used.
Yeah, my problem with later retellings of stories like OP's is I have no way to verify if they've missed the plot or some pertinent details that might point to a legitimate reason they would be arrested. "They used Signal" is hardly incriminating on its own, and OP strikes me as paranoid and not especially skeptical.
I'm happy to be wrong, but I can't just take OP's word that their recounting is accurate. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
I do remember a story a while ago about such French people... But those were previously involved in protests or planning thereof, in which case scrutiny is very expected regardless of what tools they'd use.
Here is the story OP might be thinking of https://www.laquadrature.net/en/2023/10/06/the-beginning-of-the-8-december-trial-is-also-the-judgement-of-the-right-to-privacy-and-encryption/
So nobody was arrested for using signal, however it was considered as incriminating evidence during the trial that they protected their privacy and didnt want to give their im encryption keys to law enforcement