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this post was submitted on 14 Apr 2026
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privacy
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Big tech and governments are monitoring and recording your eating activities. c/Privacy provides tips and tricks to protect your privacy against global surveillance.
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I run all my stuff in a private tab nowadays. And nuke all cookies etc each session.
Also, make sure I have anti-fingerprinting enabled.
With a VPN.
The only annoying thing is I get a few texts/emails saying "A new device just accessed your account. Was it you?". Yes, yes it was. And I'm not relying on a cookie or fingerprinting for security.
Private tabs do nothing for the backend, your ISP, browser, search engine, and any sites you visit, can still see everything you do. All private tabs do is they don't save history or cookies on your frontend.
VPN hides your data from your ISP, but there are still workarounds. Multi-hop can make you harder to triangulate though.
You still need to use a privacy-centric browser and search engine or else the ones you use can still send information about you back to their servers where they can build a profile on you. They won't have your real IP address as long as you never connect without a VPN, but any little data they collect on you can be collated with the rest to profile you and potentially identify you.
Even with browsers like firefox or waterfox, you still need to enable all of the security settings or else there are gaps that can be exploited. HTTPS-only mode, DNS over HTTPS, anti-tracking extensions, etc...
Even then, I wouldn't be surprised if there's an unseen gap somewhere. But it's a lot better than using google and microsoft and no vpn.
Vpns are over rated.
If you trust your ISP to examine all your web traffic, and if you don't mind every site you visit knowing your real IP address, and if you're not worried about hackers and sniffers on public wifi stealing your data, then I suppose you don't need one.
But if by overrated, you mean they only handle certain aspects of security and aren't a complete solution by themselves, then I agree. But no one who understands VPNs expects them to be a complete solution by themselves.
Depends on why you're using it.