I'm new to this privacy thing, besides getting a vpn and tor. With this thing of ICE deporting people for simply having differing opinions, I'm paranoid. Is there anything I can do to avoid that happening to me? I'm not an immigrant nor do I look like one or sound like one, but it could reach to other people too. I am a woman and part of the lgbtq+ community. I've already deleted my pronouns and bios showing support for Ukraine, Palestine, and showing hate towards N*zis, I'm now wondering if I should delete my accounts altogether. I'm not entirely sure how to use tor or of any other method, I have experience with Nord though. Thanks.

Encryption can’t protect you from adding the wrong person to a group chat. But there is also a setting to make sure you don’t.

You can add your own nickname to a Signal contact by clicking on the person’s profile picture in a chat with them then clicking “Nickname.” Signal says “Nicknames & notes are stored with Signal and end-to-end encrypted. They are only visible to you.” So, you can add a nickname to a Jason saying “co-founder,” or maybe “national security adviser,” and no one else is going to see it. Just you. When you’re trying to make a group chat, perhaps.

Signal could improve its user interface around groups and people with duplicate display names.

I may need to visit the United States briefly, therefore I want to offline backup my text messages and signal messages from my GrapheneOS phone. Once I return home I want to restore my data from the offline backup. Does anybody have experience and recommendations for this?

Hi 👋 just shared the site with one of my buddies and he told me he doesn’t care much about it because there’s no way you’ll be 100% privacy enforced since you’re using an iPhone and sharing your location, name, birthdate , personal files, photos.

I’ve to say this gets to me but on the other side I’m also respectful of everyone‘s opinion because after all, this is what makes us special

How are you handling these circumstances usually, do you say something?

I really like the convenience of using fingerprint unlock for lockscreen and password manager. I do however don't like the thought of being forced to unlock both physically.

I use Android with GrapheneOS.

I have set up lockdown, but it takes some time to hold the power button and then click lockdown.

Any creative solutions?

I recently discovered this setting and thought it might be of interest to others::

This setting is intended to help our users in the European Economic Area (EEA), the United Kingdom and Switzerland control the use of their personal data to train, test, validate, and align our own Al models as well as third-party Al models

Fastbackgroundcheck. com says there's info on me on truthfinder, spokeo, peoplefinders and instantcheckmate. When I try going through all four of those sites takes a super long time, including a few times in the past when I tried getting reports on myself.

The progress bars reach 100% and reset continously. If these sites are legimate like some reddit users claim, then why or be upfront about wanting me to pay? Right now I'm convinced that these sites are snake oil, maybe they work if you pay but the behavior of the free options turn me off. They act 100% like typical scam websites, the kind that asks you to complete three surveys on external sites with fake progress bars.

Basic info like my full name, address, age, and siblings can be found with search engines easily but I feel like there's no point in trying to wipe it if there aren't methods that could definitely work.

I have a lot of friends and family that use SMS/RCS and I can't get them all to use Signal.

I have the option to send SMS from a simple FOSS SMS app, and then we can communicate back and forth.

I've heard something about RCS getting E2EE and find that appealing.

What is the future of RCS? What are my options, and should I just stick with SMS?

Edit: Stick with SMS when I have to, and use Signal etc when possible ofc.

A contractor for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and many other U.S. government agencies has developed a tool that lets analysts more easily pull a target individual’s publicly available data from a wide array of sites, social networks, apps, and services across the web at once, including Bluesky, OnlyFans, and various Meta platforms, according to a leaked list of the sites obtained by 404 Media. In all the list names more than 200 sites that the contractor, called ShadowDragon, pulls data from and makes available to its government clients, allowing them to map out a person’s activity, movements, and relationships.

ShadowDragon says in marketing material its tools can be used to monitor protests, and claims it found protests around Union Station in Washington DC during a 2023 visit by Benjamin Netanyahu. Daniel Clemens, ShadowDragon’s CEO, previously said on a podcast that protesters should not “be surprised when people are going to investigate you because you made their life difficult.”

“The long list of sites and services that ShadowDragon’s SocialNet tool accesses is a reminder of just how much data is accessible and collected from and about us to provide surveillance services to the government and others,” Jeramie Scott, senior counsel and director the Electronic Privacy Information Center’s (EPIC) Project on Surveillance Oversight, told 404 Media in an email. “SocialNet is just one example of the unchecked surveillance ecosystem that lacks any meaningful transparency, oversight, or accountability that allows the government to circumvent Constitutional and statutory protections to access sensitive personal data,” he added.

The leaked list of targeted sites and services include ones from major tech companies such as Apple, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, and TikTok. It also includes communication tools like Discord and WhatsApp; activity- or hobby-focused sites like AllTrails, BookCrossing, Chess.com, and cigar review site Cigar Dojo; payment services like Cash App, BuyMeACoffee, and PayPal; sex worker sites OnlyFans and JustForFans; and social networks Bluesky and Telegram. Even relatively obscure social networks are included in the list, such as BeReal.