Tim's journal

This article about applying harm reduction to your secure use of the Internet has been going around. I can't share it in good conscience without adding a few things to it. I work for Google, but the following is my personal opinion.

If you're concerned about your data being collected (and I understand that you may be concerned about Google retaining your data not because you think Google will use it inappropriately, but because you fear that the federal government will require them to surrender it), use Chrome without being logged in. People disagree on how safe Tor really is, but my odds are on "not." If you don't have the level of technical expertise necessary to read the source code for yourself, you probably shouldn't be risking your life on it. It doesn't guarantee full anonymity. The reasons why are fairly complicated, which is a good sign you might want to avoid being lulled into a false sense of security.

For email, I wouldn't really recommend riseup. The author alludes to this, but: any widely used anarchist/radical site has been compromised already. Having a low volume of data makes you an easier target.

A friend I trust has confirmed that Signal is trustworthy. I agree with this article that regular SMS is not secure.

Passwords: use a password manager, turn on 2-factor wherever you can. Pretty much what they say.

Google: Don't log in when searching if you're worried (use multiple browser windows). As an insider, I can say Google takes user trust and privacy extremely seriously. I can't share everything that backs up that belief, but I will vouch for them.

It was pointed out to me that: "Turning off geolocation on a cell phone doesn't do much; the government can and will subpoena cell phone tower records which provide enough geolocation information."

If you would like to see how Google works with government requests for data, watch this official video on how Google responds to search warrants.

I don't trust Duck Duck Go any further than I can throw them, honestly. I would say the same thing about any other small service. They may be trying to do the right thing, but there are lots and lots of ways to retain more data than you intend to, and it takes a huge amount of human resources to not do that.

tl;dr: Only big companies have the resources to actually protect your privacy. Whether they want to do that is a different story. I'm confident that Google does want to do that, because without user trust, Google has no business.

Pretty much nothing is resistant to the government coercing you or your friend with the email server or Google into giving up data, because coercion is how the government works.

Use non-discoverable media when possible. Talk in person.

Whatever you're doing, think about what security people call your "threat model": what are you trying to defend against? What concrete risks do you face if your data gets into the wrong hands? What are the benefits of using a communication mechanism that's subject to surveillance? An example of threat modeling is your bicycle lock: if you have a nice bike and you ride in a major city, you might want to carry a heavy-duty Kryptonite U-lock at all times, plus extra locks for the wheels. That's because you can infer, based on information that you have, that your bike is attractive to thieves, there are many thieves, and they will try hard to steal your bike. If you have a rusty bike and live in a small town, you might be OK with a cable lock because the benefit of not having several pounds of metal to carry around outweighs the risk of theft, and a good U-lock costs more than your bike did. You can think about analogous trade-offs as they apply to your use of networked communication technologies.

This is one post where it's perfectly fine to well-actually me if you have security or systems expertise.

I hate to say one more thing about Steve Jobs. But last night, after I lost cell phone signal while driving through wildest Marin and could no longer listen to Pandora, I turned on the radio to an archived Fresh Air interview with Jobs from 1996.

And he had all these inspiring things to say about how at Apple, they believed that everybody should be able to use technology, and that what's more, math and science should be for everybody.

But he didn't really mean it, because the people who work in factories in China assembling Apple products don't get to learn about technology or science, because they're paid such low wages that they can't possibly have time to. This is not an accident; without exploiting people this way, Apple wouldn't be able to sell you the products that entertain you so (including the one I'm using to type this post) at such low prices.

Nor do the people who suffer ill health or early death because of environmental degradation caused by Apple's manufacturing processes (they have one of the worst environmental records in the tech industry) get the chance to enjoy the delights of math, science and technology.

So when Steve Jobs said that technology was for everybody, he didn't really mean everybody, and he knew it, and everyone he was speaking to knew it. "Everybody" means white people, upper-middle-class people, Westerners, people who have privilege. Everybody else just doesn't quite make the grade of being considered "people".

And that's one of the fundamental problems I have with working in the field that I hypothetically still work in: you have to listen to people saying all these grand things about access to technology, and you have to know that those grand things fall somewhere in between meaningless and mendacious because they're deeply predicated on the maintenance of social inequality. You have to know it without talking about it, because the price of talking about it falls somewhere in between hostility and banishment. You have to embrace hypocrisy.