During the past few years I was avoiding the increasing number of products or services that required biometric verification, specially face recognition (FR). But the things are getting harder are harder in my country:
- The largest e-commerce platform in latin america and the most used in my country requires FR to use it. It was possible to use cash if you buy from its website but since a couple of weeks it’s requesting me to identify using it’s app.
- The telecoms demands FR from now on if you want a new SIM card in case you lost your phone or it’s been stolen.
- The bank is now pressing me to use their app with FR as a 2fa when using homebanking from its website, something that wasn’t necessary up to some weeks ago.
- The government is in the same direction as it’s moving to digitalizing many burocratic procedures and also requires FR.
and the list is increasing quickly.
I’ve never used any private social networks and I’ve degoogled many years ago, the only non free software that I use is Whatsapp because in some countries in latin america is almost imposible not to use it, you need it even to call to the car towing service.
Anybody that is well informed knows the dangers of allowing such an amount of private information now tied to our face be available for hackers now equiped with AI, but frankly it seems a lost cause to fight against something that 99.9% of people dont worry about and give consent to do so to corporations (that sell all your data to whoever wants it) and governments (who use it as a tool of control).
I don’t know, may be I’m also worring to much and it’s not that serious, after all if tens of millions of people do the same the chances of being targeted by hackers is not different of being robbed in the street (at least in latin america) and with the obiquitous surveillance cameras plus the almost unavoidable need of a phone, the government probably know exactly where you are and how you look, so the information may be already available. Perhaps it’s time to give up and adapt to the world we now live in.
So. Individual pricacy measures are a lot like eating a vegan diet. There’s only so much any one individual can do. You are making things better in some small way by doing it, but once you’ve taken things as far as you, its time to switch from an individual journey to one of collectivization. Advocate to your friends and family about why you browse the internet weird and what we all stand to gain by banding together and doing it as a group. Not all of them will listen, but that’s okay. Evangelism isn’t about reaching everyone, its about reaching a few people. Movements are built by people trying to make them world better and you can do this.
Importantly, too, accepting that there’s only so much you can do will help you confront your anxiety. Anxiety is the emotion we feel when we wish we felt a different feeling from what we’re feeling. Its a uniquely insidious emotion in how when you feel anxious, you want to feel another way, and then you feed the anxiety by doing that. Breaking free of these loops are important if you want to make them world a better place because you need to be able to function and not be broken by your desire to improve things.
And hey. I believe in you. You can do this
Well, it seems that my bad english made it seem that I am suffering of anxiety or something. I just don’t like the abussive behavior of corporations and the government that exposes us unnecessarly to the risks of being hacked or scammed.
Oh, I think for me it was just that when I have thought patterns like “…is it time to give up?” My emotional color is anxiety. I have to pick myself back up by focusing on the value of focusing not only on protecting myself, but also protecting others. Just saw more of myself in you than I saw you for you I guess
If I should talk about an emotional color concerning to this I’d say it’s defeat. They will get what they want.
That’s debatable. It will depend on how radical we each are willing to be about our privacy individually.
For example, I have a friend that is sort of a privacy freak like me, however, he’s chosen to keep WhatsApp because some of the people in his life won’t use anything else.
I, on the other hand, do not have a single mainstream app or social network. Those who never heeded my warning 8 years ago that I was killing it all, and if they wanted to talk with me it was either Signal or visit me, basically fell off of the world for me.
Those I really care about have gone as far as moving to SimpleX with me. Most still use mainstream crap, but they chose to add SimpleX to their apps so that we can keep in contact regularly.
What I’m saying is, your success at how much you keep from the paws of big tech and big brother (regardless of where you live) will be inversely proportional to your ability to give a fuck. The less fucks you give, the more ground you’ll cover.