REAL-ID Phone Access Coming Soon

[shelley at misanthropia.org]

On February 24, 2015 12:35:12 PM grarpamp <grarpamp at gmail.com> wrote:

--snip--

> In other news...
> http://motherboard.vice.com/read/looking-up-symptoms-online-these-companies-are-collecting-your-data
>
> Pissed off yet? Or still a sheeple?

I am plenty pissed off; have been taking action for a while now.  I take 
more steps than many people to try to block a lot of this data spying and 
siphoning (for which a few of even you have teased me!), yet I know it's 
never enough.

I have de-googled my phone as much as I possibly can.  I use no google 
products, have never used the google play store nor associated a google 
account with it (F-Droid & sideloading ftw) and use DDG or ixquick for search.

I use a good firewall and limit which apps can have root.  I use Ad Away 
and have modified my hosts file to block/loopback every analytics and 
tracking URL I can find, anything to do with google or Assbook (and many 
other popular sites that I personally do not use), all social media and 
sharing buttons, even gravatars.  I monitor logs to see what inter-app 
calls are being made.

I use FOSS, change app permissions and recompile .apks so they don't use 
permissions they don't need/shouldn't have.

Always blocking images in email is handy to stop web beacons.  I never 
click on links with a bunch of tracking info or when I can't see the exact 
target.

I don't use social media of any kind.

I don't allow Flash (ever) nor JavaScript or cookies except when 
temporarily necessary on sites I trust (my credit union and email 
provider), use private browsing with Flash/plug-ins disabled by defult and 
clear everything upon exit.  Use HTTPS everywhere possible.  Block or spoof 
my browser string, don't allow referrers...and probably more things I'm 
forgetting.  Like proxies.

No, I do not notice any appreciable delays as I browse; most pages actually 
load faster without all that tracking crap.  Yes, it means I can't access 
some sites.  No, I don't care that my browsing experience looks more like 
1995 than 2015.  I prefer it, actually (and I have no flashing .gifs or 
'punch the monkey and win!' banners, but I do miss the dancing baby ;) )

While that is much, much more than the average person does (even amongst 
some cypherpunks I know), it's never enough.  My only alternative is 
probably ditching the damn phone, and I have considered it more than once.

What about you (plural)?  What are you all doing to make it a little bit 
tougher for these bastards to track you?