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So the other night I was on @TheCommieCon's twitch stream. We talked about the J6 White Riot, the inauguration, and the likelihood that Biden and congress will introduce surveillance legislation under the guise of stopping "domestic terrorism," but that will get used against us.
The conversation then took a turn into privacy and we discussed some tools that can be used to protect our anonymity, some cool orgs/individuals who are doing anti-surveillance work, and some other ways to thwart surveillance tech. Here is a thread of the things we referenced.
We talked about VPN's. Lots of folks had opinions on certain services. My VPN dropped like three times during the stream. It was super cringe. So my final word on this is do your own homework before selecting a service. Here is one guide: https://ssd.eff.org/en/module/choosing-vpn-thats-right-you
The best VPNs are the ones who don't collect and store your data so that if subpoenaed, they don't have shit to give. Here's another guide: https://freedom.press/training/choosing-a-vpn/
Next we talked about wiping ourselves from data brokering sites like spokeo, Pipl & whitepages. You can go to each individual site and navigate their opt-out process OR you can pay for a service to do it for you. https://joindeleteme.com/about-us/
We also talked about how those sites get our info, to begin with. One place is publicly available voter records. If you want to protect your info, consider filling out a voter confidentiality form. Most of the time this just takes a quick google search for your state's process.
We also talked about making smarter decisions when navigating the internet, specifically like making purchases. http://Privacy.com has a great burner card service that adds a layer of anonymity to digital purchases. It's not like crypto, but it can be helpful.
We talked a little bit about keeping our emails secure too. I mentioned a website called https://haveibeenpwned.com/ that you can plug your emails into to see if they've been part of a data breach. Once you check that, you can take some steps to change passwords and login practices.
I suggest folks use a password manager like @LastPass or @Bitwarden. Password managers are helpful because they store all our login information so we don't have to remember it and most will generate strong passwords for us too.
I also suggest enabling two-factor authentication for all your online accounts and using a tool like @Authy to login as opposed to your phone or whatever.
In my opinion, the absolute coolest part of the conversation was about who out here is doing the best anti-surveillance work and deadass, hands fucking down, its SEX WORKERS. We should absolutely be looking to sex workers because they have been on the front lines of this fight.
An awesome collective of surveillance fighting sex workers is @hackinghustling. They are pretty incredible and doing great work. Another great organization is @STOPSpyingNY - Surveillance Technology Oversite Project.
Sex workers have so much on their plates, so be sure to find one and send them some cash if you've got it. @swopusa and @swopbehindbars are great places to start.
Other orgs that are fighting to protect our rights in digital spaces are @accessnow, @mediajustice and @EFF. Each of these sites has excellent resources to help us navigate privacy, surveillance and activism.
Finally, we talked about how art and fashion can be used to fight the surveillance state. I specifically mentioned Adversarial Fashion. https://adversarialfashion.com/
From their site: "The patterns on the goods in this shop are designed to trigger Automated License Plate Readers, injecting junk data in to the systems used by the State and its contractors to monitor and track civilians and their locations."
They even have DIY guides so that you can make your own because the more of us that have this info and skills, the safer we all become. https://adversarialfashion.com/pages/diy-resources
Okay, that's basically it. I may have forgotten some things but I'm not perfect. 
Thank you for having me on @TheCommieCon! Can't wait til the next time.
Thank you for having me on @TheCommieCon! Can't wait til the next time.
