Mad at Meta? Don't Let Them Collect and Monetize Your Personal Data

Is this rhetorical? Nothing. Every website that adds their code will be tracking you. Every friend, acquaintance, or anyone that you’ve shared your contact with for what ever reason that has given them access to their contacts has provided your info for you. There’s nothing you can do about it.

At the rate we’re going, it will soon be law that you have to allow them to track you. The Zuck just hasn’t figured out yet that if he writes larger checks, he can get an executive order that would benefit him.

If you live in one of the states that has strong privacy regulations send Meta a data deletion request. Or if you are curious about the data they have on you, send them an access request to get a copy of your data, and then a deletion request.

In some cases Meta ignores these requests. If that happens to you then complain to the state regulator. Both sending requests and complaining is easy as sending an email / filling in a form.

It's almost certain that you've agreed to privacy terms somewhere (even if just a misclicked cookie box) that has the lines:

"You consent to processing... by us and our partners..."

Where the partners list includes 400 or so companies, one of which is for sure Meta.

Would this hold up on court? No idea. But I'm sure Meta will happily take you consent and run with it, as will all the other companies.

They'll keep a shadow profile on you anyways. If you want Meta to not know you exist, it's probably almost impossible.

> What can I do, under US law, to minimize what they store about me and my behavior, or at least keep tabs on them?

Nothing. They just make shadow profiles. You can sue them (see Google), but they get a pat on the back.

Tailscale is a bit overpowered for just using custom DNS. Even if it’s “free” for personal use.

A simple WireGuard server setup at home configured with my custom DNS resolver to block known tracking urls and setting up VPN profiles on devices works for me.

So how do I make my mom do this? /s Seriously, even I would have to spend a day or two to figure this out. We need something simple for 99.99% of people to use.

> it's easy to stop using Facebook. It's a lot harder to stop using Google or Amazon.

Not in my country, where Facebook owns basically the entire messaging space through Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp. I have been able to switch my default search engine, email provider, mobile OS, office suite, etc. from Google no problem, but the network effect has been too strong to get most of my friends out of Meta's ad network. It doesn't help that most groups and basically all events are organized through there.

The only real messaging alternative with significant adoption at this point seems to be Telegram, which I cannot support for numerous reasons, primarily for the founder selling the entire user base of vkontakte to an authoritarian state.

As a Swede, the Amazon comment is funny.

They came here perhaps two years ago and everybody I know agrees they suck and can not compete with our local alternatives. They're not cheaper and the website is an utter mess of auto translations and dark patterns. Order flash storage and pray it's not counterfeit. We use Prisjakt[1] to compare prices and price history between shops.

About Google... Yes, YouTube is hard for me to avoid. I use StartPage for search (which is Google search proxy just like DDG is a Bing proxy). Switching to DDG wouldn't be that much of a sacrifice. I don't have a Google account and YT works well via RSS. FreshRSS is basically my YT frontend.

Facebook is the hardest to leave, without a doubt. Civil society isn't organized around any of Amazon's or Google's services. Parent group for school? Facebook. A group for your neighborhood? Facebook. Local trading of goods? Facebook marketplace. I've made the data takeout and have been hovering over that account deletion button I don't know how many times... But I don't follow through.

So, I respectfully don't agree. :)

[1] https://www.prisjakt.nu/produkt.php?p=6498581

It’s pretty easy to stop using Amazon.

The federal government is not a unitary organization. It's logically consistent to both not like the president and want congress to pass privacy laws.

The right federal privacy laws would protect people regardless of the flavor of the 4 years if they're actually enshrined in law and would take something other than an executive order to undo.

It's not just about the US or the current or previous US govt: there are billions more tech users in EU, Canada, Asia, Central & South America, Africa. They also have differing levels of electronic privacy. EFF has members in those countries too.

The next major accountability moment for measuring the use of tech will be the 2/2025 German federal election, Canadian and Australian elections, also Chile, Norway, SG. When combined with 2024 (US, UK, France, India, SK, [0]) should at least give a pretty rich readout on the state of digital media and privacy, also YT/FB/IG/TT/Twitter/Bluesky/Rednote

[0]: Pew Research: "Global Elections in 2024: What We Learned in a Year of Political Disruption" https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2024/12/11/global-electio...

The current administration is an.. unprecedented one to say the least. Maybe I'm old.

Trump is neither the government, nor is he "the laws", nor allowed to make laws.

https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/education/three-branches/what-...

I trust the Federal government, if it follows all the procedures with all the safeguards in place.

The only way that the ever-growing risks inherent in being dependent on centralized platforms will ever be addressed is for "non tech people" to start learning about tech.

There is no way to reconcile "I want to trust other people to do things I don't understand but are critically important to me" with "I don't want to allow third parties to have control over things that are critically important to me.

You can neither do it yourself nor hold your fiduciaries accountable without having at least a foundational understanding of how things actually work.

I don't think they've moved at all. It's more that the Overton window fell off a cliff about 10 years ago.

They've always been about protecting privacy and liberty, just not the liberty to bully and harass people.

Could it be that red states aren’t passing privacy laws? No snark intended. Privacy seems pretty “anti-business” when you consider that it’s a type of regulation in any form. I share the same idle curiosity because I’ve followed the EFF for years too, but the more I think about it: did they ever stand a chance with Republicans?

It also seems like big tech is aging into or adopting a kind of partisanship. These companies are so unfathomably large it’s almost difficult to look at their market impact as positive. Mind you, I’m not trying to make a particular case here. I’m only espousing a general attitude. The share of the S&P 500 that they collectively occupy alone is looking increasingly concerning.

The democrats are basically the institutionist and "status quo" defenders of American hegemony at this point. Doesn't matter how "left" you go, they are basically the 'conservative' now.

Also, saying the EFF is nonpartisan? The EFF always had a strong political point of view. If you label it right or left, that's your problem.

Are you kidding? They have literally been the most progressive tech advocacy group in history. I’ve been donating annually since it was founded. They’ve been consistent. Maybe you’ve moved more to the right?

That was just EFF's first recommendation. Their next recommendation "Install Privacy Badger to Block Meta’s Trackers" is much more effective.