From internal leaks within the company as well as external analysis, the tip of the iceberg behind Facebook's spyware empire is exposed. Take a look to better protect yourself when you're not even on the platform: https://simplifiedprivacy.com/facebooks-corrupt-off-platform-surveillance/
Duh. Like this isn't news. In fact, their tips for avoiding Facebook tracking you are terrible. VPN + VM? Still going to track your data habits through finger printing which is not specific to hardware or browsers but browsing habits. Of course, as well, you can't control your friends or family's habits which are going to upload pictures and other data about you. Facial recognition is going to tie your data to anything you put your picture on. None of these things actually help. They just take the algorithm an extra millisecond to compute the data.
Even if you and your family got off of Facebook right now, Facebook would still understand your browsing habits and realistically they don't even need to be accurate, just enough data to massively sell that data to the NSA or advertising agencies or whoever else. So, I'm not saying get a Facebook account but I will say, don't make your life harder for little to no gain.
Using weird anonymization techniques will also make you more unique. Disabling JS, running in a VM and having uncommon settings in general will make you very easy to follow around.
I guess I'll just wait for the Carrington Event.
You can not use Facebook with JS disabled. uBlock Origin is an option to reduce facebook off the platform. Running a VM is an effective strategy for isolation of certain sites. No solution is perfect, nor is it for everyone.
You cannot do a whole lot without JS to be honest. My comment was not about Facebook but fingerprinting in general, though I kinda forgot to mention. I suspect finger-tracking strategies are kinda trade secrets so it probably varies. Running a VM still expose your VM settings, which basically let them track your VM around. This is the insidious thing about fingertracking, you can be followed around with spoofed data just as well. The very first time you will login anywhere, whether you use a VM or a VPM everything you touched with those settings will now track back to you.
Every time I see people talking about privacy solutions and suggesting to disable and block JS, I'm just completely dumbfounded. It's not 2005 anymore. Most of the web these days is driven by JS. Nearly every web app you interact with, every site that has dynamic content, etc. all use JS. Disabling it entirely simply is not an option. You can find ways to selectively block certain origins, but that's it. And trying to run noscript and just whitelisting only the things you absolutely need is a phenomenal amount of work. I know. I used to do it. It got really tiresome. Every single site is broken by default, and then you have to spend 20 minutes trying to find which scripts you have to whitelist to make a site functional.
I'm not saying this to be defeatist, but to be honest about the kind of work it takes and why we need to find seamless and user-friendly ways to block the kinds of things FB does.
Leaving Facebook has likely never made anyone’s life harder.
It can and has. There's no way I could keep in touch with old army mates. They won't all move to other platforms. I don't even know of an alternative for group chats and finding people.
Unfortunately I have to go along with it. I keep it locked down as much as possible, use it only on Linux desktop etc. But there you go.
My brother, you all have email, phone, txt...
None of which are the same or similar interaction process if they were it never would have taken off
I know these are there - I said so in my post. It does not work when others are on FB and will/can not leave for another platform. None of that is comparable to to FB for group chat, looking for people, swapping pics etc. People may not want their phone number given out (a bit ironic when FB has everything else I know).
It's so easy (and dare I say lazy?) to just say 'FB bad, use phone/Signal/email etc.' but not offer any real alternatives. Let's face it, FB has this covered. It's so simple to get your nan, mate to join because all their friends/relatives/workmates are on it. There's no shame in admitting that it provides a valuable service for some people.
I think it did in the past when FB would show you exclusively posts and pictures from your friends. This is no longer the case, its an advertisement and fake news platform that has long alienated all sane people to the point where they no longer log in or post anything.
All I see now when I open fb is "shares" from obviously bogus or right wing sources that my not so bright ex classmates or boomer relatives post, or ads.
I have a tablet in my kitchen I use while cooking. I have only couple of apps on it, it does not sync my contacts and I don't use it to browse the web daily. That's when my WhatsApp client is installed. I still get messages, just not instantly. With Facebook groups you don't have to be online 24/7, you can just check them from time to time.
That's not a bad idea - I might try that with a spare tablet I have.
Discord is my solution. I made a server, invited my friends in EU and we blab away for hours whenever we want, including video calls. We are happy with it 🙂
That works for you and friends - fine. It does not work when others are on FB and will/can not leave for another platform.
Telegram, discord, mastadon, signal, session, etc there are too many to list
Which are all useless if nobody you want to talk to is there.
Oh, that's why it was so easy for me. There's nobody I want to talk to.
Then simple text or oldschool phonecalls work
Facebook is a passive form of information feed on your family and friends. Phone calls are not a direct analog to them.
---Everyone
Discord is a giant data hog. It's not a good argument.
The thing that Facebook has is momentum and a passive feed.
I know these are there - I said so in my post. It does not work when others are on FB and will/can not leave for another platform.
Text
No. Simply not suitable or practical.
But you do you.
Communication with loved ones can be harder without Facebook.
Not in my experience. Anyone I need to talk to has a phone. Everyone else has email or snail mail. Simple.
But YMMV.
But your experience is not all experiences
Yeah, a lot of people want to video call across phone oses. Like FaceTime works for iphone but not Android.
How about texting? Does texting work?
n...no? It's like saying to a person who wants to watch a movie, what about a book? Does reading work? Like no, not really. Not even close.
My mom lives in a different country, is retired and can very easily use Signal to msg me and do video calls. She has no technical education, and is not very good with the devices. But... she could install Signal and use it every day.
Congrats, one data point doesn't define a statistic. Equally, I have family who only use Messenger and can barely work with that. So from my statement, these people exist, even if it's just my family. I know I've seen a lot of similar experiences but even just my direct family is enough to justify me stating that just not using facebook doesn't work for everyone.
I feel like being defeatist about this is what FB would want. There are ways to obfuscate yourself though techniques like generating noise or using anti-fingerprinting features that work under the objective of making your print anonymous and generic rather than hiding you completely.
You can also do things like ask your friends and family to simply not post pictures of you online, your mileage may vary depending on how seriously your friends and relations take your wishes, but it worked for me. And I simply avoid pictures with people I know who don't care about privacy.
Any attempt to create private space is worthwhile, even if it doesnt completely hide you you're still able to learn and better understand how you're tracked so you can make better decisions and mitigate the problem.
So you’re saying privacy against meta is futile so you might as well just keep your accounts there?
Honestly, account or not, they are still able to track you in full. It doesn't truly matter if you have an account. They track everyone with or without an account. So all I am saying is don't make your life harder by deleting an account and thinking "Haha, I got one over on Facebook, they can't track me now!" They can, and are, and have a full profile on you. GDPR fines are just the cost of business. They can afford it and make more off of the sale of data than they get fined. It's a net positive.
So essentially privacy in 2023 is entirely pointless, and I shouldn’t bother?
Bootlicker
They have a point, if your run noscript on firefox or trackercontrol on android, almost every website has a facebook script trying to glean data. Dumping facebook is only one step in removing facebook from your life
At least, it's illegal in Europe. People have a right on their image.