Why does it even matter?

The problem I encounter the most when debating about privacy is that often people throw in the argument: "I am not doing anything wrong, I don't care if they are spying on me." and I get it, it is a great excuse to not care about yours or anyone else's privacy. Let's debunk this claim :D

It's about the principal of it

My main and the most obvious argument is that it isn't about whether you are a criminal or not, no one should have this kind of information about so many innocent or guilty people. I strongly believe privacy is a human right and should be the default everywhere.

Misuse of data

This data is being used mainly for one thing as of right now: ads.
What is it used for exactly? It is used for "targeted ads", basically if you talk a lot about wanting to buy something in your phones proximity after some time you will start to see a lot of ads for that thing (don't believe me? I urge you to try it, have a chat with your friends about some highly marketed product for a while and then scroll some social media on your phone). So why is this a bad thing? Mostly it isn't really that bad, to me it sounds very dystopian and corrupt so I personally don't like this already but why should you care if you don't share this subjective opinion. Very good question dear reader! And the answer is that you simply can't know what they will use this data for in the future. But okay let's be really stupid and say that you really trust these corporations. Let's say Google for example, well not only is Google selling your data to other companies to make profit but you can't know for certain that someone won't forcibly take that data from them, do you really trust Google to protect your data with everything it takes?

Example of forcible data extraction and use

During WW2 about 70 percent of the Jews living in Netherlands have been murdered. That is more compared to some neighboring countries (Belgium: 40%, France: 25%). One of the believed explanations as to why that happened is because of the population registers. There has been proof that the Germans paid administrative officers and the police for information like addresses and names of Jews.

Another thing that I think is wrong about the data use right now is it's impact on politics. Using this personal data to then show people the ads they want to see to make them vote a certain candidate is so fucked up in my opinion. For example it may show two different ads for the same politician to two different people to make them vote for the same person, even tho they might have completely different political opinions.

So what can we do about it?

Well unfortunately you can't get 100% privacy these days without seriously limiting yourself. For me it comes down to two things: paying with a card and having a SIM card, those are two things I really don't want to live without that just don't have any good private alternatives right now.
Good news is there is so much the average person can do without any or minimal impact on there lives!

No impact/effort

Let's start with what the majority of people is willing to do. This is quite subjective so feel free to find me on some socials and DM me how wrong I am, I love to debate.

• Ublock Origin - it is a adblocker that also blocks some trackers and can be heavily customized to block most of them (for the most privacy you need to set settings that will break most sites)
• Signal - download the Signal app right now! it is a very simple yet powerful messenger app like Whatsapp. But unlike it it does't steal your data and is insanely private
• Don't share info you don't have to share - just don't share too much personal info that you don't necessarily have to share

Some impact/effort but still pretty easy imo

• Switch browsers - Iam guessing you are using chrome or something simillar, not only I think it really isn't a good browser it also spies on you. Go for firefox or some firefox base browser (I use Zen). If you really want there are some chromium based ones that i believe to be somewhat good but you are still technically relying on Google (Vivaldi, Ungoogled chromium, Brave, DuckDuckGo browser)
• Password manager - We both know that you have the same password in almost antything... I get it why make it complicated for yourself? Well I have the solution for you! Password managers mean you only need one password and it remembers and even creates all the other ones for you. You then have a extension/app that autofills it for you. My favorite is Bitwarden but there are many great selfhosted and cloud password managers so just find the one that suits you.
• 2 factor auth - I know I know it's annoying but it really isn't that hard and drastically improves your privacy. My recommendation as of now is Ente auth it is free and has cloud sync.
• Diversify - It is convenient to have one company handle everything for you, ehrm ehrm Google.. but by doing that you put all your trust in one company and there isn't any company that you should put this much trust into. That is why I don't like Proton much anymore.
• Find alternatives - There is really good and often better alternatives to the things that you currently use that are way more private or even opensource. Try to focus on finding either opensource or eu based things (eu has much stricter privacy laws like the gdpr)

Go all in

Once you start getting into it there's no turning back. Don't be afraid of these just because they are labeled as the hardest on this list. I still think that with the right mindset these shouldn't impact a man's life much (women too of course :D)

• Linux - I know I know buzz word! I personally like Linux but I don't think it is perfect, far from it in fact. But the thing is if you care about your privacy there just isn't a better alternative right now. It isn't more complicated it is just different.
• Custom ROM - reinstalling the stock OS on a phone is quite hard for most people but it isn't impossible depending on your phone. Next time you buy a phone maybe focus on that.
• Selfhosting - Cloud is just a fancy word for your data being on someone else's computer. It is't that hard to get into if you just by a NAS with some solid stock OS that handles stuff for you.
• Research - Just do basic research about the stuff you use, does it feel too good to be true? It probably is. If it's free you are the product. (Many huge companies make most there money of your data)

How to go about all this

This is all very overwhelming especially if you didn't even to anything from the step one.
My advice and how I am handling this:

1. I follow two main rules. under no circumstances I don't start using anything "bad" going forward
2. I slowly systematically get rid of all the "bad" things I use, even after years of focusing more and more on my privacy I still use Gmail for example, I have a plan to get rid of it but I just haven't got to it yet. The intent is what matters here. So if you were to believe in anything i said, then it is okay that you are using many bad things right now, it is not okay to live with the idea that you will be using them forever (windows, google and so on)