Privacy in a digital age

Is there such thing as privacy in any modern digital society? In recent years, privacy has been a very hot topic. With the Snowden leaks and continuous reports of violations across the world, there’s a strong case against privacy in a digital age.

I’d argue that you should have no expectation of privacy in a digital because of the invasive, full take surveillance. We as citizens need to defend ourselves against this surveillance by all nations.

The internet is a superhighway, with almost infinite possibilities, and the governments of the world are manipulating and blatantly stealing our data away with no repercussions.

As a citizen, I should hold the right to my data, and should not fear interception or secret court systems ordering the disclosure of the data.

I’m yet to hear an argument for surveillance that’s legitimate, no it’s not making us safer. It’s giving the government agencies blackmail and ways to manipulate and harm citizens.

In order to retain our privacy, we need to encrypt our data, encrypt our communications and resist malware to the best of our abilities. You’re all targets of the government, even if you don’t believe it — they want it all.

Here’s some tools you should be using:

• XMPP with OTR
• SSL on all sites
• Pretty Good Privacy (PGP)
• Full disk encryption (eg Veracrypt)
• TOR
• VPNs (such as PrivateInternetAccess)

It’s time to take back our privacy, piece by piece!