65

WATCH: How to de-Google James Corbett’s latest edition of #SolutionsWatch deals with disentangling yourself from the rainbow web of Alphabet Inc.

Remember when Google was just a search engine? In the age of Gmail and Google Drive and Google Maps and GooTube and Google phones, it’s truly unsettling to think how much of the average person’s online activity is now directly feeding the Google data behemoth.

Today on #SolutionsWatch, James talks to Rob Braxman (The Internet Privacy Guy) about how to de-Google, and why protecting your privacy online is so important.

In a piece of perfect serendipity this video came out only days before OffG itself was (finally) able to get our proper email functioning again, and bid farewell to our (unfortunate) temporary reliance on gmail.

For links, sources and shownotes click here.

SUPPORT OFFGUARDIAN

If you enjoy OffG's content, please help us make our monthly fund-raising goal and keep the site alive.

For other ways to donate, including direct-transfer bank details click HERE.

5 6 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
guest

65 Comments
newest
oldest most voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
epousedesacrecoeur
epousedesacrecoeur
May 13, 2021 12:31 AM

I think that there needs to be more articles and discussions on and about contact tracing.

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 15, 2021 8:15 AM

Contact tracing (and testing) has been one of the standard (and effective) transmissible disease-fighting tools since at least 1900. Of course, once you volunteer or are volunteered (e.g. as with STDs) as an identifiable contact your privacy is blown. Now that we can use computerized tracing (and notification) it is perfectly possible to write an ‘open source app’ that maintains your privacy (through notifications) until you volunteer. Trouble is, most ‘official’ apps delegate the design and coding to Google/Apple, in whom we all trust, of course, or to private ‘developers’ who keep their source code to themselves, claiming ‘commercial confidentiality’ (huh) when the only part of the code that needs to be ‘confidential’ is the authentication code that confirms the identity of the connection only as a unique keyed-in pin or similar. Looks like those running 2020-2021’s trace and test apps either don’t care or positively want your privacy to be an illusion.

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 12, 2021 12:35 PM

It’s not often you come across a computer security expert who is actually an expert. In fact, it’s very seldom. Like very very seldom. Within the sub-expertise involved in this video (and maybe more broadly–I don’t know, as the video didn’t go there) the guy on the right is one of the few exceptions you’ll come across. Pay attention.

Now go on, downvote me.

Incidentally, in the telecoms security field, the social term ‘privacy’ is usually known as ‘anonymity’. When it comes to ‘hard’ problems, then–compared to ‘anonymity’–technical ‘privacy’, which is usually accomplished by encryption, is a pushover. Usually I don’t even try and I’ve forgotten more about both than any of you will ever learn. At least until you stop hystericing about such things.

Now go on again, log in under a different name (from a different IP so as not to upset Sam but not much useful else) and downvote me again. I’m collecting them.

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 15, 2021 7:53 AM
Reply to  Robbobbobin

Forgot to say: technical privacy is usually referred to as ‘confidentiality’.

Wayne Vanderploeg
Wayne Vanderploeg
May 10, 2021 7:44 PM

Found it interesting that Google was called ChumHum in the TV show called The Good Wife. Was that tongue in cheek humor about their character or was it simply the farthest the producers could get to avoid a law suit? ChumHum was not depicted in a very positive way.

Badger Down
Badger Down
May 12, 2021 5:09 AM

The stink of rotting fish! Chum hum. I like it!

Lolly
Lolly
May 10, 2021 3:46 PM

A must read for those who have been vaccines and those who have not.

https://www.globalresearch.ca/clotting-covid-vaccine-science/5744820

Wayne Vanderploeg
Wayne Vanderploeg
May 10, 2021 7:39 PM
Reply to  Lolly

Hi Lolly,

I continuously bombard my representatives with information similar to what is found in this link. Thank you. I am sure my rep hates me. I start with : These vaccines are not safe. It will be criminal to give these vaccines to children.

Tim Drayton
Tim Drayton
May 10, 2021 12:08 PM

A thought has just occurred to me. If you go to Google every now and again and enter some random search terms and click on one or two random pages, won’t this throw a spanner in the works by creating false data?
I’ve just been to Google and entered the first word that came to my mind (Rejkyavik) and clicked on two of the hits.
What do those better informed about these things think? Could this help to make the data Google is collecting about me worthless?

mgeo
mgeo
May 10, 2021 12:27 PM
Reply to  Tim Drayton

Such words in an email too help. That may only apply to personal emails to people you have first told of what you are up to.

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 12, 2021 1:22 PM
Reply to  Tim Drayton

Could this help to make the data Google is collecting about me worthless?

No. As Shakespeare said of the multiple underhand methods Google and many others use or can use to get at you and sort out the wheat from the chaff: “Let me count the ways…”

Tim Drayton
Tim Drayton
May 12, 2021 4:56 PM
Reply to  Robbobbobin

Drat. I’ve recently googled to get information about bus services at the North Pole!

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 13, 2021 4:29 AM
Reply to  Tim Drayton

That’s very bad. Their AI will immediately detect that the North Pole County Council runs only sled services and then only on winter weekdays.

To expand a little, two (as in ‘only two of many’) of the vectors (a.k.a. ‘attack surfaces’) of interest to deanonymizing ‘adversaries’ lie in

  • ‘unrelated’ data aggregation (e.g. comparing a phone’s IMEI &/or IMSI number across different databases–the manufacturer’s, the service provider’s, mobile and/or internet DNS connection info, etc); and
  • in the case of web connections, tracking a ‘browser’s fingerprint’ (Google that word for more info) and so on. Johns Hopkins Security Lab has developed a particularly interesting version of the latter that can uniquely identify any phone, tablet or other device with web access with better than 99% certainty, even if the user has installed several different browsers and switches between them for different categories of browsing (e.g. porn, conspiracy, MSM, home, work, etc), all behind the average user’s back. To rephrase to emphasize the last point: a web browser running HTML5 or later can uniquely identify the associated phone or other web-capable device. Note that you don’t need to Google anything directly for a web connection to a particular site to detour through many Google-operated systems en route, courtesy your friendly particular site operator’s need or desire to monetize that operation, and that just one of those Google operated sites could be enough. And that’s for now. Widespread 5G will, as the guy on the right notes, open a whole new can of worms.

And, as some advertising come-ons say, “many, many more.” Full disclosure: the latter, still rather esoteric, capability for this post was especially selected to give me little frissons of delight at the thought of scores of conspiracy nuts convulsing over the ‘scamdemic’ (Johns Hopkins) provenance of the research involved. What’s your guess? The Bill and Ex Foundation sponsored it?

mgeo’s advice to salt* email rather than or as well as other mobile or Internet connections (web, ftp, etc) could be slightly more resistant, but only if it’s done so technically carefully that considerations of the effort involved would outweigh the effectiveness for anyone except a privacy fanatic. If you don’t want it to be public, don’t put it on the Internet or say it over the phone unless you’re prepared to put in more work and evasiveness than most people have the time to justify and most ‘app’ and web ‘developers’ don’t have the smarts to anticipate.

* ‘salt’ being a term erroneously (though self-admittedly so) and unfortunately confusingly introduced by the guy on the left. In his case any reference to ‘salt’ should be far more specific, viz ‘Epsom salts, ingested’.

Edwige
Edwige
May 10, 2021 10:16 AM

Somewhat at a tangent and apologies for linking to the Fraudian but this is revealing:

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/may/10/smartphone-is-now-the-place-where-we-live-anthropologists-say

The behavourial manipulation handbook is at play here. They want everyone with a smartphone, obviously. The panopticon requires it. How to manipulate people who haven’t got one:
1) Publicise what you’re missing out on.
2) Imply that you’re not fitting in and are not part of the group.
3) Move towards establishing something undesirable as a “right”. (Shelter is a right and so if a smartphone is like a home then it’s a right too).

This last one goes back to Bernays and getting women to smoke. Scientists said that did no harm too.

It’s further proof that anthropology is not disinterested pursuit but one that studies societies in order to learn how to maipulate them. David Price’s WEAPONIZING ANTHROPOLOGY is the book to read here (although it doesn’t go back in history to people like Bateson and Mead).

Tim Drayton
Tim Drayton
May 10, 2021 2:09 PM
Reply to  Edwige

Also make it necessary to have one by making you have to swipe a Q-code generated on one to enter places.

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 14, 2021 9:18 AM
Reply to  Edwige

So the Fraudian now knows even more about who follows links from the Off-Fraudian to them.

mijj
mijj
May 10, 2021 9:46 AM

easiest and best way to de-google – Huawei.

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 13, 2021 10:14 AM
Reply to  mijj

Perfect. 🙂

jigsaw puzzle
jigsaw puzzle
May 31, 2021 11:08 AM
Reply to  mijj

that’s the same thing I want to say. You have read my mind 😀

Howard
Howard
May 9, 2021 5:19 PM

Is this not a little like bolting the door after the horse has escaped? And, truly, does anyone imagine entities like the NSA, CIA, MI6 etc desperately need Google to haul in our personal data?

Those who come in the front door can also sneak around back and come in that way. And once the Smart Grid is 100% working, you can smash all your computers, cell phones and whatever else you think might be hounding you. They can still get to you.

There is only one time when it’s possible to stop the psychopaths from gathering all your data. (Ask your friendly neighborhood Luddite when that was.)

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 13, 2021 10:11 PM
Reply to  Howard

“…does anyone imagine entities like the NSA, CIA, MI6 etc desperately need Google to haul in our personal data?”

Complicated question. Anyone who can’t afford Palantir does. Which seems to include many Google staffers who aren’t as well off as Larry and Sergey. And then there’s always Calvin Coolidge, as there was then:

After all the chief business of America is business. They are profoundly concerned with producing, buying, selling, investing and prospering in the world.

So what about “the business of war”, fans and shit in a BRI world and good old mission creep?

Which way do you cut a coin in half? Down the middle or through the middle–half heads and half tails or all heads or tails and no heads or tails?

Silverback
Silverback
May 9, 2021 12:11 PM

People think banking and shopping apps alone are there for convenience, they are not.
They are created to gather information on everything you do.

Non of these apps will install on a non Google phone rendering moving away from Google hassle for those who don’t want to think for themselves.

THX-1160
THX-1160
May 9, 2021 4:23 PM
Reply to  Silverback

Mister Bump
Mister Bump
May 9, 2021 11:15 AM

This degoogle your life video made by de google experts is posted on Google YouTube. Me thinks there is no hope.

K. Cavan
K. Cavan
May 9, 2021 6:23 PM
Reply to  Mister Bump

There’s no point in a signpost at the end of the road, it needs to be at the start, get it?

Igor
Igor
May 9, 2021 10:59 PM
Reply to  Mister Bump

FYI Corbett does have an alternate video host. Details are on his youtube channel.

I’m not a Corbot. This is not to be taken as a recommendation.

James1
James1
May 9, 2021 11:09 AM

I’ve switched to https://swisscows.com excellent search engine that doesn’t track you & seems better that some other alternatives.

Apolline
Apolline
May 12, 2021 7:37 AM
Reply to  James1

I did too and I agree

scott work-shy
scott work-shy
May 9, 2021 11:02 AM

Or alternatively, instead of watching this video, use the time more productively by rummaging around the shed / garage for a couple of minutes trying to locate your mash hammer. One located use the said hammer to direct a couple of firm blows in the direction of your smart phone. Quickly tidy up the remnants and place safely in the bin. There, job done.

Use the time saved to watch this video instead.

Then kick back and enjoy that glorious penny-dropping moment when you realise that your smart phone IS “the chip” that we’ve all being going about for years.

Mister Bump
Mister Bump
May 9, 2021 11:16 AM
Reply to  scott work-shy

WATCH THE google hosted VIDEO ON WHAT?

scott work-shy
scott work-shy
May 9, 2021 11:29 AM
Reply to  Mister Bump

lap-top?, pc?, use your imagination Mr Bump, if you had paid attention to Mr Corbett’s video around 3:50 you would have heard Mr Braxman emphasise that this is primarily a hardware issue, 80% of data collection happens through your smart phone

Igor
Igor
May 9, 2021 11:08 PM
Reply to  scott work-shy

Agree. Hard to keep Google out of the loop on an Android phone.

If one logs onto Gmail on a desktop/laptop they can and will track through the device’s IP address. They have no shame nor scruples.

I had logged into gmail on a virtual machine, checked mail, then shut the VM down. On another VM, on the same host with same IP, I looked up a movie on IMDB.

Later, I received spam from Google about that same movie.

Igor
Igor
May 9, 2021 11:15 PM
Reply to  scott work-shy

I see I have a unique browser fingerprint. So, not just an IP address.

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 14, 2021 12:08 AM
Reply to  Igor

It’s kind of sad to see the overprivileged realizing so late the nature of the monsters they have for so long so embracingly and lovingly applauded and enabled.

timfrom
timfrom
May 10, 2021 7:03 AM
Reply to  scott work-shy

Thanks for that blast from the past, Scott! Haven’t heard that in 20 years even though it’s been sitting on my shelf the whole time. I think I’ll be giving it a spin later…

scott work-shy
scott work-shy
May 10, 2021 1:43 PM
Reply to  timfrom

Your welcome Tim. You should give it a spin later. Great tune.

Benton
Benton
May 9, 2021 10:28 AM

I use Linux and a VPN service, different browsers with a couple of blocking add-ons and sometimes TOR-browser with VPN as backup. Login and other identifiable things is done on one browser without VPN and roaming Internet is done with an other browsers with VPN.

But I don’t think I’m that private, just a little less obvious. They have hard- and software backdoors everywhere and Internet itself is one large monitored honeypot where we reveal our inner-self under different shades of imagined privacy. If your are of any interest – “they” know about you. All my steps above is just to make them work a bit harder for that knowledge. And if uninteresting me would be of any interest I hope to get my suspicion confirmed in one way or an other. The only safe way to use Internet is not using it at all.

THX-1160
THX-1160
May 9, 2021 11:28 AM
Reply to  Benton

alternatively, maybe they want you to believe that kind of panopticon is actually real, so that you won’t do or even think anything that they wouldn’t approve of.

even something as simple as setting your web-browser to delete all cookies on exit, makes a huge difference.

as for backdoors, don’t use Microserf, Goolag, Fakebook, or crApple products, and you’ll be free of most of them.

https://coveryourtracks.eff.org/

http://browserspy.dk/

Benton
Benton
May 9, 2021 12:38 PM
Reply to  THX-1160

“They” weaponise everything and guess who is perceived as the enemy – the ones currently getting “vaccinated”. And it really doesn’t matter if I use Linux since my Intel processor have a separate chip, running it’s own Minix OS invisible from mine, that has full access to my hardware. The same goes for newer AMD processors. My steps above and you deleting your cookies don’t matter if we make a interesting blip och the radar.

THX-1160
THX-1160
May 9, 2021 4:20 PM
Reply to  Benton
Benton
Benton
May 9, 2021 5:24 PM
Reply to  THX-1160

Well, you got to “upgrade” some day. And those two are just a few ways of many more. Knowledge is power and a lot of juicy corporate information. They monitor Internet in the same way they have been monitoring telecommunications since inception, but on a much larger automated scale.

In my western “democracy” (LOL) they even take a photo of every envelope passing the larger post-sorting terminals. My point is that they have the ability to do whatever they want if we would’t be perceived as uninteresting noise.

Robbobbobin
Robbobbobin
May 14, 2021 12:13 AM
Reply to  THX-1160

“…and you’ll be free of most of them.”

They only need one of them.

Igor
Igor
May 9, 2021 11:10 PM
Reply to  Benton

Benton, how do/did you establish trust in a VPN?

I figure VPN providers could be as dodgy as anyone else out there.

Benton
Benton
May 10, 2021 2:44 PM
Reply to  Igor

I don’t trust anyone or anything. VPN protects me from getting caught downloading some shitty Hollywood movie from TPB. Which I don’t do anyway because they are shitty.

But VPN services could be a honeypot where they can focus on them trying to hide instead of monitoring everyone. If so they will have to show their hand and that’s worth paying for.

Raz Putin
Raz Putin
May 9, 2021 3:15 AM

Thanks to James Corbett off the The Corbett Report and offG.

Rewire your digital self and disconnect from the Alphabet Octopus while you can.

BOYCOTT GOOGLE, YOUTUBE, FACEBOOK,TWITTER, APPLE.

Support your alternative media sources!!!

p.brooksmcginis
p.brooksmcginis
May 9, 2021 2:31 AM

This Guy took the MRna vaccine
https://www.bitchute.com/video/X7dGgMVMx3te/
All War is Evil. No More War

p.brooksmcginis
p.brooksmcginis
May 9, 2021 2:28 AM

All War is Evil
No More War

aspnaz
aspnaz
May 9, 2021 12:48 AM

fonts.googleapis.com

uBlock origin is asking me whether I want to enable scripts from the above site whenever I visit OG. Maybe you missed this, but every time someone loads your site, the people at google hear about it unless the user specifically blocks it.

Lulu
Lulu
May 9, 2021 3:38 AM
Reply to  aspnaz

Technical ignoramus here – please advise as to how one blocks that.

aspnaz
aspnaz
May 9, 2021 1:35 PM
Reply to  Lulu

I use firefox, so the instructions:
a) Select “AddOns” from the menu.
b) Find and install the AddOn called “uBlock Origin”.
c) Spend an hour reading the “uBlock Origin” plugin’s own instructions on how to use it, they are very clear and you need this knowledge otherwise it will become a very frustrating experience.

Sorry, no pain no gain: you need to learn to defend yourself and this is probably the easiest and most reliable way of doing that. Good luck.

Lulu
Lulu
May 11, 2021 6:00 AM
Reply to  aspnaz

Thank you kindly, aspnaz!

Steve C
Steve C
May 9, 2021 3:59 AM
Reply to  aspnaz

First time I’ve heard of that, so looked it up on the Duck via Opera. All the search results mention Microsoft and Google means of accessing it. I wondered, If I’m going to get it through the people I want to ignore, what’s the point?

PS to Admin: Why have you introduced the horizontal scroll on your home page? Tacky.

YeahBut
YeahBut
May 9, 2021 4:52 AM
Reply to  aspnaz

Yes, that should go, and embedded YouTube needs to use youtube-nocookie.com instead of youtube.com to prevent cookie setting even for people who don’t watch the video, or if that’s not possible then just use a web link to YouTube rather than embedded video.

Mr Y
Mr Y
May 9, 2021 11:12 AM
Reply to  aspnaz

OffG, you left Gmail, removing Google fonts is a natural next step!

THX-1160
THX-1160
May 9, 2021 11:40 AM
Reply to  aspnaz

NoScript isn’t showing me that. what it IS showing, is both google.com and gstatic.com as script sources, along with doubleclick.net — but I have all of those blocked, so maybe that’s why the googleapis script doesn’t get pulled in.

I’d be curious to know why those three are present here.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/noscript/

THX-1160
THX-1160
May 9, 2021 11:51 AM
Reply to  THX-1160

it appears that doubleclick and google get pulled in as script sources, by enabling youtube as a script source. I’m not sure how gstatic (also google) gets included.

dr death
dr death
May 9, 2021 1:02 PM
Reply to  THX-1160

usually for control panel so one can monitor web traffic and google ads etc they are usually bundled with the back end, most webmasters use google apps, it is difficult not too with their market penetration, to be fair they are the market.

Mister Bump
Mister Bump
May 9, 2021 11:56 AM
Reply to  aspnaz

OffG is showing 17 trackers on uBlock Origin! 5 of them are google trackers. This is an extraordinary high number. Putting this video out while tracking us this much is ridiculous. includes fastly, gstatic, polyfill, doubleclick, gravatar and bitchute trackers.

mike
mike
May 10, 2021 12:34 AM
Reply to  Mister Bump

Not to mention promoting uncle Jimmy again… We are so supposed to worship this guy when he tells what we know already. Bill Gates has his fingers in all pies and your smart devices are tracking you. Errr, thanks for that, very enlightening.

This is supposed to be a channel were people can discuss all possibilities, however nobody on here likes a bad word said about uncle Jim. Watch the barrage of dislikes come after me saying this.

Last time people wanted proof. What is proof? Somebody’s else’s opinion. Somehow we have come to the conclusion if we are pointed to the opinion of another on a glossy website then this opinion is more valid. Proof comes from you knowing something does not add up.

I personally don’t like uncle Jim for his earlier connections to Charles Veitch who is a well know crisis actor. Further I don’t like that he brushed over some important points regarding 911. Same for Veitch, who did an amazing back flip on 911 after a paid BBC conspiracy tour back in the day. All a bit strange.

These guys lead their flock with many truths only to send them to slaughter at the end. Bit like all the plant based doctors now. These guys promoted health and well being by getting people to ditch the toxic foods only to now promote vaccines to them.

Mister Bump
Mister Bump
May 9, 2021 12:15 PM
Reply to  aspnaz

There are 17 trackers on this site according to Ublock on firefox. OffG is one of the worse when it comes to trackers.

dr death
dr death
May 9, 2021 12:39 PM
Reply to  aspnaz

all web sites use scripts imbecile, for format,rendering fonts etc, any ‘no script’ type security feature will ask to allow a particular feature or ‘script’…

some times this will appear as bad formatting in comment sections etc etc..

educate yourself before whining and delete your google cookie, because you will probably be dead by the time it expires..

aspnaz
aspnaz
May 9, 2021 1:50 PM
Reply to  dr death

I’m an IT consultant, have been for 40 years: I started as an electronics engineer, did my masters in embedded systems, moved into real time systems and control systems, initially robotic manufacturing systems for GM, then missile systems, then missile guidance, then GPS mapping algorithms, then financial mathematics, in which I am currently employed. There were lots of detours along the way, such as writing the hand-held controllers for airport baggage handling systems etc. Lots of detours.

OK, I am now ready for your lecture in internet web pages. Please tell, what bit of IT education am I missing?

magumba
magumba
May 9, 2021 2:56 PM
Reply to  aspnaz

Perhaps you are missing the point that you are part of the problem and nowhere near the solution?

aspnaz
aspnaz
May 9, 2021 11:37 PM
Reply to  magumba

My efforts in helping people avoid Google are part of the problem? Please enlighten me as to how you came to that conclusion.