Personal field manual · private page
You won't become invisible, and chasing that wastes effort. The realistic win is raising the cost of watching you until you're not worth the trouble. Surveillance is a volume business on thin margins — friction is the lever.
Proton VPN + NetShield (VPN box essentially ticked), Brave with Google Search + AI already dropped, and Bitwarden for passwords. That's three of the hardest habits already in place.
Your Yahoo inbox — most-used, and the worst major provider on privacy. Plus two Gmail accounts and Google Maps/Drive, data brokers reselling your WI details, and dumb radio signals (car, earbuds, watch) a phone can't mask.
Toggles that break the cheapest, most automated tracking.
One shared tag ties every app to the same profile. Deleting it blinds the largest, laziest network overnight.
Samsung: Settings → Security and privacy → Privacy → Ads → Delete advertising ID. Confirm it reads "deleted," not just reset.
This account touches the most of your life. Turning off the history streams and auto-deleting the rest starves the profile at its source.
At myaccount.google.com/privacycheckup, do each — location logging needs both of the first two, not just Location History:
You already use Brave, and you've dropped Google Search and AI — that's genuinely good enough. Brave blocks trackers, ads, and fingerprinting by default. Two tweaks and one caveat, no need to switch browsers.
One caveat, not a dealbreaker: Brave rides on Chromium (Google's engine), so it doesn't dent Google's browser monopoly the way Firefox does. For your privacy goals it's fine — keep it, and set:
Content matters less than metadata — who you talk to, when, how often. Signal is the one mainstream app built to collect almost none of it.
Broker opt-outs are the single biggest footprint cut available to you — the free DIY route beats the paid services (~70% of records removed vs. ~35%). The worksheet is below; these are the phone settings to pair with it.
Most apps hold more access than they need. Downgrading location and revoking camera/mic from apps that don't use them shuts off passive collection.
Samsung: Settings → Security and privacy → Privacy → Permission manager.
These keep locating you even with GPS off, by sniffing nearby networks and beacons. Off is a pure win — nothing lost day to day.
Samsung: Settings → Location → Location services.
A strong passcode and hidden notification previews mean a seized or stolen phone doesn't spill its contents on the lock screen.
Three settings quietly build a profile of you or ship your usage back to Samsung and Google. None is a security feature — turning them off costs you nothing but some AI "suggestions."
Samsung: Settings → Security and privacy → More privacy settings.
Larger changes and the habits that only matter in genuinely high-risk moments.
Your most-used account, Yahoo, is your weakest link — not a safer alternative to Gmail. It scans mail for ad targeting, it was the one major provider that secretly scanned all incoming mail for US intelligence in 2016, and its 2013 breach exposed all 3 billion accounts.
Proton encrypts message contents but is not anonymity — under Swiss law it can be compelled for IP logs and payment data. Great against profiling; not a shield against a targeted order. Map your accounts:
Maps Timeline is a minute-by-minute diary of everywhere you go; Drive is your files sitting on Google's servers where they can be scanned or subpoenaed. Your stickiest Google dependencies.
"Sign in with Google" doesn't leak your activity to Google, but it makes one account the master key to your whole online life — the single point of failure you're trying to reduce.
Cell-site simulators ("stingrays") work by forcing your phone down to insecure 2G. Turning 2G off removes that downgrade path.
Samsung: Settings → Connections → SIM manager → tap your SIM → disable 2G (some builds: Connections → Mobile networks). Leave it off.
A fully powered-off phone is dramatically harder to crack — the encryption keys aren't in memory. Your move before any genuinely high-risk situation.
Before a protest, border crossing, or seizure risk: fully power off (not just lock). A restart forces your PIN on first unlock and disables biometric bypass. Highest tier: turn off fingerprint/face unlock so you can't be physically compelled to open it.
Personal opt-outs treat symptoms. These target the engine — optional, civic, and where the problem actually gets fixed.
Your effort scales when you teach it. One evening walking neighbors through the broker list multiplies the friction across a whole group.
Use EFF's Surveillance Self-Defense (ssd.eff.org) as free curriculum and the broker worksheet as the exercise. EFF's annual Opt-Out October is a ready-made template.
The government buys from brokers what it would need a warrant to seize. Two bills would cut that off; call your reps and name them.
The Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act (passed the House, died in the Senate) bans government purchase of data that would otherwise need a warrant. The Banning Surveillance Advertising Act attacks the supply side. Ties into your repwatch civic work.
The heart of "this week." Do a handful a night. Each opens the broker's own opt-out page; most ask you to find your listing, confirm by email, and wait a few days. Wisconsin note: California's DROP tool isn't available to you, so this manual list is your route. Re-run every ~3 months — brokers re-scrape. Full master list: Yael Grauer's Big Ass Data Broker Opt-Out List.