You go to your local fair or market. The organizer charges an entrance fee. You pay via credit card. Its crowded; there are many people milling around all going their own way.

You move on.

You stop at a stand, maybe you tell them your name... something about living just down the street. They comment on your hair, "It's so bright and purple. I wish I could do that!".

You move on.

Someone walking nearby notices your shirt. Its the same college they went to. You don't notice them.

You move on.

You enter a store. Spend 15 minutes there browsing. You try and find a restroom, but can't locate one. The shopkeeper tells you that urinals across the field.

You move on.

This type of pattern repeats over the course of the day. Someone notices something about you, either because you chose to convey it to them, or it was exposed publicly.

You move on.

A week later, someone knocks on your door. Law enforcement is here saying that you were seen stealing $10,000 from the backroom of that store at the fair.

There are two possibilities:

1. You did steal something, and the information you revealed (intentionally or otherwise) confirmed a positive identification
2. You did not steal anything, but the information you revealed (intentionally or otherwise) matched the suspect enough that law enforcement decided to identify and question you.

It does not matter which one is true.

You now have to spend an unknown amount of time defending yourself from this accusation. Your reputation may get ruined. You may go to jail. If you make the wrong move in this split second, you might die.

A choice was made for you.

This likely took many hours of work for these detectives. They had to collect statements, create a profile, review security footage to find you in the crowd - reversing through to capture the moment you entered the fair - and request your payment records from your credit card company.

Many steps, all built on a shaky profile. It's not easy. Its time consuming. Law enforcement probably wouldn't have even bothered if it wasn't a reoccurring event or a high enough amount of money. This one crime absorbed this squads time for investigation and enforcement for a week, preventing them from looking at other crimes.

Online, this level of profiling happens in minutes. Every day, thousands of data brokers, websites, and other parties trade your information. Governments buy up your data for surveillance. Insurance agencies exploit it to cheat you out of your policies. Websites create precise models to serve you ads with scary amounts of accuracy. Your life, a set of data to be tracked across the internet.

Why are you here?

You dislike surveillance capitalism. You feel you are under threat by governments or companies. You feel out of control in this fast moving world. You simply just are not happy with enshittification in your favorite products.

There are many reasons to want to change. I started desub.lol because I was tired of unchecked capitalism driving an attention and rot economy. I was tired of moving on from one product to the next when they figured out how to squeeze just a little more money out of my time, privacy, and wallet.

Regardless of your motivation, you are here. Let's take a journey, and find your home base.

What?

I have a challenge. Take 14 days, and completely restart your digital identity. Reclaim your privacy, take control of your technology, and feel secure in knowing that you own your identity once again.

Day 1 - Understanding Privacy [Coming Soon]
Day 2 - New Device, New Me [Coming Soon]
Day 3 - I Hate Crypto [Coming Soon]
Day 4 - Browsers, VPNs, Tor, and you [Coming Soon]
Day 5 - Email, Email, Email [Coming Soon]
Day 6 - Password Managers, Security Keys, and why nothing is safe [Coming Soon]
Day 7 - Backup, Backup, Backup [Coming Soon]
Day 8 - New Phone Who Dis [Coming Soon]
Day 9 - Delete Your Social Media [Coming Soon]
Day 10 - Delete Your Old Accounts [Coming Soon]
Day 11 - Lets Create New Accounts [Coming Soon]
Day 12 - I guess we can have social media again.... [Coming Soon]
Day 13 - Long Term Maintenance [Coming Soon]
Day 14 - Its time to breathe again. [Coming Soon]

All advice from days 2-12 are going to have two options:

1. Comfortable, low effort, less resistant to privacy attacks
2. Takes time, money, or discomfort, but you will have as secure of an environment as I can give you.

You don't have to try every step. I think anyone should do Days 4-7 and 9-12. Find what works for you. But before you decide, read Day 1. Set yourself up for success by understanding just what you are getting into and how privacy builds on itself.