Going Old School

Like many, I've had enough virtual intrusion from the likes of Fakebook, Google, Twitter, YouTube and many other big tech players. So some of us are doing something about it. We're going back to the future: going old school.

Written By: Geovian
Updated: 5 November 2024

Back to the Future?

Remember at the start of the century? Nokia was king. Before all this intrusion and surveillance nonsense took over. If you look at technology today, I believe there are three ways to manage your digital life where you control the virtual narrative, and no one else.

• we move all of our context back under our own virtual roof where it can't be interfered with. Usually to an offline repository of your choice.
• keep it in the cloud under your own strict control, like an encrypted Nextcloud instance hosted on your own domain.
• or, move it to a trusted de-centralized and federated platform where no single person or entity has the power to boot you off, or de-platform you.

Personally, I would aim up at options 1 and 2.

OK, let's now take a look at the lay of the land, in particular around the use of mobile networks and smartphones.

The NEW phones

Have you seen the prices for the new mobile phones in particular those offerings from Apple and Samsung? The prices are really off the scale. No sane person would spend over 2000 bucks for a new phone. From those two manufacturers even if you took their flagship phones from 3 to 4 years ago they are still well over the thousand dollar range.

To me, this suggests a brainwashed and captive market for those people who need the comfort and satisfaction of being one step ahead of everyone else. That is ego-centric thinking at its best (or worst). Who the fuck cares?

Old School Phones

Yes phones are still important as communication devices, but now more than ever, we should only allow the flow of dialog in one direction mostly; that being outwards and not inwards.

Unless you are paranoid and have blacklisted everything on your phone, the modern smartphone allows all manner of communication and data to flow from your phone, and in many cases leaving your phone without your knowledge! Android and iOS apps are the main instigators of our concern here.

Can we go back to old style phones?

To ensure Google can't get to you on your phone, you could always return to an older style phone, like an older styled Nokia handset. Some of these phones are not powered by Android which means they are not supplemented by Google. The only things you can do are to make phone calls and to send SMS. The basis of an old style phone right?

Unfortunately, one of the problems is that these phones use older Telco networks, like CDE or GSM, many of which have been deprecated around the world. Most phones these days are running 3G 4G and 5G.

In this current era of CoronaVirus and lockdown, it's a good idea to be off the Internet anyway, so you avoid all the fake news going on across News Sites and Social Media, but unfortunately, too many people are addicted to tech in the most unhealthiest of ways.

Other non Google Technology

Anything that doesn't have direct hooks back to Google (which also includes YouTube, Microsoft, Fakebook and Twitter/X would be a good thing. In this regard, a Linux distro is ideal.

So you want to do Internet stuff. Well don't do it on a phone if you are really paranoid, but do it on a small form factor device like a Raspberry Pi and a touchscreen monitor. RPi handles Linux distros like a boss, though do remember that only ARM based distros can be installed on a Pi. A single board computer (SBC) like the Odyssey X86 can run x86 Linux builds, whereas the RPi as mentioned runs ARM builds only. Either way, good choices, but I'd opt for the RPi because of the better support and distribution.

How about installing a custom ROM like Lineage or Calyx? Unfortunately this is easier said than done, as the entire procedure is not for the faint hearted. It involves a number of steps including rooting your phone, finding the right custom ROM that matches your phone (say Lineage OS), and then there's the tricky procedure of overriding your existing Android build with the custom one. Many a phone has been bricked by attempting to install a custom ROM with disastrous consequences. You should only ever attempt this if you truly know what you are doing.

As at late 2021, Linux phones are now a thing, though in its infancy and still not mature enough to be a viable proposition. So, devices like the UbuntuTouch, PinePhone and Librem5 are the best known of this new brigade but they have a long way to go before reaching mass acceptance let alone a breakeven point.

Let's not forget that 2022 is supposed to be the year of the Quantum phone, or so we've been told. We'll be keeping an eye on that space for sure. Step on up Elon Musk.

Mobile Data

I'll focus on mobile rather than a home broadband setup because mobile is where Google has aimed up at consumers due to the ease in which they extract your data via Android. So this is the platform where most of the privacy effort needs to be applied.

A VPN is important, if only to disguise your online activity and to throw the bloodhound off the scent, so to speak. Choosing a VPN is an art in itself. Don't rely on online reviews as most of the people writing them up are being paid to do so by the VPN company itself!

Some people swear by TOR, though it is tricky to configure, especially in the area of proxies, bridges and endless Captcha screens. If you can get past these three things, and unlearning some bad habits of online surfing from your recent past, then TOR might be a possibility for you.

Private DNS is now a thing. This can be applied to all modern Android phones uding Android 13 or higher, both at the phone level or st the browser level (like Brave). Or even both! Choose between the Adguard or Cloudflare solution. My preference is Adguard.

Possibly a DNS Resolver and Anominizer might provide some help. Cloudflare have a DNS tool which is useful, though I'd be loathe to use Google's DNS of 8.8.8.8. That's just inviting trouble. I'll write more about DNS in a future article, including a newish Android app currently in beta called Rethink DNS.

If you are torrenting, it's essential that you use a VPN to disguise your real world IP address, and also to use a Torrent client which forces encryption on both the download and upload channels. Most do, but it pays to check in your client settings anyway. This provides two forms of obfuscation when your disguised IP address is presented to the torrent file swarm as a tracker.

And finally, if you are one of those people who surfs naked around the Internet mostly on a smartphone, then you definitely need to install a No Root Firewall on your device, to prevent Google and other Big Tech companies from pinging your device and taking YOUR data. Once installed it's easy to set up and easy to switch off all apps and services from communicating with home base, and only allow those by whitelisting. ET phone home? Not in this case.

Note: Unfortunately you cannot use No Root Firewall alongside an existing VPN app that you have on your phone. All smartphones have a single VPN Port so you can't have two applications running on one port.

Search for No Root Firewall on the Play Store, F-Droid or an APK repository like Aptoide.

There you go, some food for thought.