I appreciate the intent of this message, but how sure are you that federated social media like Lemmy is really any safer than Reddit? Not much on here is encrypted, to my knowledge, and instance admins need to respond to subpoenas just like anybody else… In the event of hostile government action, you’re much better off communicating on E2EE platforms, and unfortunately, posting on public social media platforms is a risk.
You can mitigate much of that risk with a burner email and VPN, but you can do that on other platforms too.
The decentralized nature of federated social media is the only advantage it has. But it’s kind of a wash. The big social media platforms have resources and weight they can throw at resisting state level surveillance. The operator of the Mastodon instance you sign up for probably doesn’t have a lawyer on retainer let alone the army of legal experts Facebook or X could throw at the problem. That said you can always change instances or use multiple ones to begin with.
Sure, there are things you can do to be safe on Lemmy/the fediverse, but most of those things aren’t inherent to the platform, they’re just good safety practices, and most importantly none of them are mentioned in this “PSA” about “safety”.
I don’t disagree with you. Realistically if you’re serious about security and a state level actor is in your threat model, you probably shouldn’t be using social media at all, but especially not platforms that focus on followers and public posts rather than one-on-one or small group connections. At least not for day to day usage.
I don’t know a lot about this. If the United States wants to subpoena records from an instance admin based outside of the United States, do they have to comply?
I think it’s pretty murky, ignoring a subpoena is a crime, so US may be able to charge them with obstruction and request extradition, it’s then on their home countries to decide whether to accept the US’s requests. Either way I’m sure it would make them ever traveling to the US very tense.
See: Julian Assange
Remember though, these instance admins are generally doing this out of the kindness of their heart on shoestring budgets, it’s so much safer and easier for them to just comply with legal requests. They’re nice people, but not political martyrs.
For extradition, you’d first have to know who the instance admin is.
I don’t think foreign ISPs will (or are even allowed to) react to a US request for information.
So the US would have to request that info from the foreign country’s government via diplomatic channels.Thanks, that makes sense. I wasn’t sure what to even consider for that kind of thing, but I do recognize these admins are just ordinary folks.
Mainstream social media track and identify in non-obvious ways such as browser fingerprinting. If you’re on a federated open source social media site then there’s none of that. If you use a VPN (and if you can’t afford one, Proton offer a free tier) or Tor browser to mask your IP and you’re using a non personally identifiable email address that goes a long way towards protecting yourself.
Beyond that, never posting identifying info about yourself such as the place you live, including the State, will protect you even further.
But I do agree that using an E2EE service is the best way to communicate.
Centralized platforms are much more dangerous, the various FOSS federated platforms are auditable and don’t contain inherent spyware. You can also use certain sites as a proxy, or start your own VPS+lemmy instance to use as a secure proxy for yourself. The restrictive nature of sites like reddit means they can ban you for taking basic security precautions, which they do regularly.
I generally agree, but that is not conveyed in your image, it just (basically) says “come to Lemmy, you’ll be safe”. There are critical extra steps you should take if you’re worried about safety - this just feels more like an advertisement.
If you’re reading this I’d recommend against joining the ml or hexbear chat groups
Please join the actual Blahaj Matrix group instead as it is moderated by Ada
Blahaj Sidebar:
We have a public matrix channel for all Blahaj users at #blahaj:chat.blahaj.zone
If you’re looking for the support channel, rather than the general chat channel, you can find it at #blahaj-support:chat.blahaj.zone
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Are you yet another cis person coming into trans spaces to fearmonger about other trans spaces and why certain trans people are ‘the good ones’? Just wondering, because that would definitely be transphobia.
Rich of you fuckers to talk about brigading when you’re deliberately sending other admins into this thread, likely from an admin chat. You don’t even have pronouns displayed anywhere, which is the bare minimum for supporting trans people online and normalizing showing pronouns.
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Are you cis? And yes, they are safe and have done more things for trans people than you will ever do, and this concern trolling is ridiculous.
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We can continue this conversation in DMs if you wish but your ‘concerns’ are not welcome here and contribute to an atmosphere of hostility towards trans communities on the fediverse.
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Sounds like nazifur donkeyshit to me
“You won’t find a community there” uhhhhhhhhhhhh, the instance census proved that was a lie
You are simply lying, it is very easy to find a community in hexbear’s trans spaces.
Their regular trans megathread is there right now if you’d like to partake instead of lying about trans people.
it’s so fucking frustrating and upsetting seeing people like you speak over trans people, lie about us, and erase us when it’s inconvenient for you constantly like this. you are seriously a massive piece of shit
Yeah i’m sure the majority 49% of users are simply using the minority 51% of users as a shield to dunk on YOU specifically.
Whether you like them or not, they have very useful mutual aid groups that have funded a lot of HRT, rent, etc for trans people. One trans person got hit by a hurricane and needed assistance with rent for 2 months and it was paid in full. Without their help, that person would have been homeless.
I mean this is great except for hexbear and .ml, wtf lol
Hexbear has a really large trans community with a lot of mutual aid work. Are you trans?
When I first checked Lemmy this morning, I quickly found three threads from trans communities full of people afraid for their freedoms and even their lives because of the results of the eletion, and another that was a circlejerk about how the election didn’t actually matter. That’s pretty much it in a nutshell.
edit: To clarify, the dismissive circlejerk was on lemmygrad. I actually think lemmy.ml isn’t bad, just a mixed bag sometimes. Lemmygrad.ml is significantly worse, and Hexbear is worst of all. Don’t go there for anything but vibes-based politics that will sacrifice any ideal and any person if it means they can be smug (as smug as the worst liberal) on the internet.
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These are all large trans spaces, and Hexbear has a couple of impressive mutual aid groups thats helped many trans people.
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These are all large trans spaces, and Hexbear has a couple of impressive mutual aid groups thats helped many trans people.
Why not share c/trans over c/transgender? It’s way more active.
Its a good point, tbh. Maybe should have included it too but I scrambled this together when a couple people asked me for stuff
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Lemmy lacks the resources to protect anyone; use things that we already have, like tor, instead.
Tor is a good choice, yes, but most normal people aren’t going to use that daily. It should absolutely be used for purchasing things like DIYhrt though.
Ah… well… the Tor Project currently receives funding from the US Department of State, and has in the past received funding from DARPA and the US Naval Research Laboratory… (Tor sponsors list)
the federal government currently accounts for well over half of the Tor Project’s overall funding.
Privacy group demands answers about government’s influence on Tor
Just fyi
Relatedly, lie frequently and believably on the internet. Bots and potential doxxers don’t deserve the truth and others will benefit from your efforts in poisoning the well.
Aye.
Lemmy itself is inherently public.
People should be careful what they post anywhere online, including here.
Don’t doxx yourself peopleThe “no takesies backsies” rule of the Internet applies 100x on decentralized platforms like Lemmy, since anything you post is being broadcasted to tons of other instances which can do whatever they want with the info. When you ‘delete’ something on the fediverse, all you’re doing is politely requesting every instance that received the content to remove it.
Also rotate accounts regularly, using different information in each one.
Afaik revolt.chat (real Discord alternative) has a trans community as well.
Install Linux on your computer, install GraphineOS on your google pixel phone or lineageos on any other android phone, get a VPN (Mullvad is the best choice), always encrypt your communications, always encrypt your data (some distros support full disk encryption), find people you can trust, and most importantly be careful.
i recommend Privacy Lock to force entering credentials to unlock the phone if you drop it or shake it, and don’t use fingerprint so you can’t be physically forced to unlock it
Joined the matrix. Not trans, but I’ll support all of you and spread the good word.
edit: they kicked me after I said I wasn’t trans, even though I support them. Oh well.
Its a trans group chat, its for trans people. Public facing communities like this one are fine to converse respectfully in. If you do know trans people, be sure to spread the image around.
Please don’t take it personally as there are other groups who do welcome allies, the community is a bit worried at the moment, I’m appreciative of your support!
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There are already states with laws to tattle tale on suspected trans individuals. Now the people behind that will have control of supreme court, senate, and likely house majorities along with the presidency to carry out their bigotry. Privacy is an always important thing, especially if 51% of the population of your country just put a giant target on your back.
Of course, you don’t seem to have ever interacted with this instance so coming here to dismiss people’s concerns is not a great look.
PGP!!!
