Currently, the bill would require electronic service providers — companies that provide cloud services, messaging apps, social media platforms, email providers, companies that provide internet services, video game platforms, AI systems, as well as smartphones and smartwatches — to build surveillance capabilities into their systems meant to be used by law enforcement and national security agencies. The bill would also compel service providers to retain the metadata of its users for six months.
Yeah I hear this all the time here. It all sounds good but means nothing in the end. Our lives are so intertwined with US and foreign tech this is not even possible anymore. All your records are out there, regardless of what you do. Your license, your medical records, your movie watching history. You’re recorded daily on CCTV and other people’s smart phones. Your friends and family spend a ton of time curating your images in social media for you and telling people what you are up to. So while your comment is technically correct, all you end up doing is making your life harder to get that medical advice or search for that dream job. Your smart TV is recording you right now. Your VPN is still owned by a for profit company that can be compelled like any other company. Working in tech for 29 years, I have seen companies just freely hand the RCMP and even US law enforcement whatever they wanted, without a warrant. So we either stop using tech altogether or we stop lying about how safe the precautions you listed are. They are not safe. They present the illusion of safety.
Make better choices.
My media watching history is entirely my own. My smart TV doesn’t talk to the internet. My VPN can not identify me because it does not have any identifying information. It’s not easy but it’s not impossible.
The point is not to be invisible to the government it is to let them have the low value data and keep your truly private data private.