Privacy

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A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

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Does VPNs even work against Big Brother apps? Using one really protects our privacy? (masking our location) (lemmy.world)

submitted 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) by PrivacyWayFinder@lemmy.world to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

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I am currently using Proton VPN (free tier) which is set to Always-ON and Block Connections on disable.

Today while I am going through my Gmail security option, on the devices/sessions I found my real location mentioned over there. Even when I use desktop I always connect to VPN.

On this issue I got couple of doubts:

Is this because I am using a free tier VPN? so it's not functioning properly etc...
Else google fixed my location based on my previous location history? I used my google applications without VPN for many years, I am just learning & following privacy tips recently.

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[–] dogsnest@lemmy.world 15 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

There are many ways Google (and many others) know what you're up to and where you are besides your internet browsing history.

It's called metadata, and John Hancock can be proven to have been "in the hood" when the Declaration was signed....

GPS, wifi, cell pings, your neighbours, friends, their histories, their meta.

If you're concerned about hiding your browsing history from a peer, a vpn is fine.

If you want to swat someone, then maybe not.

[–] PrivacyWayFinder@lemmy.world 4 points 5 months ago

Thank you for enlightening me.