One of my New Year’s Resolutions for 2022 is to minimize my Google footprint. In reality, it’s very difficulty to completely avoid Google products, if you include things like Google Analytics, Google’s cloud computing, and other services that we may not directly choose. But thankfully, there are many excellent, privacy-respecting alternatives to Google’s more well-known products and services. In today’s show, I’ll start with some of the most basic ones: Google Search, Google Chrome browser, and Android.

In other news: Google beats Apple to offering a way to disable insecure 2G cellular connections; people are selling “silent” AirTags that won’t beep to let you know they’re near (which could be better for stalking people); Facebook reported its first ever loss in subscribers along with a $10 billion loss due to people opting out of ad tracking; privacy advocates scored a huge win in the European Union against advertisers collecting and sharing your data; the IRS may be rethinking its coming requirement for facial recognition-based authentication after pushback; the FBI admits to evaluating NSO Group’s nasty Pegasus cell phone spyware; Kaspersky finds several serious vulnerabilities in wearable medical devices; and Google has abandoned its FLoC web tracking system for a much more privacy-respecting version called Topics.

1. EFF praises Android’s new 2G kill switch, wants Apple to follow suit https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/01/eff-praises-androids-new-2g-kill-switch-wants-apple-to-follow-suit/
   
2. Sale of ‘Silent AirTags’ on eBay and Etsy Raises Privacy Concerns https://www.macrumors.com/2022/02/03/silent-airtags-privacy-concerns/
   
3. Facebook lost daily users for the first time ever last quarter https://www.theverge.com/2022/2/2/22914970/facebook-app-loses-daily-users-first-time-earnings 
   
4. A Change by Apple Is Tormenting Internet Companies, Especially Meta https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/03/technology/apple-privacy-changes-meta.html 
   
5. Regulators find Europe’s ad-tech industry acted unlawfully https://www.engadget.com/european-union-gdpr-ad-tech-unlawful-iccl-iab-europe-125735068.html
   
6. Treasury Weighing Alternatives to ID.me Over Privacy Concerns https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-01-28/treasury-weighing-id-me-alternatives-over-privacy-concerns 
   
7. FBI acknowledges it tested NSO Group’s spyware https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/02/02/pegasus-fbi-nso-test/ 
   
8. Unpatched Security Bugs in Medical Wearables Allow Patient Tracking, Data Theft https://threatpost.com/unpatched-security-bugs-medical-wearables-patient-tracking-data-theft/178150/ 
   
9. Google abandons FLoC, introduces Topics API to replace tracking cookies https://www.theverge.com/2022/1/25/22900567/google-floc-abandon-topics-api-cookies-tracking 
   
10. De-Google My Life, Part 1: https://firewallsdontstopdragons.com/de-google-my-life-part-1/
    
11. Apple’s new Personal Safety User Guide: https://support.apple.com/guide/personal-safety/welcome/web 
    

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