Phone audio/video recording took over the topic at hand. Let’s bring it back.
I suggest attending regular meetups, conferences, hackathons, trainings etc, regardless of where they are geographically located, that are either relevant to privacy or tangential (privacy activism, privacy tech, digital rights, human rights, Luddite clubs, groups that practice opsec, Linux, FLOSS, security, cryptocurrency, freedom etc).
If you do this, you may make friends there who happen to live in your area. Alternatively you may become online friends with some people you meet, and either you visit them or they visit you whenever possible.
If members on this forum who want to make friends and are willing, they could disclose their own general location (or disclose what events they attend regularly) to give other people opportunities to make friends.
But it’s a significant challenge for people who want privacy to make friends. Even with the above suggestions, you will find many people who couldn’t bear being without their phone for longer than a few minutes, or people who will treat you unfavorably for wearing a mask. Results will vary.
Any app on Android (and pretty sure on iPhone as well) using the mic will trigger a blue/green icon in the notification top bar. So if you see it, just tell them an app is recording the microphone. It probably depends on where you live, but in Europe I would say the majority are privacy-sensitive, just to differenf levels.
Also, background microphone access is very very limited on both Android and iOS. So the likelihood of you being recorded is quite small, especially if their phone isn’t used actively. (@Expert4870 already talked about that)
To find privacy-conscious friend, you probably need to find more friend overall. Or go to privacy conferences or devs conferences.
I’d try not to make “privacy” the first filter for friendship. Local Linux/FLOSS groups, repair cafés, libraries, parenting/school tech groups, or digital-rights meetups can be better starting points because there is already a normal shared activity. Then privacy comes up naturally as one practical habit, like Signal for a small group chat or helping someone set up a password manager, instead of feeling like a test people have to pass.
Right, a local repair cafe collaborates with us every month in the same timeslot, so I handle the advanced and tougher use cases while everyone else deals with the installation/setup procedures.
Back on topic, this is a really underrated answer. There’s also a minor juxtaposition in finding people who take measures to not be found, but groups and in-person meetups that focus on shared interests that may naturally exist above / below / around privacy-related interests @nubeovejita27 mentioned would be a great start. I would try Meetup.com and Luma.com for IRL events in your city and keep trying different events until you run into interesting people who happen to have similar or shared interests.