Join us 2025-12-26T22:00:00Z for This Week in Privacy #33, to catch up on the latest Privacy Guides updates and to discuss trending news in the privacy space.
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Question for PG staff hosting this week: would love to know your 2026 privacy goals and tech resolutions if you have any?
Embracing more digital minimalism? Tightening/enhancing your threat model in line with how bad some things are becoming? Moving to desktop Linux full time? Or something else?
It’s worth noting, the headline on the article is a bit misleading on the Google article, the police DID HAVE a warrant. True, it was not specific to Kurtz’s data but a warrant for a large swath of data.
From the Ruling:
“In a subsequent investigation into Kurtz’ crimes, the Pennsylvania State Police (“PSP”) obtained a search warrant for a substantial quantity of Google’s records and thoroughly examined them.
The records revealed Kurtz’ Google search for K.M.’s address.”
I have been reading Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport. He mentions how companies like Meta will spend billions of dollars trying to keep people as long as possible on their platforms. It makes me wonder, how do these companies make money off keeping people as long as possible on their platforms? For instance, if I were to use Facebook with Ublock Origin in a privacy respecting web browser, how can they make money off me?
I assume the primary way that Meta makes money is by constantly spying on their users and then selling that data to data brokers and advertisers. Maybe it is just me not understanding something. I haven’t been using Facebook for a couple of years personally.
This still doesn’t block Meta ads can they? I don’t use it so can’t say how it looks on the platform but can it fully block the ads?
Meta has multi billion user base. They can afford to make many billions and also spend billions to ensure users stay on their platform.
There is so much info and many videos out there that talks about this and I won’t even begin doing the topic justice if I explain it here. Also, there’s so much to say here. I recommend researching how Meta makes money. Caution: it will make your skin crawl.
