My privacy journey started 4 years ago when i bought a Xiaomi mi band and while setting it up i saw something in the terms and conditions that they might send my health data to the cloud and might be reviewed by their team to “improve their products”, which somehow made me not feel at ease, i searched youtube for an alternative solution to evade the trakcking and to my luck i found Henry’s video talking about privacy of the fitness trackers and this is how my journey into privacy and digital minimalism started thanks to Techlore.
In these 4 years i was able to overhall most of my workflow focusing on Privacy First, Open Source approach with a digital minimalism in mind. HOWEVER i am also a social media specialist and video editor - my only means to make ends meet (you know - privacy nightmare platforms
) - so i had to compartmentalize as much as i can to separate my privacy invasive work from my privacy friendly personal life.
Here is my workflow:
Mobile Devices:
- iphone 13 for personal (removed all apple apps and only using necessary apps (Avoiding most closed source apps on it except banking apps) and simplified my iOS home screen following a video Henry shared about Simplifying w/Digital Minimalism: What’s on My Phone
really worth it 
- iphone 12 mini for work to compartmentalize (having all social media and analytics apps on it) but still using custom NextDNS and connected to another guest wifi channel meant only for work devices to be connected to.
- An old samsung phone for tinkering and testing new stuff (Fully debloated using Android Debloat GUI and using Trackercontrol to block unnecessary connections to the outside)
Computers
- Windows PC for work and personal - debloated using Chris Titus Tech tool (GOD SENT
), removed all microsoft apps using revo-uninstaller and using all open source alternatives including the calculator app
(Except Office
you know everyone use it workwise it is impossible to get rid of this though it is LTSC so i don’t have to worry about it), NextDNS with HaGeZi - Multi ULTIMATE and a huge list of manual blocklist to block windows and unnacasary creative cloud “INVASIVE” trackers - including windows firewall block rules. I also use bitlocker for all my drives for added security. - M1 Macbook air for personal use also using NextDNS as well with filevault disk encryption enabled
Browser:
- Brave is my main browser for both desktop and mobile - on desktop i use 1 Profile for work and 1 profile for personal
- Chrome for work things ONLY that don’t like brave and refuse to work
- Chrome installed inside a Sandboxie container without admin privileges (An open source sandbox software where you can install an app in a container on windows)
Privacy Softwares and Tools i use:
Open Source: Ente Auth - Mullvad VPN - Mastodon - Jellyfin - Finamp jellyfin music player for iphone and mac - Proton and Tuta Mail - Notesnook - Audiobookshelf - Calibre - SimpleLogin - NextDNS - Bitwarden - Signal - Onlyoffice - LocalSend - FreeFileSync - PCSX2 for PS2 games - Sonixd jellyfin music player for windows - Jan AI for windows - ImageGlass - ShareX - Screenbox Player - QuickLook for windows .
I hope my journey inspired you all and @Henry thank you so much for everything you are doing! Both for Privacy and Animals rights ![]()