I created an infographic of privacy-forward alternatives to Google products…and would love your feedback.
Is it easy to use? Enough white space? Intuitive? Sharable? Is there anything I’m missing?
The infographic image in this post is NOT clickable. The link above will give you a downloadable PDF with working hyperlinks.
Re: the legend, “easy set-up/use” means either that this is a big part of the alternative product’s branding, or I’ve used it myself and found it easy.
Great list so far! I’d also like to recommend KSuite. They have email services and KDrive for storage.
I think I’m all set now,…but I will check this out and potentially add it to the website links page!
Nextcloud replaces Photo’s, Drive and docs.
And more
Oh, perfect!
Grr, I’m trying to sign up for an account to try it out and it keeps failing! I’ll try again later, it sounds even better than I thought.
Now make a EU version.
Maybe after this!
For news I would advice using the newstool MiniFlux.
MiniFlux
That looks awesome…but also complicated. I’m looking for things that, say, my mom could figure out. (She can’t understand how to copy/paste, but would like to leave the Google ecosystem.0 :) Maybe someone should create a similar graphic for more tech-savvy people?
Yeah, rss isn’t for everyone.
Organic Maps and OpenStreetMap should be listed as map alternatives. Mullvad Leta is a recently popular private search engine.
Google isn’t inherently bad; they are bad for privacy but good for security. For that reason, Chromium-based browsers such as Vanadium, Trivalent, or Brave Browser are still good alternatives to Google Chrome even though Chromium (which is the open source base for Chromium-based browsers) is developed by Google.
Also: the “T” in
PeerTubeshould be capitalized.Thank you, thank you, thank you! If there was one browser from my list you’d replace with Vanadium, which would it be?
Epic, only because I’ve never heard of it so it probably isn’t recommended often. I should note that Vanadium is only available on Android and is very difficult to install if you don’t use GrapheneOS. Trivalent is only available for a small subset of Linux distros (and comes preinstalled on secureblue). Brave Browser is cross-platform and recommended by GrapheneOS as an alternative to Vanadium if you want specific features Vanadium lacks.
Thanks! Oh yes, I knew that…I use GrapheneOS myself. I’ll check these others out.
What kind of security is google good for?
Chromium, as I mentioned, as well as the Android Open Source Project used as the base for GrapheneOS. Their hardware is also very secure, which is why it is used by GrapheneOS. Google Play Store is also one of the most secure app stores for Android, but one of the least private. This is where Google becomes a double edged sword.
osmand uses openstreetmap, its just a polished up android version. Most features I’ve seen in an open source maps app although I think they were trying to monetize some parts last I heard. openstreetmap on its own is unfortunately a pretty rough substitute for google maps in a lot of common areas (its pretty bad for even looking up addresses), but it is still useful
Isn’t Grayjay a frontend for YouTube?
Aha! Yes, it is. Any suggestions for non-YouTube video platforms?
Maybe Peertube or Odyssey.
Thanks!
It is. Same as NewPipe but they are using different extraction methods I think.
Any alternatives for Google Tasks?
Ooh, good question! It looks like Nextcloud has a tasks app. I can’t fit every product on the infographic, but may add this to the links website page.
It’s contacts syncing that I’m stuck on. Hoping to do something with a box running OMV but I’ve never come across anything so simple as Google Contacts 😔
I like it
Thanks!
nah With all respect, as a proton user, proton docs sucks ass. but that may change in the future
I see Ground News recommended all the time but for some reason i cannot trust it, idk why
I mean it’s heavily advertised by YouTubers. And basically everything that sponsors YouTube videos is a scam.
mullvad browser was discontinued but ironfox is an up to date fork
Thanks for the info!
Thanks for the info, I’ll check it out!
Are you sure it was discontinued? Mullvad is not Mull.
you’re right I’m trippin
I get these confused all the time.
It looks like Mullvad still exists …but last time I checked, it was free and now it’s around $5/month?
The capitalization for OsmAnd should be corrected. Please?
Of course! Thanks!
would you mind if i translate this to my language and use it as a poster?
What’s your language? Would the products.links still make sense to readers of this new version?
In any case, it’s fine with me as long as you’re not making. monetary profit from the poster. Also, will you please share a copy I can add to my website?
Also, I made a poster of a similar infographic I created several years ago when I owned a content studio…I forgot all about that and think I may do it for the English version as well! I can sell it at cost. A friend also suggested I turn it into a mouse pad.
korean. I might have to change a few things… I’ll be running some small local campaign at work about degoogling/free software etc and there are surprisingly very few good graphical contents I could find and this looks great.
I’ll get back to you if I actually get to use this. Thanks :)
Oh, very cool! Yes, do reach out if you decide to do it.
Y’all should probably stop mentioning proton
What’s wrong with proton?
The owner of Proton is publicly a Trump supporter. Never trust a company that publicly supports Trump (e.g. Proton, StickerMule, etc.)
Honest question, do you think Gail Slater was a good or bad choice?
I have no idea who is she.
She has a track record of going after big tech, which can be a bit surprising as she is a republican. People were surprised that Trump chose her. That’s what the whole origin of “Proton CEO is pro-Trump” is about. Trump chose someone who isn’t a friend of big tech, and the Proton CEO posted that it was a good choice. This article explains the whole thing step by step: https://medium.com/@ovenplayer/does-proton-really-support-trump-a-deeper-analysis-and-surprising-findings-aed4fee4305e
I know there has been some political controversy around them lately, and that for email Tuta is recommended over Proton Mail—I do mention both of these facts in DISENGAGE: Opting Out—and Finding New Options—to Reclaim Your Life from Spammers, Scammers, Intrusive Marketers and Big Tech, which I’m trying to promote through the infographic. But overall I’ve been happy with Proton’s suite of products as compared to the relevant Google products.
As someone who wants to drop Proton VPN and has stopped using their mail in favor of mailbox.org, I think we should still mention them, just with an asterisk. People deserve to make their own choice about if they wish to support him or not. At least it’s non-profit now.
I really wanna stop using the VPN and go to Mullvad (since they’ve proved they have no logs), but they don’t offer port forwarding anymore, and the only other option is AirVPN, which had a server seizure in 2015 that they didn’t want to disclose until like 2023… (gag order?)
I don’t torrent often, but I do occasionally…
If you dont torrent often you probably arent really needing port forwarding. I use mullvad and i torrent things all the time with zero issues.
How is mailbox? I just recently got proton set up with my custom domain and I kind of like it to be honest and their app is nice too.
I don’t do anything fancy, just use the light version with the email I made, and use anonaddy to alias for free. I use Thunderbird as a client.
It works, although the web app is kinda slow. If you enable MFA Tokens, instead of the password you made, you now type a PIN + TOTP code to login, which is dumb (They might be changing it soon). I know some have pointed out a security issue about flags or smth, specifically about how people can spoof your email and send messages as you. This comment specifically shows what tests failed and passed.
It’s cheap (Light plan is ~1€ per month) and allows easy one click enabling of PGP for webmail and encrypted sending (to mailbox.org users) but if you’re a pro you can do expert/customizable settings for those instead.
I just wanted something that was relatively private and secure, and will work with Thunderbird.
Maybe consider Posteo too, which has another lengthy post of Privacy.guides forums about whether it’s good or not.
Honestly, maybe I would move to Posteo due to the DMARC policy and MFA being iffy on Mailbox, but we’ll see. I use aliases to avoid too much spam anyway.
ETA: I thought you meant how do I like the Proton mailbox@! :D
I like it. The only issue for me is that the search is slow, but that’s because they have to compile all your data first…as opposed to Gmail, which already and always has access.
Another plus of Proton Mail is their masked email app. When I go to a site that asks me to enter an email, the app can create a masked email for me on the fly.
