Act I — The Reckoning
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01
They Were Watching the Whole TimeI spent twenty years in cybersecurity tracking what adversaries do inside other people's networks. It took me an embarrassingly long time to look at what was happening inside my own.
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02
What Your Computer Is Doing Behind Your BackI went looking for the off switch. There wasn't one. That was the answer to a question I hadn't quite thought to ask yet.
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03
The Company That Knows You Better Than You Know YourselfI went looking at what Google had collected about me. Nothing shocked me. That, in itself, was the most unsettling part.
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04
You Are the ProductWindows collects data as a byproduct of a product you actually pay for. Facebook has no such separation — there's no version of the News Feed that isn't built entirely out of you.
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05
The Most Honest Liar in the RoomApple markets itself as the exception to everything in this series so far. In real, meaningful ways, that reputation is earned. It's also not the whole story.
About This Series
Escape Velocity is a sixteen-part series documenting one security professional's journey out of the commercial technology ecosystem — and what he found on the other side. New articles roughly every two weeks. The series eventually splits into two tracks: practical steps for general audiences, and a full technical migration for those who want to go further.
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