Virginia Police Routinely Use Secret GPS Pings To Track People’s Cell Phones
The nonprofit online news site Virginia Mercury investigated their state police departments’ “real-time location warrants,” which are “addressed to telephone companies, ordering them to regularly ping a customers’ phone for its GPS location and share the results with police.”

Public records requests submitted to a sampling o … ⌘ Read more

i was speaking with @prologic@twtxt.net recently who mentioned, like myself @off_grid_living@twtxt.net prefers not to have a phone number (and possibly a phone).

this raises a bigger question. can you, a netizen of the world survive sans phone?

let’s loop through reasons why one needs a phone in 2022 (and my responses to each):

• social media: nope.jpeg
  
• banking: if your bank supports mfa via email, or better yet totp/secure tokens nope.jpeg
  
• friends: most are on signal, twtxt, session, threema, irc
  
• family: don't have any, but if i did, session or salty(once it's finalised)
  
• work: fvck em
  
• doctors: they can send an email
  
• car repair: i do my own
  
• online shopping: nope.jpeg
  
• in-person shopping: get rekt
  
• government: fvck em too
  
• pharmacy: email me
  
• significant other: don't we spend too much time together?
  

what am i missing here?

@mckinley@twtxt.net very reasonable and i don’t disagree with your tactics. my own view is less about tracking and more about not being distracted. in a world where attention can be currency, i try to preserve it. i do have a mobile, but there’s no sim and it’s a glorified messenger when i don’t want to lug my laptop around.