Good points. Yes, I do prefer to give an instance at least the benefit of the doubt. Difference tho really with Fediverse is you have to search and follow stuff to see it. It does not get inserted into your feed through ads or people playing the algorithms. So generally I’m only seeing what I follow. I suppose we do need to choose our instances wisely. Certainly, if an instance (not just a user on it) is really spamming or impacting on other instances, I suppose there can be grounds to block it. But we have not all been spammed yet by Threads. I don’t like Threads (cancelled all my accounts years ago) but I left a few good friends and family there that I would like to reconnect with, and follow them. I also like that my metadata stays on the Fediverse side, so I don’t need a Threads account or their app tracking me.

I just would not like to be denied the option to even reconnect with my family and friends. Same goes for WhatsApp interoperating on Signal protocol - I have many friends and colleagues I left behind on WhatsApp, and would like to reconnect again with them.

Especially when any individual can decide themselves to block Threads or Lemmy.

I agree 100%. I don’t need someone else overriding my existing right to decide whether I want to block or not (where is that going to stop). Anyway, I connect and follow individuals, not their whole instance. I’m not going to see anything from Threads unless I choose to follow someone. And if any friend reboosts stuff I don’t like (from Threads or anywhere else) I block that “friend”.

A lot of speculation that does end with this in the article:

"After discussing her case with experts, Matsapulina now believes her Telegram messages may have been compromised by a form of spyware. When she was told that a hacking device would need to be physically nearby to infiltrate her phone, a memory resurfaced: At times before her arrest, she had noticed an unmarked truck with a dome on its roof parked outside her building. She had even jokingly mentioned it to friends on Telegram. Now, she remembered, as the police were banging on her door that morning, she’d spotted the same mystery vehicle parked outside. By the time the police stormed her home, the vehicle was gone.

Matsapulina has since started using Telegram again."

Most messaging apps are vulnerable on the client side with spyware, no matter what E2EE exists along the way.

It stands for Long Range, so would otherwise have been LR.

I’m reading this on Boost (once off payment) and no ads…

Brave Search

Paid Proton Mail with my own domain name and own PGP keypair. Although it now has a way to securely search mail, I use the bridge service to allow Betterbird mail to sync my mail to my PC for searching.