Migrating is such a good feeling. You don't have to do it all at once, either: I migrated to fastmail over the course of several years. Each time google did something that got my blood pressure up I went into my password manager and migrated another account. In aggregate it was a hassle, but these days I almost miss the feeling of being able to do something in response to stinky actions from google.
I don't think fastmail is going to help you. They are subject to legal requirements too and probably American jurisdiction also despite what their particular position is. https://www.fastmail.com/blog/fastmails-servers-are-in-the-u.... People love to hate Google but they're just doing what any corporation subject to law is going to do.
> It has been pointed out to us that since we have our servers in the US, we are under US jurisdiction. We do not believe this to be the case. We do not have a legal presence in the US, no company incorporated in the US, no staff in the US, and no one in the US with login access to any servers located in the US. Even if a US court were to serve us with a court order, subpoena or other instruction to hand over user data, Australian communications and privacy law explicitly forbids us from doing so.
They can say what they like, and I am a customer, but in hand-wavey generalization terms one should be aware that Australian law enforcement has excessively broad access to telecommunications data on request and a long history of doing the bidding of the United States. Carriers are forced to retain your data for 2 years.
Under TIA Act provisions (such as s180), an authorised officer of a criminal law‑enforcement agency can authorise access to prospective telecommunications data [metadata only; not whole messages] if satisfied it is reasonably necessary for investigating an offence punishable by at least three years’ imprisonment. (In other words, ~any time they want)
Example: the data‑retention regime’s records were being accessed over 350,000 times a year by at least 87 different agencies, including non‑traditional bodies such as local councils and the RSPCA [pet cruelty nonprofit].
Given Australia's population is only 28M, that means roughly 1 in every 80 people gets communications metadata pulled by their own government annually.
Yep, I am a fastmail user, born and live in Oz. I just assumed that this data would be collected either on this side or via the US servers. Also, we are still a part of the 5 eyes alliance.
In addition to what the sibling comments say, this also puts Fastmail at risk of having their US based service suspended while they attempt to resist government overreach (were they to attempt to do so) which is really not a lot better for their users.
I wasn't looking to dodge US jurisdiction, I was looking to dodge "our craptacular moderation AI had a brainfart when reviewing your account and now you are locked out of your life."
I recently migrated off of my legacy "Google Apps for Your Domain" (now Workspace) account to a mix of self hosting and a regular old vanilla gmail account.
It was a real eye opener to experience how challenging it was to move my data from one Google account to another. Takeout is nice in theory, but there is no equivalent "Takein" service that accepts the data form import to another Google account in the format produced by Takeout! I naively assumed "Export Google calendar from here, import same files to there" but nope, that did not work at all. Maps data was even worse.
I've migrated everything from Google except for Google Voice. I have yet to find an alternative that can match the feature set and ease of use, regardless of the cost.
I have one page with my full history of text messages, full transcription of all voice messages, contacts information connected with every number, and I can search everything. I can configure which of my phones ring.
And, possibly most importantly to me right now, my current phone has only a data connection and I make and receive calls using the Voice app. I think SIP eats too much battery and data and doesn't work well for wifi<->lte switching, but it's been a long time since I used it much.
I'm not sure what the OP does, but at least for me I find myself chained to Google Voice for SMS 2FA use because it's basically the only phone number provider that cannot be exploited with a sim swap attack (same deal with Google Fi). And while I don't necessarily trust Google, their account security is leagues ahead of anyone else imo.
I previously looked at jmp.chat but they didn't really inspire confidence on the security front.
My use cases include 2FA and I like the added security that Voice provides, but it's not really added security, it's just moving the risk from your cell provider to Google. IMHO, Google does security better than the cell providers do.
I like the muti-platform integration of Voice. I use it on my iPad, on my Android phone, and mostly from my desktop. It works well on all platforms.
When I'm at home, I mainly use my VoIP phones. GV forwards to them, and they spoof my GV numbers when I make outgoing calls.
I like the spam text and call protections that GV provides. I believe they're partnered and integrated with Nomorobo.
I also have jmp.chat. It has capabilities that GV doesn't have, but it's not well integrated. (I use Cheogram on my Android phone, but there's no easily usable client on my iPad, or my desktop.)
I don't like they way they've made it harder for me to see what they actually offer vs. what I offer myself (with my FreePBX VoIP client). I wish they would (maybe on a separate page) show the capabilities of their SIP trunk. E.g. Does it support SMS? Does it support video calling? Does the client require a static IP? Etc.
Anticipation of stories like this are why I didn't rely much on Google 20 years ago.
Never used Gmail other than as a throwaway account.
Went many years before I had a Youtube account. Finally made one to upload some videos. I am normally not logged in.
(OK, OK - I was more concerned with them suddenly charging for a "free" service, as well as selling data to commercial enterprises than with them giving to the government).
Does anyone else remember Epic 2014? It was a video made years ago that speculated about the future of the internet and media, with the end game being personalized news written by a computer. The timeline is off but the brand names are mostly the usual suspects. Rewatching it now gives me this uncanny feeling.
Edit: People are not understanding the humor in the question. I implied I predicted this reality 20 years ago, and he's asking for another prediction 20 years out.
