How do I stop using Big Tech products?

"But I use those products all the time, I rely on them. Are there really alternatives?"

Yes! And many of the changes are really easy to make. In the ALTERNATIVES section of this website we'll show you the best options.

The constant surveillance from big tech products is just so CREEPY 🤢 but we've got you covered by listing dozens of ethical alternatives on this site. The easiest way to start is to follow our Big Tech Walkout programme.

THE BIG TECH WALKOUT

🚀 RECOMMENDED 🚀 ➡️ Click HERE for links to the two phases of the programme

The Big Tech Walkout is the easiest way to ease into the process of moving away from big tech, step by step. It starts with simple ways to reduce your data footprint, then moves to alternatives. It's very beginner-friendly!

ALTERNATIVES: FULL PAGE INDEX

You can start working through specific alternatives at your own pace:

Product type	Spyware to replace	Link to our Alts page
Ad & Tracker Blockers	n/a	Link
Private Messaging	WhatsApp	Link
Search	Google / Bing	Link
Browser	Chrome / Safari / Edge	Link
VPN	WhatsApp	Link
Social Media	X / Twitter	Link
Social Media	Instagram	Link
Social Media	Reddit	Link
Social Media	Facebook	Link
News	Google News / MSN / Apple News	Link
Email & Calendar	Gmail / Outlook / iCloud Mail	Link
File Storage & Backup	Google Drive / OneDrive / iCloud	Link
Maps	Google Maps / Apple Maps	Link
Office Docs	Google Docs / Microsoft365 / Notion	Link
Notes	OneNote / EverNote	Link
Media Consumption (films, TV, music, eBooks)	YouTube / Netflix / Spotify / Amazon	Link
Video Calling	Zoom / Teams / Google Chat / Facetime	Link
Being Organised	To Do / Google Tasks / Trello	Link
Threaded Chat / Forums / Groups	Slack / Discord / Teams / Google Chat	Link
Laptop OS	Windows / Mac OS / Chromebook	Link
Mobile OS	Android / iOS	Link
Git Hosting	GitHub	Link
Web Analytics	Google Analytics	Link
Web Hosting	Squarespace / Wix / AWS	Link
File Sync	Google Drive / OneDrive / iCloud	Link
Database	Airtable / Monday.com	Link
eReader	Kindle	Link
Payment Systems	Stipe / Mastercard / Visa	Link
Other Alts	Various	Link

Ethical tech map

See where all the good stuff is made:

Ethical tech - what is it?

There are two options for alternative sofware that is not creepy:

1. FOSS - Free Open Source Software
2. Proprietary software with privacy-by-design features (such as E2EE)

FOSS - Free Open Source Software

Free means 'freedom', not 'free of charge', and refers to the licences that they release the software to you under. Even though it doesn't mean free of charge, a large majority of this kind of software is offered for free. In these cases they rely on donations to keep the lights on.

Open Source means that the code is available publically so anyone can study it to see how it works. This provides much needed transparency on the privacy side of things.

Open Source also means that members of the public can contribute to the software, either pointing out bugs, fixing bugs, helping with queries or coding new features

Proprietary software with privacy features

These products are not open source - their code is secret - but they have strong privacy features, for example Zero Knowledge Encryption (E2EE) and Zero logs policies.

Much of these proprietary products are also free, and rely on donations. Many are 'freemium' - they have a free entry tier and then you pay for advanced features. Some freemium products are the consumer version of a business product, in which case the business customers are subsidising the consumer customers. Lastly some of these products are fully paid services.

Next➡️ explore non-creepy options in the Alternatives submenus of the Change tab ☝🏼 e.g. start with Ad & Tracker Blockers

💡 If you would like to suggest a tech alternative for our lists, or provide a correction, please 📧 email us at info@rebeltechalliance.org

Want to skip straight to hardcore mode? ➡️ Learn about self-hosting