Hi, I'm posting this because someone recently asked here and I've been steadily researching this for a few months now. So here's some of the options I found out about and would 100% recommend.

Don't let the amount of work scare you. If you are interested in this, take it step by step, one by one. Every little step away from being owned by these criminals is a huge W.

Ok, here goes:

  • X/Twitter: Bluesky or Mastodon. Bluesky is the more user friendly option and has more traction right now. De Standaard, VRT Nieuws en De Morgen are there. Mastodon offers you the choice of picking a server, this means all the data isn't centralised.

  • Meta – Facebook: just delete and don't replace, it's 2025.

  • Meta – Instagram: Flashes (Bluesky) or Pixelfed (Mastodon). These are the photosharing alternatives by bsky and mastodon.

  • Meta – WhatsApp: https://signal.org – non profit, open source, end to end encrypted and no meta data is kept.

  • Google – browser (chrome): FireFox

  • Google search: https://search.brave.com/search – I know ecosia is well known, but it really really sucks and it uses google and bing indexes. Brave is so much better and is the only search engine using its own index.

  • Google – mail: Proton mail. Open source, encrypted and respect for your privacy.

  • Google – calendar: Proton calendar. Same thing.

  • Google – drive: Proton drive. Same thing.

  • Google – Maps & Waze: There are tons of apps using https://www.openstreetmap.org. An open source map edited by the users. I personally use this combination:
    -> Magic Earth: this one has live traffic, so I use it in the car, works with android car etc.
    -> Organic Maps: the detail of the maps when you are off road is something that will blow you away. Google maps is only accurate where mickyD or starbucks are, openstreetmap will show you the hiking path you desperately needed to find.

  • Google – Photo's: Jottacloud. Green, GDPR proof, European alternative. I'm switching to this when my annual Google Photos sub is due, but it looks extremely legit.

  • Google – gboard: HeliBoard or florisboard. HeliBoard is great.

  • Android/iOS: https://grapheneos.org/ – I haven't went here yet, but it's on the list. There's a lot of info here: https://www.reddit.com/r/GrapheneOS/comments/12wzowt/my_ride_through_grapheneos_what_works_what_doesnt/

This list is not finite by any means, it's a work in progress.

Please us the comments, I'll update with extra info from you guys and I'll try and answer any questions.

by smaugdmd

19 comments

  3. Geef me eens een voorbeeld van een app dat het gehaald heeft op lange termijn en een wereldwijd gebruikte app van de troon heeft gestoten

  5. I prefer Tuta to Proton. I don’t like some of the things that Proton CEO guy said about the situation. They got deleted, since they realized it was blatantly stupid, but they were said… Tuta has the same mail – calendar – drive suite.

    As for Facebook, well, again, still, is the place where one finds everything about Leuze, or everything about BeWapp, and that sort of stuff. I’d work in migrating Leuze, if I had any idea where to. It needs to be a space with the ability to make your own pages, but also groups, this while usable by boomers. Would like to see examples from other cities.

    Map-wise, do you have anything that’s functional with cycles? Do we have like Waze but cycling?

  6. I Need the Facebook groups. My neighbourhood FB group has our elected representatives in it too, it’s a democratic tool. I, need it.

    But everything else you mention sounds wonderful, I have part of it in place already.

  8. Great tips here.
    In the name of both privacy & the rapidly worsening relationship with the us, i think its important totake a look a who you do business with digitally, step by step, and try to find non ethinically terrible alternatives.

    I have been on this train for a long time mostly in the name of privacy, and just general quiriocity for whats out there.
    This is where im at right now:

    X/Twitter: just deleted back in 2020, was never very active to start with.

    Meta – Facebook: big one for me but finally deleted in 2020, used a browser extention to export birthday calendar, informed everyone about other ways to contact me. Have barely missed it since, its horrible for mental health.

    Meta – Instagram: see twitter…

    Meta – WhatsApp: Signal.org 

    Google – browser (chrome): FireFox, i never even left them, been my only browser since 2009.

    Google search: left it all the way back in 2010, was ln duckduckgo for a long time, bjt have been teying qwant since a few weeks.

    Google – mail: Proton mail, made it about 5 years ago, spent 2 years slowly changing all of my accounts. Painfull process, but worth it 200%

    Google – calendar: Proton calendar

    Google – drive: i have set up my own locally hosted NextCloud instance about 6 years ago, that now does far more the google drive ever would.

    Google – Maps & Waze: tomtom go for car, organic maps for walking and biking.

    Google – Photo’s: nextcloud does this too.

    Google – gboard: anysoftkeyboard

    Android/iOS: still on android, but i have heavily modified it.

  9. Bestaat er een niet-Google Android versie voor Android auto? Want dat heb ik echt wel nodig.

  10. Firefox was decent until recently, but nowadays it’s just an alter ego of Google. Better use Librewolf then.

  11. Browser: Ik haat Firefox. Chrome (of Edge) werkt voor mij gewoon beter, vooral in professionele omgevingen. En Mozilla is ook gewoon een Amerikaans bedrijf.

    Mail: Mijn mail zit in Exhange Online/MS365 🙂 Maar opnieuw. Protonmail vs MS365….? Mijn eerste reflex was ´nee merci´ omdat MS 365 gewoon zo makkelijk is maar ik ga proberen om niet vastgeroest te zijn in oude gewoonten en Proton eens testen.

    Mobile OS: Een smartphone is voor mij als een auto. Dat moet gewoon werken zonder dat ik erbij moet nadenken. Ik koop het fysieke product, ik start het en veel meer wil ik niet doen…

  12. Where are the days that Google was a plucky little startup that was going to shift how the tech world worked and was going to save us from the evils of big tech like Microsoft.

    It did one of those things I guess.

  13. I’ve been using Firefox (sic) since Phoenix, but some people might have a problem with the fact that Google pays Fx to have Google as its default search engine. (Or don’t they do that anymore?) I’ve changed it to Startpage long ago, but that’s basically Google, so…

  14. I’m trying the best alternative for Google drive, getting a Synology NAS. It’s expensive to buy (new) but I’m stunned by the freedom it gives you!

  15. The thing that would be the hardest for me to drop is Google docs, sheets etc for collaboration. It works really well for the things I need to do and can’t imagine anything else replacing it. I did close my facebook last week, and am encouraging people to switch to signal. Not easy though, it’s standard for schools, clubs etc to have an ongoing Whatsapp group.

  16. zoek een gratis alternatief voor photoshop. ben nu geen professionele gebruiker maar heb geen zin om dagen uit te zoeken hoe het programma werkt.

  17. Plug for Kagi, alternative search engine. It costs money but it doesn’t serve me adds + I can raise and lower priority of sites.

  18. Similar discussion and initiative has been going on r/buyfromEU where a comprehensive guide has been released.

    At this point it’s available as a sticky note among other interesting additions, eg. an app and a browser extension that will help users to choose European services and products.

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