How Linux Respects Your Privacy (And How Windows Does NOT!)

I often claim that Linux is better for privacy than proprietary operating systems like Windows, Mac, ChromeOS, Android, iOS, etc. Usually, I talk about the things that are hidden from view, like the spyware and keyloggers that Windows secretly uses. Today though, I'm going to talk about easy-to-see, tangible benefits of using Linux if you are concerned about privacy.

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[TheRandomFool]

Additionally, Windows will sometimes change your settings without your knowledge. After some patches, the privacy settings change.

[knick]

Quick correction: Android itself is free and open source. The different ROMs manufacturers fork from AOSP are often proprietary, but Android itself is free software.

[Prophet]

Linux respecting privacy is one of the best aspect of it.

[nERVEcenter]

I've found this argument falls on deaf ears for most people. They don't care if their very operating system is phoning home with their private secrets. It's unsettling.

[pdr.]

I completely replaced Windows with Linux back in late 1995 and have never looked back. I actually blame MS for holding back the industry decades from what it could have been (mostly because of IE), but my bitterness aside, I'm super happy that DT is still working hard to bring people over to a better place, and having tangible results! Keep it up, dude!

[theodorealenas]

Mac: pay with money
Windows: pay with yourself
Linux: pay with a promise to contribute

A lot of people don't realize ads and tracking are payment, and they assume certain products are free. Well you're free if you (might) contribute! That's what FOSS is.

[abdellatifdev]

Talking from experience, linux improves productivity too

[shatterstone]

"Do you want candy crush ads in you OS" had me rolling...

[Zesuto]

I was running Fedora since 2008 and then Arch since 2012 on my laptop but I was sticking to Windows on my workstation, but with Windows 11 I just couldn't take that level of intrusion anymore, I made the switch to Arch on my workstation and it's almost perfect, I can say with full confidence that I made absolutely no compromises to my workflow. Shortly afterwards, I ditched Arch on my personal laptop for OpenBSD precisely because of its privacy and security focus; it's more oriented towards server implementations but it also shines as a dedicated internet browsing OS on a separate physical machine. From the outside and once you're fully accustomed to it, it's nearly indistinguishable from something like Gentoo or Slackware.

[patrxgt]

"You need Gmail account, if you want to activate your phone"
*Laughs in LineageOS*

[StaceyAyodele]

Another awesome video, DT.
I switched to Linux a couple months ago and I haven't looked back. Fedora Workstation Edition on my ASUS TUF GAMING F17 runs smooth as butter. My favorite games on Steam run with Proton and I'll never need Windows again. I'm free from Microsoft's clutches and my computer is mine.
With Windows, your computer isn't yours. As we've seen with the release of Windows 11, Microsoft can decide your computer is told old to run the latest Microsoft Spyware and thus you're stuck with a computer that loses support in 3 years.

Linux on the other hand runs on anything, and runs faster. I'm so glad Linux exists!

[Szowisz]

Privacy is one of the reasons why I switched to Linux

[toaster]

Thank you for making videos like these! Privacy concerns have become such a real problem as we have increased our usage of the internet. Its scary how much data corporations collect on their users. It was really eye opening for me when Microsoft decided to make it mandatory to have a Microsoft account in order to use Windows. Your operating system should never have to be tied to the internet in order to work. When I learned of the mandatory online accounts with Windows 11 I decided it was time to give Linux a try. I've been using GNU/Linux for about 3 months now and I've had a fantastic experience. I don't ever plan on moving back to Windows. Fun fact I was doing some research and it turns out Windows 10 sends telemetry data to over 10, 000 Microsoft APIs. That is down right scary.

[KoltPenny]

Thought I was subscribed but turns out Youtube was showing me your videos just because I was binging them lol. Subscribed now.

[terrydaktyllus]

I'm 100% a Gentoo Linux user and I run it on "any old cr*p" when it comes to computing devices - the only hardware that I buy new is storage and I gave up on AAA games about 10 years ago because I am not participating in "games as a service" for overpriced, buggy, derivative and DLC-ridden crap being churned out by games companies - I therefore don't buy many graphics cards either.

One thing I have noticed recently on eBay is the prevalence of really cheap 4GB DDR3 and DDR4 memory DIMMs and SODIMMs being sold by many, many people. This is at the time when "normies" are being encouraged (forced?) to upgrade to Windows 11.

As most PCs have two memory slots in them, the assumption therefore is that even 8GB RAM is now not enough for a Windows PC - hence people selling old 4GB modules to upgrade them to 8GB (or bigger) ones. Windows "experts" that I have spoken to have told me 16GB RAM is the practical minimum RAM on a Windows PC now if you then take into account games and heavier applications running on top of it.

By comparison, even the heaviest Linux OS probably only ever demands around 1.5GB RAM before you start running anything else, an extremely light desktop that still has a few network services running in background can run in about 200MB.

If a Windows OS needs that much RAM even before you do anything else with it, then there is some "spooky sh1t" going on in the background in terms of rifling through the contents of your PC and reporting it all back to Microsoft.

Note also that the "success" of Windows Defender as a malware defence tool on WIndows is specifically down to "the Microsoft hive mind". That application is in constant communication with Microsoft Central sending file signatures back and forth in order to build up malware databases extremely quickly. Ultimately, Windows Defender is a case of "the more it does for your security, the less it does for your privacy" as it gives itself full access to all of the files on your computer.

Normies really should be taking more notice of this nonsense.

[nekotoo]

Great video, I switched to Linux around a year ago and distro hopped quite a bit until I landed on Arch Linux. Just until a month ago I was using arch Linux, but I decided to switch to NixOS. It works very well with my relatively new hardware (AMD RX 6500 XT) and I really have not had many problems other than with proprietary applications not working very well with pipewire screen sharing.

[VasiljMilosevic]

In most Android implementations you can skip signing in with Google account. you don't have access to play store then, it will keep you reminding to do so and stuff, but you certainly don't need the account.

[felipeaires]

I'm new on Linux and recently found your channel. Nice video, man. Greetings from 🇧🇷.

[bantymech]

Should make this as a best Linux video on YouTube.
Nice video DT.

[brads]

Privacy and the ongoing issues with updates breaking things finally drove me away from Windows.